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Space Science

Shuttle Set for Launch on Dec 18th, Says NASA 335

Posted by michael from the getting-back-on-the-horse dept.
Tony J Case writes "Just a quick note for you guys - According to space.com, NASA's target date for the next shuttle launch is Dec. 18th, with a whole bunch of new guidelines."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Shuttle Set for Launch on Dec 18th, Says NASA More

Shuttle Set for Launch on Dec 18th, Says NASA

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  • New Guidelines (Score:5, Informative)

    by frieked ( 187664 ) * on Friday June 13, 2003 @10:51AM (#6190759) Homepage Journal
    The new guidelines:
    No night launches for the foreseeable future.
    So they can see any stuff that falls off better.
    A revamping of mission management from the ground after a shuttle crew takes off.
    So when bad stuff happens, someone actually does something about it.
    Jettisoning the external tank during orbital daylight.
    So they can see any stuff that falls off better.
    And under consideration:
    Limiting shuttles to flights to the International Space Station or the Hubble Space Telescope.
    So they can see any stuff that has fallen off better and so they have a place to stay when bad stuff happens.
    Keeping a second shuttle on standby when a sister ship launches.
    So when bad stuff happens and someone actually does something about it there's a way home.

    To me it seems like most of these new guidelines are things that should have been taken care of before any accidents happened. Did you know that foam has fallen off the "bipod" of the shuttle's tank "on at least six other shuttle missions." Why was nothing done about this previosly?
    Hopefully now they'll be willing to put the extra effort (read money) in that it will take to make space flights safe(r)
    • Didn't NASA used to keep an extra shuttle on standby? IIRC, they always had one active launch and one cold backup that could be prepped in a very short period of time. When did this change?

      • Re:New Guidelines (Score:5, Informative)

        by 0123456 ( 636235 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:04AM (#6190895)
        "Didn't NASA used to keep an extra shuttle on standby?"

        No. There have been occasions when there were two shuttles on the pads simultaneously, but there's never been an active requirement to have a second ready to launch... more normally, there's one on the pad and one a month or two away from being ready to go.
      • It has been said that a second shuttle which would normally have taken a couple of months to prepare could be readied in a bit over a week but the launch would then be another massive risk as the normal procedures would be by-passed.

        Whether NASA has any plans for a standby for the future remains to be seen but it could prove extrememly costly to always have the next shuttle immediately ready.

    • Re:New Guidelines (Score:5, Informative)

      by 0123456 ( 636235 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @10:58AM (#6190831)
      "So when bad stuff happens, someone actually does something about it."

      They did do something about it. They asked the engineers if it was a safety problem, and the engineers said "No".

      "So when bad stuff happens and someone actually does something about it there's a way home."

      Yeah, provided you're willing to risk another orbiter and its crew to fly up there, crossing your fingers that whatever bad stuff happened to the first shuttle won't also happen to the other one. Though if you're going to lose the first shuttle anyway it doesn't really matter what happens to the second once since the shuttle program will be dead, dead, dead whether it's left with one or two orbiters.

      "Why was nothing done about this previosly?"

      NASA were developing a fix for the problem, which would likely have gone into place sometime next year. No-one was ignoring the problem, it just wasn't considered to be as high a priority as fixing the numerous other problems which haven't destroyed a shuttle yet.

      Incidentally, I was under the impression that the only launch possibility at or around Dec 18th was a night launch, so if they have to launch in the day, they can't launch then.
      • They did do something about it. They asked the engineers if it was a safety problem, and the engineers said "No"

        The engineers said there 'might' be a problem and it needed investigation. The beauracracy said 'No Problem' to the point of cancelling the engineer requested satellite image gathering.

    • You forgot the most important guideline:

      No blowing up before, during or after flight

      Jeroen

    • Re:New Guidelines (Score:5, Interesting)

      by EvilTwinSkippy ( 112490 ) <yoda AT etoyoc DOT com> on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:01AM (#6190860) Homepage Journal
      Note: they aren't fixing any of the actual problems. They are going through painful steps to make it look like progress. Some of these steps sound like the "Hightened Security" measure at the airport.

      While I am all for a manned space program, it's time to stop flying the shuttle. It's a white elephant, and the costs of keeping it up in the air are siphoning money out of developing its replacement.

      And note that they aren't even discussing the 40 pound bolt fragment [yahoo.com] that periodically comes off the SRB's.

      • Re:New Guidelines (Score:5, Informative)

        by dpilot ( 134227 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:16AM (#6191029) Homepage Journal
        It isn't that simple. Stop flying the shuttle so we can fund a replacement, and I'll wager that the saved money finds its way out of the NASA budget, and the replacement is never developed. ie- the US manned space program would stop until political pressures push us back into it, and then it would most likely be another limited single-goal effort like Apollo.

        Of course if the single-goal was to match a sustainable moon base, I just with "they" would start applying the political pressure.
        • That way we can find a black monolith on the back side of the moon. 10+ years late, but hey at least we would find it :-)

        • Re:New Guidelines (Score:3, Insightful)

          by simong_oz ( 321118 )
          then it would most likely be another limited single-goal effort like Apollo.

          No, this sort of effort will never happen again, for one very simple reason - it was absolutely staggeringly expensive (at the time). Most people point at Apollo and say how much was achieved (which I'm not disputing), but few people realise just how much money was spent to put a man on the moon. I remember reading (sorry, no ref) that at the height of the Apollo program (which lasted for quite a few years), it was costing about 5

          • Re:New Guidelines (Score:3, Informative)

            by starman97 ( 29863 )
            From the NASA web page:
            "After the last lunar landing, total funding for the Apollo program was about $19,408,134,000. The budget allocation was 34 percent of the NASA budget."

            This was from 1963 to 1972, in 1969 the US population was 200 million. Divide cost of program by number of years and population and you get...
            $1 /year*person , or about 0.295 cents a day

            The Vietam War cost somewhere between 100 and 140 (1970's) Billion $, 50,000+ american lives, 200,000 South Vietnamese military lives, 500,000 civili
        • Actually, NASA has funded multiple replacements for the shuttle. They just never seem to get anywhere with them because the insist on developing stuff a "project" at a time, instead of a "technology" at a time. Take the X-33. In one project they were simultaneously developing the Aerospike engines, composite fuel tanks, and a radical air frame.

          All failed because unexpected delays, manufacturing problems, and cost overruns caused research to take a back seat to budgets. I'm reminded of the Navy not willing

      • Re:New Guidelines (Score:3, Interesting)

        by rusty0101 ( 565565 )
        Until they have a better platform, they will probably continue to use the shuttle.

        Perhaps if the open source movement were to desing and implement a shuttle replacement, we might have a working replacement faster than if NASA were told they have to come up with a cheaper faster replacement.

        For those thinking of suggesting that Soyuz would work, might I remind you that every Soyuz capsule is a one time use vehicle. Even when everything goes right, it doesn't get re-used. It has no airlock, so either everyo
        • Perhaps if the open source movement were to desing and implement a shuttle replacement, we might have a working replacement faster than if NASA were told they have to come up with a cheaper faster replacement.

          Working on it: Xprize [xprize.org]

      • Re:New Guidelines (Score:5, Informative)

        by FatAlb3rt ( 533682 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:20AM (#6191069) Homepage
        they aren't fixing any of the actual problems

        Thank you Dr. Nasa. At least you made your ignorance known first thing. The CAIB report [www.caib.us] should be out next month - that's what will address the constraints to flight.

        Steps are currently being taken to correct the ET foam issue, the weld on the SRB bolts have too low of a factor of safety so a fix will be incorporated there, and procedures are being generated and analyzed for on-orbit TPS inspections. I'm sure there will be other recommendations - more technical stuff and maybe Nasa cultural type stuff (civil servants vs. contractors w/r/t program duties).

        Please, don't pass off your ASSumptions as fact. Sorry for the rant, but it rubbed me the wrong way.

    • Re:New Guidelines (Score:5, Funny)

      by Lev13than ( 581686 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:02AM (#6190875) Homepage
      Limiting shuttles to flights to the International Space Station or the Hubble Space Telescope.
      So they can see any stuff that has fallen off better and so they have a place to stay when bad stuff happens.

      Dunno about this one. IANARS (I am not a rocket scientist), but I suspect that even a damaged shuttle would be safer for re-entry than riding back in the Hubble.

      • Re:New Guidelines (Score:2, Interesting)

        by cybercuzco ( 100904 )
        IAARS, and the reason the limit it to the station and the hubble is because the hubble is a masive PR booster for NASA : Look what human in space can do, see we can service this telescope that takes all these pretty pictures. Not that I think thats a bad thing, since working on SM3b paid for my summer living expenses for 3 summers.

        • Re:New Guidelines (Score:3, Interesting)

          by jafuser ( 112236 )
          The cost was insignificant to anyone who is/was floored by this picture [nasa.gov]. Anyone who looked at that image for the first time and did not feel the hair stand up on the back of his/her neck (or some equivalent response) probably does not possess adequate intelligence to express a rational opinion on federal spending.
    • I can't agree more. I think these guidelines are shoddy at best. Their approach is fixing things that have gone wrong before. They don't seem to be taking into consideration other scenarios. If a piece of foam can damage the shuttle, there have to be much bigger problems that haven't been looked at yet. A teardown and redesign of the shuttle should be the next logical step. Finding potential problems and fixing them before they happen is the step to take, logically.

      What they've basically done is walk
    • "Limiting shuttles to flights to the International Space Station or the Hubble Space Telescope."

      So they can see any stuff that has fallen off better and so they have a place to stay when bad stuff happens.

      Yeah, because and that crew aboard the Hubble is probably getting bored of just looking at each other all day.

    • If limited to the ISS.... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by reality-bytes ( 119275 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:21AM (#6191076) Homepage
      Its going to make the shuttle one incredibly expensive taxi service for the ISS.

      When the shuttle launches equipped to dock with ISS, it has an ammount of its payload bay consumed with the docking adapter.

      If the shuttle is used for the originally slated US module launches, this would indicate a valid use (although still very expensive in comparison to a Soyuz module launch).

      Now, here's my thinking. The Shuttle was a severe compromise of an originally good system (Flight launch Horizontal TakeOff and Landing) but ended up with the return vehicle pointlessly (and expensively) attached to an SRB+LOX rocket system.
      NASA is now likely to resume using the Shuttle - apart from anything this is quite political with China probably joining the elite club of nations who have launched people into space later this year. What NASA ought to be doing is saving the pennies by retiring the shuttle - not neccesarily immediately, but soon and putting out to tender a contract for a brand-new cost-effective launch system.
      The new system could be based around the original Ho.T.O.L concept which was mean to be the Shuttle.

      At the same time, NASA can be doing lots of new research into aerodynamic re-entry to safeguard lives in the future (FYI 2 aero-re-entry incidents to date - 1, X-15 and 1, STS).

      The major sticking point is simple: The U.S. government would have to get their wallet out!

      • Mixed feelings (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Colonel Blimp ( 642760 )
        Mixed feelings on this, the shuttle has to go, but till we pull our heads out and get something better (and vastly more simple) we are stuck. I worked with Commander Rick Husband's brother, who is an Airline Captain. Rick made a few visits out to our hangar and did some great PR after his first shuttle flight. By all accounts, he was a fantastic guy and a great ambassador for human spaceflight. We all followed the progress of his flight, and I was stunned when I saw the footage of the accident. These a
        • All I ask is that if the America Government wants to put brave astronauts into space merely as a political device, they give maximum support to NASA, funding and otherwise.

          They must give future astronauts the best chance possible; money should be no object. After all, space-flight is not safe and Astronauts should not be treated as expendable.
      • Did you even read the article?

        The shuttle is not going to be used as a "taxi service for the ISS"

        They are just suggesting that it be limited to the same orbital plane as the ISS so if something catastrophic happens there is a better chance of getting to the ISS and surviving.

        I see noting wrong with a little safety here.
        • And, answering my own question here, I bet you did read the article. Sorry. I read it on the BBC news site first and confused the two articles.

          If anyone is interested, this [bbc.co.uk] article is more descriptive of the changes proposed.

          The relevant quote:
          "Another important change will be that space shuttles will, with one exception, only fly in orbits that allow docking with the International Space Station (ISS) so that astronauts can use it as a refuge in case of an emergency." (emphasis mine)
      • It's not just acting as a taxi. It would be lifting the remaining parts. We (Russia included) do not currently have another heavy lifting vehicle that can loft some of those big modules -- only the shuttle has the capability.

        You're about to say, "So, build a big unmanned rocket!" Well, the design, construction and testing of the unmanned system would take almost as long as a new shuttle. So, it's either continue building with the shuttle, or abandon the ISS.

        • FACTs on ISS module launches (Score:4, Informative)

          by reality-bytes ( 119275 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @12:41PM (#6191840) Homepage
          The Russian Energia Booster [russianspaceweb.com] (in current production) can lift 100 ton modules into LEO - this against the shuttles 30 ton payload.

          Russia has already launched the major modules Zarya and Zvesda using the Proton launch system.

          ESA is also in the future slated to launch a private module using the Arianne 5 launcher

          It is feasable (but undesirable) that the ISS could be completed without further use of the Shuttle (Although this would require a gigant re-think) Perhaps US modules could be sent to Baikonur with HeavyLift [heavylift.co.uk]
    • I think we should cut NASA's budget to punish them for the previous accidents and demand more from them in the future.

      Money!
      Hahaha.
      What could we do without it?
      Nothing! Hahahahaha!

      We're so stupid.

  • Good (Score:2, Insightful)

    by JohnnySkidmarks ( 607274 )
    And I hope they never stop. No matter what disaster strikes or how trgic it all seems at the time. Hopefully they are looking at new safer technologies at the same time though.
  • Fixed the whole wing thing. Bit embarrasing for it to happen twice!!

  • Good. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Schezar ( 249629 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @10:52AM (#6190772) Homepage Journal
    I really can't believe they're actually resuming Shuttle flights. I was worried that we would bury our heads in the sand for a few years like we have after similar accidents in the past.

    I'd still like to see an actual, cheap, reusable space vehicle though.. The shuttle isn't so hot on that front (no pun intended).
    • Unless a method unlike our rockets is developed, a cheap vehicle for leaving the earth is impossible.

      It is unrealistic until we gain alot more experience, to expect space travel to be safe. All that can be done is try to minimize risk. Those travelling should be fully informed as to the dangers. I doubt many astronauts expect it to be fully safe.

      Space travel is too important to mankind not to pursue it, even at great expense and some loss of human life. Congrats to them on keeping the shuttle going

      • Re:Bubba Say Aint Gonna Be Cheap (Score:5, Interesting)

        by rusty0101 ( 565565 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:31AM (#6191151) Homepage Journal
        One thing to remember is that most of our rocket technology is based around getting ICBMs off the ground, and over the horizon. In other words they are designed around high thrust to weight ratios, and fairly high G forces.

        There have been a few other concepts for rockets, including variable thrust and SCRAM jets, (for the in atmosphere portion at least) that do not have the same requirements for thrust to weight, and can be less costly to operate.

        Another observation is that there are several alternative launch mechanisms that do not require nearly the volume of fuel that the current mechanism does, as they launch from higher altitudes, or from launch platforms that are already moving in the direction they desire the orbiter to go.

        As far as space travel being safe, it is neither safe to stay in bed, nor to get up. And that's without leaving the planet. That's part of life.

        -Rusty

    • Re:Good. (Score:3, Interesting)

      by cybercuzco ( 100904 )
      Thats because NASA has pretty much ceased to be a reasearch agency as it was originally intended (back in the NACA days) Nasa stopped doing step by step research (research one tech, then one based on the first one, then one based on the second one, etc) and moved to an all up vehicle design (build the entire vehicle with lots of new tech on it) because that was cheaper. The problem was if one tech failed, the whole vehicle was a pile of scrap. Now nasa contracts out to companies to design vehciles, funds

  • Excellent (Score:3, Insightful)

    by stanmann ( 602645 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @10:52AM (#6190776) Journal
    Last time we lost a shuttle, it took almost 10 years to recover, this time we are pressing on. Smarter harder and quicker.

    Lesson Learned moving on now.

  • The best memorial (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Cat9117600 ( 627358 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @10:53AM (#6190785) Homepage
    Continuing to fly the shuttle,l and explore space is definitely the best memorial they could ever give to the people on Columbia.

    • Re:The best memorial (Score:5, Insightful)

      by The Grey Mouser ( 14648 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:28AM (#6191130)

      Continuing to fly the shuttle,l and explore space is definitely the best memorial they could ever give to the people on Columbia.

      Not to sound unsympathetic, but we've explored low-earth orbit pretty well by now. Truth be told, the shuttle program has been a solution in search of a problem for many years now. Little to no publishable research has come out of the scientific experiments undertaken on the shuttle flights. The scientific experiments on the last Columbia flight were essentially meaningless. This is common knowledge to most folks in the industry, and is approaching the level of an inside joke.

      I'm beginning to think that NASA is stuck in a rut regarding the space shuttle. Shuttle launches are still extremely expensive (which was the whole reason that they were developed in the first place), and have a miserable rate of return, irrespective of whether your metric is scientific of economic. The best reason for keeping the shuttle around now is to support the ISS. Given the anemic state of the ISS (to put it kindly), this raison d'etre is starting to evaporate.

      I'm a huge supporter of NASA, and the concept of manned space exploration, but I'm starting to see the shuttle program as an enormous leech, diverting resources that could be used to further the R&D and space exploration at the heart of NASA's mandate. They keep launching shuttles though, accomplishing precisely bugger all, and no one in this organisation seems to be thinking about where to go from here (this is not true, of course, but one could be forgiven for thinking so). I wish it were otherwise, and I wish that NASA could reclaim the vision that gave us the Apollo program, and the Viking, Voyager, Mariner
      and Pioneer-series probes. Galileo and Cassini are steps in the right direction, but ultimately I think NASA must either terminate the shuttle program, or apply it towards a real program of research and exploration. Zero-g nematode growth just isn't worth the lives of seven humans.

      Cheers,

      Mouser

  • Just a thought... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Jedi Holocron ( 225191 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @10:56AM (#6190806) Homepage Journal
    Strap on a couple of extra SRB's and get rid of the damn external tank and it's foam. It's a bloated piece of equipment anyhow. And the SST main engines don't really do much for getting the SST into orbit anyhow.

    Yes, this is a gross oversimplification, but I think it's a valid topic point without getting into the gross technical details of how to implement it.

    Okay, so now you have to deal with the newly reported explosive bolt problem....but still...it seems like a better idea to me than riding atop a giant tank of liquid hydrogen and oxygen.

    • Re:Just a thought... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by andreMA ( 643885 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:03AM (#6190884)
      Without getting overly technical, that's not feasible because it's necessary to have a significant percentage of the thrust be variable and steerable. While the SRB nozzles can gimbal a bit, the thrust is totally predetermined. Also, I don't see sitting next to huge steel cylinders of ammonium perchlorate/aluminum powder as being safer than the cryogenic gasses used by the SSMEs. There was much resistance at the outset of the shuttle program to using solid fueled boosters on a manned vehicle, and those concerns are still valid. No, I'm not a rocket scientist.
    • Actually the Soviets had a better idea: build the engines into the fuel tank. Of course they abandoned their shuttle after a few flights. They found the concept WAY too expensive.
    • The reason you have been modded as "funny" (for those who think this is a serious post) is because your idea is truly funny. The SRB's are probably the most dangerous part of the STS. They are just a big tube of uncontrolled fire, and when you light them, they burn until they burn out. The could burn out normally, like in 114 of the flights, or they could burst, like on one of them. Even if the techs has seen the plume of smoke coming out of the shuttle at liftoff, there was nothing that could be done.

      A bi

    • Re:Just a thought... (Score:4, Informative)

      by rand.srand() ( 243903 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:41AM (#6191249)
      The purpose of the SRB's is to get the shuttle above the atmosphere and escape drag. After they fall away the shuttle is still something like 5000 m/s away from orbital velocity (which itself is 7000ish m/s), but the relatively "weak" main engines don't have to fight the atmosphere.

      Even more, the last 20% of the fuel is really what kicks the shuttle along. They have the full power of the engines, but nearly all of the boost weight is gone. The thing boogies whereas on the ground they couldn't get the shuttle off the pad.

      The external tank, main engine set up is one of the more amazing accomplishments of the shuttle design, without it the "land like a plane" would never have happened.
    • That is exactly what Buran was all about. Just not solid fuel boosters.

      A real laucnher. Energia, bless it.

      Unfortunately they do not make them any more. Actually it may be cheaper for NASA to order some from the russians, then to continue this external tank+halfbaked solid fuel abomination.

      After all ESA ended up buying Soyuz launchers (OK they call it cooperation but this is what it is for all practical purposes)

    • Re:Just a thought... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by superdan2k ( 135614 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @01:01PM (#6192083) Homepage Journal
      Oh yeah, that's about the brightest idea I've ever heard. SRBs should have NEVER been rated for manned spaceflight...once they're running, they're running, and that's it. No throttling. No kill-switch. You wait until the propellant is gone.

      As for the SSMEs not having much to do with getting the orbiter into space I say this: uhhhhh, what?

      Here's a great site [nasa.gov] that explains the physics of the SRBs. Before this page gets Slashdotted to hell and back, I'll recap what it says: each SRB produces 3.3 million pounds of thrust, and each one weighs 1.3 million pounds (191,000 pounds dry-weight, plus 1.1 million pounds of propellant). That means the combined pair can lift about 4 million pounds. The shuttle itself weighs 171,000 pounds (empty, with engines), and the external tank weighs 66,000 pounds. So with a little rounding off, you can add 3.75 million pounds to the stack before you have an equal balance between thrust and weight (which will get you nowhere near orbit). The aforementioned external tank carries 1.3 million pounds of liquid oxygen and 227,000 pounds of liquid hydrogen. More neat rounding brings us to 1.6 million pounds of fuel, 2.15 million pounds remaining. Let's assume the shuttle is carrying its max payload -- 63,500 pounds. Leaves us with 2.08 million pounds.

      So:
      Booster Stack Weight + Fuel: 4.52 million pounds.
      Thrust of SRBs (combined): 6.6 million pounds.
      Resulting Thrust-to-Weight Ratio: 1.4.

      By comparison, a F-15 has a thrust-to-weight ratio of 1.19 [nasa.gov], giving the shuttle a 15% advantage, when using SRBs alone.

      That's right. I haven't forgotten about the SSMEs. When run at 104%, they provide an extra 488,000 pounds of thrust each. That's an extra 1.46 million pounds of thrust. Thus, our 4.52 million pound stack now has a 8.06 million pounds of thrust, resulting in a thrust-to-weight ratio of 1.78, or a 66% advantage over the F-15. Note that these figures are assuming that the SSMEs are run at 104% from ignition (which they're not), but also bear in mind that as the shuttle burns fuel, which it does as a prodigious rate, the overall weight of the stack is reduced while the thrust remains constant, so as the vehicle climbs, it's thrust-to-weight ratio improves, and continues to do so after the SRBs are cut loose.

      Now, IANARS (RS = Rocket Scientist), but it seems to me that if we want to scale up the SRBs so that they alone can carry the shuttle into orbit, the weight of the propellant is going to exceed the maximum thrust of the SRBs before you can get enough propellant for the entire burn into orbit.

      What I'm trying to say is this: leave the rocket science to the rocket scientists.

  • New guidelines? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by NetNinja ( 469346 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @10:56AM (#6190808)
    When so many people are at fault, nobody is at fault.

  • Better uses (Score:5, Interesting)

    by flez ( 463418 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @10:56AM (#6190811) Homepage
    Maybe they should think of some better uses for the shuttle than literally shuttling stuff back and forth from the ISS.

    It's time for something new and exciting.

    • Re:Better uses (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Drakin ( 415182 )
      Takeing an outdated peice of equipment and doing something new and exciting with it? While it's fine to do here on earth, because you can always walk home, but in space?

      That's ass backwards. When you have something that's so old, you set it doing the simple stuff, while you send the new stuff to do the new and exciting.

      Though, to do something truely new and exciting, you'd probably either have to go further out into space, or strat landing on the moon again and starting a base there.

      We need new designs

  • yay (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Lxy ( 80823 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @10:57AM (#6190824) Journal
    Disagree all you want to, I'm just happy that the space program was not ended.

    Fly on, NASA.

  • exploding bolts (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Potor ( 658520 ) <farker1&gmail,com> on Friday June 13, 2003 @10:58AM (#6190833) Journal
    discovery.com is just now reporting a new problem with the shuttles; the force of the exploding bolts that detach the boosters has been found to be too close to the strength of the dome that catches them. they predict that this will ground them further.

  • Needs Another Seven Astronauts (Score:4, Interesting)

    by arth1 ( 260657 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @10:59AM (#6190843) Homepage Journal
    Perhaps it's time for NASA to take a look at how the Russians handle things -- their track record for the last 25 years is much better. At least no fatalities, and guess who had to step in when the US didn't dare send up another shuttle to rescue the stranded ISS 'nauts.

    Regards,
    --
    *Art
    • I'm curious, how DOES Russia handle things?

      In my lifetime I've seen two space accidents. I've seen hundreds of missions flown. I'd say our percentage is pretty good (99% if they've flown only 200 missions in my lifetime, which I find hard to believe). How often does Russia fly? How many astronauts per flight? How do their numbers stack up against ours?

      • Re:Needs Another Seven Astronauts (Score:4, Interesting)

        by arivanov ( 12034 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @12:00PM (#6191439) Homepage

        If we count the entire soviet + russian space programs we are talking at least 10 times more manned flights, at least 100 times more time in space. Losses AFAIK were all in all 3+2 in two accidents. There were rumours of several more but these have never been confirmed so we can so far assume that it is what says on the label. And that stacks up.

        If we are talking about people on board - shuttle crews are too bloody big. Period. A decent spacecraft should be able to take of and land automated (as the Buran did). And require two people at most to run.

        Also, the shuttle leaks like there is no tomorrow and its life support system sucks rotten eggs through a thin straw. IMO this, along with the absurdly big crew is actually the primary reason for the disaster. It could not stay in orbit a reasonable amount of time even if a check showed a problem. So nobody even considered a check to be a reasonable option.

        Also, Russia (in those days SU) handled Buran launches on a platform that did not require ugly hacks like strapping foam coated fuel tanks and uncontrollable solid fuel boosters. Also AFAIK the original design for the first stage of Energia assumed a controlled descent and reuse. And until there is a reasonable platform for a horisontal take off launching on the back of a real launcher is the only right way to launch a reusable vehicle.

        So all in all: US needs to buy (or redesign its own for carrying large off-balance loads which is not easy) some launchers useable for strapping a shuttle to them and buy (or license) some proper life support systems. After all the superiority of the latter was admitted for the ISS and the ISS runs with russian life support. So sticking to the 20+ year old crapper (literally) used on the shuttle is outright stupid.

        • A decent spacecraft should be able to take of and land automated

          Uhhh, the shuttle does. If you read any of the reports about the columbia accident, you would know that the flight profile showed the automated system trying to compensate for extra drag on the left wing just before contact was lost. IIRC there has only been 1 manual landing of the shuttle.

          So sticking to the 20+ year old crapper (literally) used on the shuttle is outright stupid.

          But its cheaper. Redesigning all the systems on a 26year ol

      • Russia has lost crews (dunno how many men. no more than 3 each) on reentry I think. One accidently vented his air to space (the capsule landed automatically) and one had a heater failure and had an ice cube for a parachute... impacted siberia at about 400 mph.

        The SU has had some spectacular failures on launch (big boosters make big explosions), but supposedly no deaths on launch.
    • Are the Russians really a good model? Think of everything that was going wrong on Mir toward the end. And remember how long it took them to find the last capsule that landed? There may be a certain amount of luck in that "no fatalities" datum.
    • That might have something to do with the russians just trying to get it done without lots of payouts. They use relitivly cheap and simple rockets not a grossly overcomplicated shuttle.
    • In soviet russia, the shuttle rides YOU!

    • Re:Needs Another Seven Astronauts (Score:4, Insightful)

      by lostchicken ( 226656 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:44AM (#6191271)
      Well, had a Soyuz TM broke up on reentry, we would have rescued the ISS guys. The Soviet/Russian manned space program is much more simple than ours, and a Soyuz cannot even touch the payload capacity of the Shuttle.

      We can have debates all day about if a manned spacecraft should be nothing more than a way to get up and back, but that's for another day. Both failures of the shuttle have been directly related to their re-usability, and that's something the Russians don't have to worry about.
    • I don't know what kind of reference you used for that, but Russia has quite a few. I don't have my 20th yr anniversary picture book that Time put out (not technical at all), but it's got every documented fatalaty in there. Including all the Russian ones (from manned flights). Check your stats again. The NASA program, though highly dangerous, has a better track record that you give them credit for.

      To Boldly Go. Simply put.

    • Re:Needs Another Seven Astronauts (Score:5, Informative)

      by DivideByZero ( 80449 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:56AM (#6191401)
      Maybe you need to do a little more research. [pravda.ru]

      Also, I think you need to also take into account that during a fair chunk of the time you're mentioning, the Russian space program was kind of out-of-order - If you cut the regeme change period out, it could take you back to the good old days...

      March 18, 1980 - a Vostok rocket exploded on its launch pad while being refueled, killing 50 at the Plesetsk Space Center.

    • At least no fatalities
      what about these? 1967 [bbc.co.uk] and 1971 [svengrahn.pp.se]

  • It's about time... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by yorkrj ( 658277 )
    This is the best news I've heard all week. It is good to know that NASA has a timeline for the next shuttle launch. And I thought I was being optimistic thinking they would launch this time next year. This is a good omen amongst all of the scandals, lawsuits, and wars we've been reading about lately.

  • Good on 'em (Score:3, Insightful)

    by simong_oz ( 321118 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:07AM (#6190931) Journal
    I can't help cheering at this news.

    OK, a really bad thing happened, but let's learn from it and move on to bigger and better things. I really feel that launching the shuttle again is, symbollically if nothing else, a positive sign that NASA won't abandon manned space missions, something that seemed to be on the cards after the Columbia disaster.

    Space exploration (or just working in space) is dangerous - it always has been and (for the forseeable future at least) always will be. There will always be setbacks and it's an expensive 'business', but exploration and curiosity is one of the things that makes us human (see my sig).

    • >a positive sign that NASA won't abandon manned space missions

      Why not abandon manned space missions?

      The Hubble telescope doesn't have living quarters so a person can squint into some eye piece.

      There is some glammer in having a "Buck Rogers" in space dodging lasers and fixing the "hyper warp drive" with a few wacks of his wrench, but you are risking human lives and huge negative publicity. And that negative publicity has a bigger effect than anything positive.
      • You do realize what a poor example the Hubble telescope is for you argument right? It has been serviced at least 3 times that I can think of(using the shuttle no less), and I think that the total number of service missions is actually higher than that.

        Basically, we would be using Hubble 3 by now, if they even decided to launch it, what with all the problems in Hubbles 1 and 2...

      • Why not abandon manned space missions?

        Because they have a role to play, alongside unmanned space missions. Humans are adaptable, intelligent, resourceful and capable of coping with the unexpected, among various other qualities that a robot/probe will never be able to match. True, they require more maintenance (food, air, etc), but that's why both options are needed. Use the right tool for the job, not the cheapest - that's how accidents happen.

        but you are risking human lives

        risk is relative - every ti
  • On an entirely personal note, I would like to say that I hope things pan out well for all of the world's space programmes. There is so much to be gained, both obviously and potentially, from exploration and exploitation of our near space and solar system.

    However, safety and quality of equipment must be a primary concern. I hope NASA (and maybe other agencies around the world) are researching new forms of reusable craft...

    • Re:Good thing, hopefully (Score:5, Interesting)

      by arth1 ( 260657 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:22AM (#6191082) Homepage Journal
      I hope NASA (and maybe other agencies around the world) are researching new forms of reusable craft...
      Reusable? A tiny fraction of what's launched actually returns in reusable form. The costs for transporting and overhauling the 30 year old shuttles between launches probably costs MORE than building new ones. Never mind that most of what's being launched is fuel -- solid, liquid and gas. If the point is being environmentally friendly, a rocket launch is less damaging. If the point is saving money -- well, it isn't saving money either, just spreading it over multiple budgets. Regards, -- Arthur Hagen
      • Re-usable craft are (in theory) safer, potentially cost-saving (although they haven't been so far), have tended to be more spacious, and have a significant psychological effect, which should not be discounted.

  • September 11 vs Columbia (Score:3, Insightful)

    by crashnbur ( 127738 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:14AM (#6191012)
    The terrorist attack on New York, Washington, and a field in Pennsylvania was a significant test of American resolve. On the heels of those attacks and through the next several months, our message was clear: we are not going to let calamity or insanity destroy our dreams for good lives in America. We are going to keep on keepin' on, and your silly attacks aren't going to bring us down -- they're going to wake us up.

    The explosion of the shuttle Columbia in February was a similar test of American resolve, but the test was much more concentrated... on the space program, particularly the shuttle program. On the heels of that disaster and through the months that have followed, our message is clear: we are not going to let calamity or insanity destroy our dreams for the impossible. We are going to continue to explore our universe, both near and far, and no minor disaster (minor on the timeline of human history) is going to offset the progress of human knowledge.

    Face it, is the the American way. In fact, it is the human way: Life will go on, and we will always be there to try to make it better.

  • RotK (Score:4, Funny)

    by Streiff ( 34269 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:18AM (#6191051)
    Dec 18, LotR: RotK, or the shuttle.

    Guess which I'm more excited about. :D

  • Sad... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Captain Igloo ( 600475 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @11:20AM (#6191063)
    ... to see that this useless vehicle is put back into operation, wasting money that could be spent for good space science and efficient transportation.
    A winged vehicle has nothing but disadvantages, except looking nice on TV when landing:
    - Wings impose a huge weight penalty
    - Re-entry with wings is unstable and requires active control
    - Wings are vulnerable due to their large surface

    The space shuttle is anything but re-usable. The boosters are not re-used, the tank is lost anyway and after landing, the shuttle is completely dis- and re-assembled.
    State-of-the-art expendable launchers can haul people into space (and bring them safely back) at a fraction of the cost: use a ballistic capsule with escape rocket and a parawing for enhanced flexibility during landing.
    The shuttle's only purpose is to fly to the ISS. The ISS's only purpose is to justify the existence of the shuttle. For the Hubble telescope alone, the shuttle would never have been built.

    • Re:Sad... (Score:2, Informative)

      by stieglmant ( 628573 )
      It's not true that this winged vehicle has nothing but disadvantages. For what the shuttle was originally designed for, carrying very large and heavy payloads into and back from space, a winged vehicle was the only solution that would alow for reentering with heavy loads. Although as it has panned out, the shuttle hasn't carried many heavy things back to earth. Back in the early days it was thought that commercial satellite launch and recovery would help subsidize shuttle launches.

    • Re:Sad... (Score:2, Informative)

      by stieglmant ( 628573 )
      I am sorry but you are incorrect on a couple of points. The boosters (SRBs) are reused. They are collected out in the Atlantic Ocean and towed back, disassembled, inspected, and reused. Also the shuttle is not dissembled after every flight. As a matter of fact, Columbia did go through a complete overhaul, and upgrade about a year ago where it was (just about) totally dissembled, but that was the first time for the Columbia.

    • Re:Sad... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by confused one ( 671304 )
      Re-entry without wings is ballistic and (nearly)uncontrollable. Wings give them options on return that they wouldn't have had. At worst, wings give them the option to glide and provide a window (albeit small) in which to bail out if things go terribly wrong and prevent landing. Provided, of course, the wings didn't burn off...

      Yeah, this was a serious FUBAR and Nasa screwed up. Let's move forward, not backward

  • N. A. S. A. = Need Another Seven Astronauts (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Shortly after the Challenger disaster on January 28, 1986, a sick joke started circulating. "NASA" was reported to mean, "Need Another Seven Astronauts."

    Unfortunately, as news reports come in about disregard for safety for Shuttle Columbia, it appears that such joke has a major element of truth. NASA bureaucrats (and probably politicians up to and including at the White House, as well) disregarded Morton Thiokol engineers in 1986, and we're now hearing that engineers warned NASA officials and the President
  • as well as Arizona... and parts of New Mexico.

    Har!

  • to go or not to go, that is not the question. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by bigpat ( 158134 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @12:06PM (#6191503)
    People, myself included, have faulted NASA for past mismanagement of safety concerns. But my real concern is that they spend billions upon billions of dollars and employ thousands of the brightest engineers and scientists, and still make some of the stupidest mistakes which cost lives and money, but most importantly time.

    They have monopolized space exploration in the US far too long and provided a poor model for the rest of the world to follow, which has stifled innovation. They should be handing out research and exploration grants like the NSF does and performing reviews of the results to determine future funding. Not running a single space program for a single space station. All our eggs in one basket, as it goes.

    Arguments about the airworthiness of the space shuttle to me are pointless. It is a big machine with lots of parts and carries some risk of failure. It has been show to be able to fly successfully a high percentage of the time. Nothing they do to it will fundamentally change that situation. But by being the only game in town there can be no comparison of risk and no judgements made based on that comparison.

    NASA asks us, either fly or do not fly. This is not a free choice, to those of us that wish to see humans fly it means that we must choose the space shuttle regardless of risk or incompetence or anything.

    NASA will undoubtedly want more money to increase the safety of the space shuttle flights, but to what end? Any machine can be better maintained or operated, if we collectively choose a single means, and spend our collective resources and will on that means we could be on a fools errand. Like driving a car into the ocean. Sure we can keep tuning our procedures and plugging the leaks, but it ain't gonna get us to the other side. So that basic questions of design or operation are essentially meaningless when one only tries or has a single means. Like voting for the only candidate, the choice presented to us is meaningless. To go or not to go. To live or to die. Of course we must go, as we must live.

    Or do we? Maybe, when such a stark choice is put before us we must refuse to make it. Refuse the question. Should the shuttle fly or not? Ignore the question, it is inconsequencial to that which many of us care about. Space exploration is the purpose and the question, not the shuttle.

    Exploration of space is dangerous and will not survive safety concerns of collective action. Liken it to any human endeavor of significant unknown and danger and you will find it must be done by individuals. Individuals that have clarity of vision and certainty of purpose. It must be done by people, not by institutions or incorporations. People who know the risks, people that see the dangers, people that take the leap because they see the oppurtunity. People that learn and reason.

    If we are to keep NASA at all, then it must only be to find those people and give them a little bit of money or help. Like Queen Isabella giving Christopher Columbus enough money to get the supplies and men he needed. Not too much money though, because we know that to succeed in Space one will have to travel lightly, and the tendency of people with too much money is to buy things. We know that to succeed in space one needs to be quick, but the tendency of people with too much money is to spend time spending money.

    I expect the shuttle to fly again, because there are a lot of people who depend on it for their livelyhood. I expect that the shuttle will fly again because looking at the world a certain way, it makes sense to continue to do what we have been doing for the last two decades. I expect the shuttle to fly again because it is a link in a chain that could mean the end of the space station. Because it would mean the end to an entire generation's way of thinking.

    So there it is, the heads of NASA would like us to choose between their shuttle and nothing. Between the aspirations of mankind and bondage to this rock. It is a false choice.

  • local perspective (Score:3, Interesting)

    by NixterAg ( 198468 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @12:08PM (#6191520)
    This is somewhat offtopic but I wanted to give you guys a different perspective on shuttle related issues.

    I live in Nacogdoches (Nak-ah-doh-chez), Texas, the place where most of the shuttle debris fell. Once upon a time, NASA news hardly even made the paper. All that has changed. Everytime a NASA scientist sneezes, the local paper mentions it.

    A few weeks ago I was fortunate enough to hear the local sherrif Thomas Kerss talk about the disaster plan he and other local officials dynamically implemented to handle the shuttle disaster and the ongoing recovery effort. There is no template for a disaster like this in any city office our county office in the nation, so local officials had to act fast to keep local residents safe, to manage the recovery effort, and to manage the press surrounding the event. They did such a great job that there is now a template for disasters like the Columbia disaster and its called the "Nacogdoches Plan".

    The recovery effort that Sherriff Kerss and others implemented was especially lauded, as the Sherriff quickly received assistance from the Stephen F. Austin State University Geosciences lab and the SFA Forestry department (the finest in the nation). By using the maps provided by the geosciences lab, they divided the area where the shuttle fell into blocks of a few acres in size. They immediately dispatched deputies armed with GPS locators to locations where citizens were reporting fallen debris. The deputies would identify the debris, call in their location to central command, and central command would mark the detailed maps with the locations of debris and descriptions of what was there. For debris locations in public places and for important items, national guardsmen or law enforcement officials were dispatched to guard those places.

    The recovery is ongoing and like some have said, they will be finding things for at least another decade. In fact, its rumored that they've found a mini-cassette that might provide insight into Columbia's last moments [ajc.com].

    Seeing that the shuttle will fly again soon is fantastic news and is what everyone in this area has been hoping for. They talked about changing the landing flight path so that they won't go over populous locations but I'm not sure if that's been decided yet. I figured they start landing it in California as rule like it used to be. If not, I can guarantee that the majority of East Texans will be trying to catch a glimpse of the shuttle when it flies overhead on its way to Cape Canaveral.

  • Why is NASA still putzing around in low earth orbit with the space shuttle? NASA (and the rest of us) need to aspire higher and undertake a project that will serve to inspire the current generation in the same way that the Apollo project did in the 60s.

    I'm a big fan of Robert Zubrin's Case for Mars [amazon.com] proposal to send astronauts to Mars using current technology. For those of you who aren't familiar with this, read the book or visit the Mars Society website [marssociety.org] for more information.

  • Earth Sucks (Score:3, Insightful)

    by msheppard ( 150231 ) on Friday June 13, 2003 @02:08PM (#6192887) Homepage Journal
    My opinion on this: The persuit of space is worth the loss of life. There are people willing to risk their life for these goals. I wish we could get the kind of zeal for the space program that religon has, i.e. have people willing to climb aboard a rocket that MIGHT kill them, instead of strapping a bomb to their chest that WILL kill them.

    If we do not achieve a colony on mars or the moon soon, we will get hit by a rock, and the only known setient life form in the universe will be destroyed. And we will be to blame. Me, you, everybody.

    I believe if we could redirect the energy given to religon to the persuit of colonizing mars or the moon, we could have it DONE (or at least have ships on the way) within a decade, easy.

    M@

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