Remembering NASA Disasters With an Eye Toward the Future 273
mattnyc99 writes "This next week marks the anniversary of three sad days in NASA's history: three astronauts died in a capsule fire testing for Apollo 1 exactly 42 years ago today, then the Challenger went down 23 years ago tomorrow, followed by the Columbia disaster six years ago this Super Bowl Sunday. Amidst all this sadness, though, too many average Americans take our space program for granted. Amidst reconsiderations of NASA priorities from the Obama camp as the Shuttle nears retirement, then, the brilliant writer Chris Jones offers a great first-hand account in the new issue of Esquire — an impassioned argument against the impending end of our manned space program. In which camp do you fall: mourner or rocketeer?"
Robots in Space (Score:2, Interesting)
NASA should stick to what it's so good at doing: sending robots into space.
We meat bags should stay on Earth where we belong.
Re:I was thinking about this the other day... (Score:5, Interesting)
Without shooting people into space, we'd never have known about how fast bone mass decreases within just a few weeks.
Of course there are other technologies and issues that have cropped up that have impacted your life that were either a direct or indirect result of the various space programs. For a list go here! [spacetechhalloffame.org] Some include scratch resistant lenses and cochlear implants.
Re:Rocketeer (Score:1, Interesting)
Or traffic accidents, let's unman traffic. From what I have seen astronauts are aware of the risks and still dedicate their whole lives to the cause. I'd go, if NASA would take me. I'd even go in January!
23 years ago? (Score:3, Interesting)
Wow. I remember it like it was yesterday since I was in high school in NH at the time. I was at a boarding school and was in my dorm room waiting for the cafeteria to open for lunch when a friend came in and told me he'd heard about it on the radio. We turned on my radio and listened for a while before heading down to lunch. I guess I looked really shocked because one of the women in the serving line asked me if I was ok. I said that the shuttle had just blown up and she just laughed and said something like "oh, very funny". I snapped back at her to turn on a radio if they had one in the kitchen then went out to find a place to eat. I came back about 15 minutes later for seconds and the same woman was extremely apologetic. My friend and I then went to the student center where there was a projection tv and it seemed like 90% of the students were standing around silently watching the news coverage.
Re:kill NASA (Score:3, Interesting)
Wait a minute. The Falcon 1 has not, yet, delivered humans anywhere.
Re:January ... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Danger isn't the problem (Score:4, Interesting)
This should be the number one objective of ALL space programs on earth:
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/070919_sps_airforce.html [space.com]
If it's going to scale out, it should have solar energy collectors in a solar orbit. They should beam the energy to one of three geostationary satellite floating above the Earth. Those satellites should beam the energy to receiving stations in Brazil, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Indonesia, at which point they should be fed into the global power grid.
This would allow us to increase production for hundreds of generations of mankind, simply by adding additional solar energy collectors.
It won't be easy, but it only has to be done once.
Re:Lesson 1 - Mod parent up :) (Score:3, Interesting)
The US is a huge economy, even when it's tanking. There really isn't any reason not to fund NASA on a reasonable, sustained budget. That would go a long way to being able to make rational choices as to how to apportion money to the various aspects of space exploration. And it isn't even a matter of diverting funds to / from environmental issues. Who put most of the satellites that we're using to measure the planet up? NASA. How do you improve planet wide models of heat distribution (and hundreds of other issues) - you go somewhere else and explore other environments. Who does that? NASA.
Sure, they're bureaucratic, inefficient, wasteful and slow - but it is a complex human endeavor so what do you expect.
A better piece in Esquire and one linked to TFA is a short, humanistic blurb by Buzz Aldrin [esquire.com]. Says it better.
Re:Economic stimulous? (Score:2, Interesting)
Consider that most of what NASA builds is done by US workers it is a great way to inject money into the economy. Buy a US car and you find 47% of it is made overseas. Buy a one of a kind satellite and 99% of the cost is for American products and workers.
Consider also these engineers etc. typically work at slightly less than competitive salaries in other sectors you are getting a lot for the dollar.
Re:Danger isn't the problem (Score:3, Interesting)
This quote from a piece by aerospace engineer Rand Simberg from a couple years ago lays out the issue well, I think:
http://www.transterrestrial.com/?p=15913 [transterrestrial.com]
Which really gets to the point of the matter. Our national reaction to the loss of a shuttle crew, viewed by the proverbial anthropologistâ(TM)s Martian (or perhaps better yet, a Vulcan), would seem irrational. After all, we risk, and lose, people in all kinds of endeavors, every day. We send soldiers out to brave IEDs and RPGs in Iraq. We watch firefighters go into burning buildings. Even in more mundane, relatively safe activities, people die â" in mines, in construction, in commercial fishing. Why is it that we get so upset when we lose astronauts, who are ostensibly exploring the final frontier, arguably as dangerous a job as they come? One Internet wag has noted that, âoe...to judge by the fuss that gets made when a few of them die, astronauts clearly are priceless national assets â" exactly the sort of people you should not be risking in an experimental-class vehicle.â
What upset people so much about the deaths in Columbia, I think, was not that they died, but that they died in such a seemingly trivial yet expensive pursuit. They werenâ(TM)t exploring the universeâ"they were boring a multi-hundred-thousand-mile-long hole in the vacuum a couple hundred miles above the planet, with childrenâ(TM)s science-fair experiments. We were upset because space isnâ(TM)t important, and we considered the astronautsâ(TM) lives more important than the mission. If they had been exploring another hostile, alien planet, and died, we would have been saddened, but not shocked â" it happens in the movies all the time. If they had been on a mission to divert an asteroid, preventing it from hitting the planet (a la the movie Armageddon, albeit with more correspondence to the reality of physics), we would have mourned, but also been inured to their loss as true national heroes in the service of their country (and planet). It would be recognized that what they were doing was of national importance, just as is the job of every soldier and Marine in Iraq and Afghanistan.
What those who criticize Dr. Griffinâ(TM)s decision to move forward with the launch are implicitly saying is that the astronautsâ(TM) lives, and the vehicle, arenâ(TM)t worth the mission, and that they have, in fact, infinite value relative to it. Every month that we delay the return to flight costs hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars, with an army of shuttle technicians sitting around, their skills getting rusty (which brings its own risks). Moreover, no matter how much more time and money is spent in trying to reduce the risk, âoesafeâ will always be a relative, not an absolute term. If completing the station, if finishing this particular mission, is worth anything, itâ(TM)s worth doing sooner, rather than later, so we can sooner free up the resources for more adventurous activities that are (or at least should be) perceived as being worth the risk of life. Paul Dietz, a frequent commenter to my blog, has noted that if we really wanted to indicate national seriousness about opening up the space frontier, we would, starting right now, with great fanfare, set up a dedicated national cemetery for those who would be expected to lose their lives in that long-term endeavor, and provide it with lots of acreage.
Those who fear to risk the lives of willing, volunteer astronauts are really saying that there is nothing to be done in space that is worth the risk. This is, of course, a symptom of the fact that even with the announcement of the presidentâ(TM)s new policy two and a half years ago, we still have never really had a national debate, or decided what weâ(TM)re trying to accomplish on the high frontier. Until we do, decisions will continue to be driven by pork, politics, and emotion that have little to do with actual
Re:Danger isn't the problem (Score:3, Interesting)
NASA 2008 Budget: $17.318 Billion
The federal government throws this amount of money around all of the time. Heck, lately it's almost a rounding error with all of the spending going on. To put this in perspective, $8 billion dollars is currently earmarked for "state and tribal assistance grants" in the new stimulus package coming out. (see this spreadsheet [google.com]).
What are the gains? When the Apollo program was running it caught the public's fascination. It made an entire generation of kids that wanted to be astronauts. It made "rocket scientist" become part of our nomenclature and synonymous with "really smart guy". And most importantly, it spurred an interest in engineering and the "hard" sciences (math, physics, chemistry). The knee-jerk response of today's youth is that these subjects are too hard and not fun enough. And so the US is losing engineers and knowledge workers and replacing them with massage therapists [worldnetdaily.com]. How many people in 1965 thought that the best job in the world would be to work at NASA? How many think that now? (or for that matter, how many think that ANY engineering job would be ideal for them?)
In addition to inspiring the public to idolize something besides the latest Hollywood tabloid, the space program made numerous technological and engineering breakthroughs that we are still benefiting from tremendously today. The difficulties of doing even simple things under the constraints of space exploration force tremendous ingenuity and resourcefulness that the nation then benefits from as a whole.
For those who have never been there (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Danger isn't the problem (Score:3, Interesting)
The first electric generator gave few clues to the enormous ones powered by exotic fuels we have nowdays that supply entire nations with electricity around the clock. The electric generator however was a very simple construct that you could improve on your own provided a small capital.
Space programs on the other hand are enormous projects requiring equally enormous capital investments with a very long period before you see any real money from it. Right now it's mainly sattelites that make up commercial money in space, but there is a definite interest in space. The price tag is a bit prohibitive but as long as spacetravel is in demand for someone we'll keep up improving it.
In the end however it may be too early to pump in wast amounts of money in the program as the general technology level can't really supply what would be needed for a properly extensive space program.
Space is safe... (Score:3, Interesting)
Seems if you're an astronaut, the safest place for you is in space.
NASA Has a Short Memory (Score:2, Interesting)
GOOD NEWS: My copy had markings showing it had once belonged to the NASA library.
BAD NEWS: it had been discarded to a thrift store before the Columbia accident, where some of the same mistakes were repeated.
Re:ROI is a red herring. (Score:2, Interesting)
With the mutual threats of anthropogenic and natural ecological disasters that could wipe out all life (or at least all human life) on earth, the elephant in the room is that we could face extinction if we don't expand beyond our birth-planet in time.
But one question that nobody has been asking (with the possible exception of the writers and producers of Battlestar Galactica) remains: is humankind worth saving?
If our descendants do manage to escape certain (eventual) doom on this world, will they just go to other worlds and wreak the same havoc on them? Or will we, in the process of expanding our knowledge and abilities toward the goal of colonization of other worlds, solve the problems we face here at home? Some other possibilities: 1) We won't make it in time. Humanity dies out. God rolls a new character and tries again. 2) Only those (pick at least one) smart, fast, strong, adaptable, short, hairy, radiation-resistant, or horny enough will succeed in colonizing space and other planets, and will create a new race quite different from humanity as we know it. 3) Human bodies will be deemed unacceptable for existence in space, and will be replaced with some other form (mechanical, bionic, cylon, who knows?) which will then colonize space and other worlds with yet another race very different from humanity. 4) None of the above.