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NASA Space

Shuttle Retirement Costs Divert Science Funding 160

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the robbing-einstein-to-pay-feynman dept.
FleaPlus writes "Although overall NASA funding is expected to increase next year, NASA has announced plans to divert money from its science program to help pay for the expected cost overruns for flying the Space Shuttle safely until its retirement in 2010. A number of science projects are being canceled or delayed indefinitely."
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Shuttle Retirement Costs Divert Science Funding More

Shuttle Retirement Costs Divert Science Funding

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  • Painted itself into a corner (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Oldsmobile ( 930596 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @05:59AM (#14668143) Journal
    This might be classified as hindsight, but NASA has FORSEEABLY painted itself into a corner. The ISS is going to fail without the shuttle, yet NASA (or those that set policy for NASA) procrastinated with building a replacement for the shuttle for years and years. Now the Shuttle has been bleeding NASA dry, yet they can't abandon it without losing the ISS. Talk about being between a rock and a hard place.

    They really need to make some hard choices. One possibility would be the diverting of funds to find out how to assemble the ISS with existing hardware, mainly Russian, as they are the only ones with heavy lift vehicles, though this might be very difficult. Another might be to try to reconfigure the shuttle platform as a heavy lift vehicle, thought that would take time and the ISS would be on hold. Of course the ISS is on hold now too...

    The problem with the shuttle is, that a tremendous amount of energy is used to lift not only the required ISS part, but also a heavy hunk of 70's junk covered in tiles. This is not a smart way of lifting things into orbit.

    I'm sorry, but NASA really needs to find a way to ditch the shuttle real soon. Considering the fact that the new Federal budget gives no hope of fixing the huge deficit, NASA money might be harder to come by in the near future, even thought they did get their money this time around.

    • Re:Painted itself into a corner (Score:4, Insightful)

      by m50d ( 797211 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @06:35AM (#14668247) Homepage Journal
      How about just sending ISS bits up on a US conventional rocket? Surely a Delta IV Heavy has the capacity to plonk anything we need up there, though obviously it can't transfer it onto the ISS as easily as the shuttle can. But it ought to be possible.

      • Re:Painted itself into a corner (Score:5, Funny)

        by Richard_at_work ( 517087 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @07:14AM (#14668338)
        The Russians built many space stations without the Shuttle, pretty sure the geniuses at NASA can accomplish the same.
        • IIRC, The Russians built 2 space stations and both were smaller than even space lab, let alone ISS.

          Even now, each piece that goes into orbit is bigger than what most rockets can carry. Once there, you then have to have some way of moving the piece into place. Basically, you would need a space tug. Well, we do not have that. It would take as long as the new stuff will take. During that time, the ISS will be simple holding 2 ppl in place doing very little. Until a few more pieces are there (namely some form

      • Re:Painted itself into a corner (Score:5, Informative)

        by cbcanb ( 237883 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @07:27AM (#14668370)
        The US modules for the ISS are designed with the shuttle's payload bay in mind. In particular, they expect the loads during launch to be applied from fixtures mounted along the sides and bottom of the bay. For expendable launches, you need to design the modules to take their loads from their bottom end. Converting a module would be very expensive.

        If you wanted to, you could launch the module in a sort of adaptor that held the modules as they would be if the shuttle was carrying them. However, that would be heavy, to the point where even a Delta-IV Heavy may have trouble launching the module+adaptor combination.
        • Converting a module would be very expensive.

          More expensive than keeping the shuttle in operation for many more years?

        • Re:Painted itself into a corner (Score:4, Insightful)

          by J05H ( 5625 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @12:06PM (#14669870)
          Delta IV-H has plenty of capacity to handle handle a "Cargo Bay" adapter and still fly the Columbus and Kibo modules. The modules are each around 12 tons-15tons, Delta IV-H can theoretically fly 25tons to LEO. Also, the real question to ask w/ this is: Would the cost of adapting current mainfest to fly on EELV exceed the cancellation costs of Shuttle? At $4+ Billion per year, the Shuttle is definitely eating the rest of NASA alive. Station isn't in as bad a shape, IMHO, at least it is functional. Also, compare the cost of Shuttle (or upcoming CEV) to Soyuz: we now have a price for one six-month stay via Soyuz, $44 million. Compared to Shuttle costs, that should be sobering news to Dr. Griffin, policy wonks and all us space cadets.

          For getting modules to ISS, I think they should actually use a Soyuz (with bigger service module and American CBM adapter on nose) to meet and tug the EELV-launched modules into the proper orbit. It's still pennies on the dollar compared to maintaining STS.

          Josh
        • However, that would be heavy, to the point where even a Delta-IV Heavy may have trouble launching the module+adaptor combination.

          That's an engineering/design problem. I don't see why that would be a show-stopper. Engineers are smart. They get paid to solve these kinds of issues. That's what they're there for.

      • COTS (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Cujo ( 19106 ) * on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @11:45AM (#14669705) Homepage Journal

        NASA is studying commercial alternatives. A number of hungry alt.space companies will be in the hunt, like Space-X [spacex.com] (first Falcon launch is planned for this Friday). In my view [slashdot.org], this is a subtle end-run around the hugely expensive ESA.

    • Maybe it's time to fasttrack the Shuttle-C concept. And get the CEV on order. You're right, NASA has done a good job of painting themselves into a corner. Shuttle-C looks to me like a quick and expedient compromise.
    • They really need to make some hard choices

      The hard choices have been made for them. The Shuttle is being retired in 2010. But the US is treaty-obligated to finish construction of the minimal ISS, so the money has to go into the shuttle for the short term. Its a collossal waste, IMO, but that's the hard choice. Some very interesting science has to be placed on hold in the meantime.

      We're obligated to finish ISS, and we want to build the CEV and launch vehicles to take us to the Moon and Mars in this centu
    • The ISS is going to fail without the shuttle, yet NASA (or those that set policy for NASA) procrastinated with building a replacement for the shuttle for years and years.

      The entire EELV program (Atlas V and Delta IV) was conceived and executed specifically because of the Challenger disaster, as a backup means for the NRO to get payloads on orbit.

      The problem was - NASA didn't hop on the bandwagon in 1987 when they should have, and work to get EELVs human-rated. So while the NRO and USAF have their backup ve

  • Wonderfull (Score:3, Insightful)

    by wakeboard ( 556264 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @05:59AM (#14668145)
    Wow, so nasa is now like an airline I guess. Just trying to keep flying those pointless shuttle flights.

    Kill the shuttle and keep the science, after all they are going to spend 100 billion dollars to get back to the moon and do nothing there AGAIN, no base, no telescope, no science, most likley just golf.

    STUPID

    • Re:Wonderfull (Score:4, Insightful)

      by 16K Ram Pack ( 690082 ) <tim DOT almond AT gmail DOT com> on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @06:47AM (#14668273) Homepage
      Since early shuttle launches which proved the shuttle concept, we've done nothing useful in manned space travel. The real science has been done by unmanned missions.

      Manned space travel should be given over to the sort of missions being run by Branson and Rutan. That's where the real innovation is going to come from. Even if it starts off being for multimillionaires, it will become for everyone, whether for pleasure or science. Scientists reap the benefits of cheaper more powerful PCs that are often the result of research for commercial markets.

      • Manned space travel should be given over to the sort of missions being run by Branson and Rutan. That's where the real innovation is going to come from

        I agree. I think we'll see a private version of Mercury within 20 years, then things will start getting really wild.

        Space is a frontier, and and expensive one at that. Government space agencies have a role in breaking the trails, but as we've seen with government-funded space exploration in the last 30+ years, government is not good at developing the fronti
        • I think we'll see a private version of Mercury within 20 years, then things will start getting really wild.

          I think it'll be sooner than that. SpaceX [wikipedia.org] has already announced its intent to compete for the $50 million America's Space Prize for orbital flight, which has a 2010 deadline. SpaceX is set to launch their first orbital rocket on Friday, and the Falcon 9 (which will be man-rated and large enough to lift a Mercury-style capsule) is scheduled to launch in 2007.
          • I think it'll be sooner than that

            I like to play the estimates conservatively. :)

            The technological hurdles are pretty high for private parties without very, very deep pockets. I hope to see it by 2010, but I'm not holding my breath.

      • Re:Wonderfull (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Rei ( 128717 )
        Rutan isn't even close to getting to orbit. Sorry, try again.

        It's one thing to be a fan of private space travel. But at least look at the companies that actually go anywhere even remotely close to orbit instead of zipping around on an unscalable low delta-v rocketplane. For example, why is it always Rutan who gets mentioned, when SpaceX is about to launch a from-scratch developed *orbital* craft? Sure, it has no cockpit, but a cockpit is a nothing component compared to the difficulties of reaching orbit

        • Re:Wonderfull (Score:2, Interesting)

          by 16K Ram Pack ( 690082 )
          I should have explained better what I meant:-

          I wasn't trying to be specific, more that what they are doing will generate progress. Aircraft were at one time experimental, like the Wright Brothers, then between the wars, we saw something development and challenges (like Lindburgh and the Schneider trophy). After the war we got commercial air travel, which over the past 50 years has been put further and further into the reach of everyone.

          It was a couple of decades between the first flight and Frank Whittl

    • Re:Wonderful (Score:5, Interesting)

      by stiggle ( 649614 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @07:21AM (#14668354)
      Going back to the moon is a technology testbed - to prove and test the technologies to get man to Mars (and beyond).

      Just like the early rocket launches built up to Apollo, current projects test the technologies we will be using in the future. Ion drives and such.

      Just having a quick browse through http://exploration.nasa.gov/ [nasa.gov] shows the stuff they want to develop - for unmanned and then manned flight.
      • Going back to the moon is a technology testbed

        Yes, it was--in 1969.

        -Eric

      • it stands a real chance of going beyond that. Once we have a true heavy lift capacity (that we lost with nixon killing Saturn V), we should be capable of building on the moon. I suspect that at that point, many companies will want to build small pieces that can be used. Consider what happens if L-Mart loses the CEV to Gru/Boe bidders. They will probably build the CEV that they wanted in the first place and offer it to private enterprise. Almost certainly, private enterprise will like the idea of going to th

  • Funding Diverts... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Elitist_Phoenix ( 808424 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @06:00AM (#14668146)
    This is bad! I mean how are they going to get the shadow angles right now!? ;-)

  • OH NO!! (Score:2, Funny)

    by kernelblaha ( 756819 )
    How are we going to get that moon station up and running? And what about sending a man to mars? All my dreams are gone to *"?!#

  • Name change (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Belseth ( 835595 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @06:14AM (#14668182)
    Isn't it about time we start calling the shuttle the Albatross? It was a bad idea from day one. Heavy lift rockets are more efficent and more dependable. Now science is going to suffer while we continue to throw good money after bad. If the Russians can get astronauts in orbit for 20 mill a pop isn't it more cost effective to pay so they can hitch a ride and dump the shuttle? In truth the 20 mill was paying most of the flight costs, third world economy with first world technology. They may not be able to carry the payload but they still have heavy lift rockets so even that could be somewhat resolved until we could restart a heavy lift program. The shuttle's safty record makes them a massive risk. Isn't this more about the government trying to save face and not crawling to the Russians for help than about science and saving lives? Before the shuttle NASA had a perfect inflight record. Now the shuttle flights seem to be a ticking timebomb.
    • Why don't we just call it "swallow"? Because it takes a lot of money and sometimes kills things that are living and usually white. Also I doubt it could grip a coconut even by the husk.

    • Re:Name change (Score:2, Insightful)

      by cbcanb ( 237883 )
      The two reasons the Russians can get cosmonauts into space for $60m per flight is that wage costs are *much* lower than in the US, and they're flying them on a ship that's vastly less capable than the shuttle. If the US could pay Russian-level wages, the shuttle would be a lot less expensive to fly too.

      On the shuttle's safety record, it's in the same ballpark as Soyuz. One accident on Soyuz would tip the balance back in the shuttle's favour. The difference is not significant. Also, Soyuz has had plenty of c
      • The two reasons the Russians can get cosmonauts into space for $60m per flight is that wage costs are *much* lower than in the US,

        Probably account for some of it but far from all.

        they're flying them on a ship that's vastly less capable than the shuttle.

        So it's a better design for the job of getting people into space, amusing how you can't simply say that. The shuttle does a lot of stuff, and all of it badly.

        On the shuttle's safety record, it's in the same ballpark as Soyuz. One accident on Soyuz would tip

        • Re:Name change (Score:3, Interesting)

          by 0123456 ( 636235 )
          "But the important thing is that: no one died despite all of that."

          Two Soyuz crews have died, if I remember correctly, just like the shuttle.

          The difference is that the last Soyuz crew death was over thirty years ago, when it was still a new launcher. It's had problems since, but they've all been survivable because it's a capsule, not a brick with wings (or without wings, in the case of Challenger and Columbia post-accident). It's vastly easier to design a high-survivability capsule than a high-survivability

          • Re:Name change (Score:3, Insightful)

            by Rakishi ( 759894 )
            They lost one in the early flights, and three in a later one due to a faulty pressure valve (the craft itself landed perfectly fine asfaik). Also in terms of deaths I was talking about on the flights with accidents that I mentioned.

            It's vastly easier to design a high-survivability capsule than a high-survivability 'space-plane' because it can take much higher stresses and still be able to land.

            My point basically, for the foreseeable future a capsule is simply a safer (and cheaper) design to use. You can't r

      • Re:Name change (Score:5, Insightful)

        by arivanov ( 12034 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @07:26AM (#14668368) Homepage
        Vastly less capable for what?
        • Putting people in orbit? - nope. This is what Soyuz does considerably better. It can reach higher orbit, it has longer autonomy and considerably smaller cost
        • Putting payload into oribit? - nope. If you put only payload onto Soyuz (especially in the Soyuz/Fregat variety) it can blast it to escape velocity. Shuttle cannot. Soyuz launch cost is also considerably less.

        The only thing the shuttle is good at is launching payload and people at the same time when the payload has to be delivered to the same place as people and possibly serviced prior to installation. In reality this is usefull only for space construction and nothing else which funnily enough is the program US insists on closing. Even in that case sending the payload on a proper heavy booster like Ariana, Proton, Energia or Delta 5 and people separately will end up being cheaper and safer.

        • The shuttle can also bring things down and possibly service them in orbit (after installation); the later you can make a dedicated craft for and the former is not yet important enough.

          The new plan asfaik involves a small capsule or glider (mini single heatshield shuttle mounted on top of the rocket) for people, and a heavy booster for cargo.
          • It costs about $1.3 billion to send the shuttle on a mission. As an example, the HST cost about $2.5billion to build (though with significantly higher operating costs). If/when it comes down for repairs, the repairs themselves would cost money, and then it would have to go back up. In short, it is a very infrequently used feature, and one that isn't practical; cost of replacement for anything but the most expensive thingies is always less then the transportation costs.
            • I never said it was practical but it is a feature, simply that the current limited space program does not need it. A large scale space program may potentially need to regularly bring things down. Granted with more flights the cost per launch would go down since much of it is due to fixed infrastructure ($2 bil. per year or so even if nothing flies) and due to general increased efficiency.

              Of course at the same time the current safety record would make the shuttle utterly impractical, a failure every few week

        • Vastly less capable [than the Shuttle] for what?

          * Putting people in orbit? - nope. This is what Soyuz does considerably better. It can reach higher orbit, it has longer autonomy and considerably smaller cost

          So what if it can reach a higher orbit? It's not higher enough to be significant. Nor does it have longer 'autonomy'. A Soyuz has a powered lifespan of about 96 hours. (Nor can you launch a Soyuz [capsule] with a significant payload.) Soyuz is a highly optimized 'commuter car' - vastly simpli

    • Actually it was a very good idea on day one, but then came day two, three, four, five... and suddenly the shuttle was mounted on the side of the boosters & a host of other things.

      Then somewhere around day 10000 almost everyone was using their 10/20 hindsight (no way it's anything close to 20/20 on average) to agree it was always a clusterfuck and should have been foreseen as such on day one.

      What can we learn from this? Mostly that 10/20 hindsight will never go out of fashion, secondly that any average J
      • The only problem that I see with your argument is that once the hindsight was applied, and we realized, "Hey, maybe this wasn't such a brilliant idea after all," The program continued. The only real change was that instead of lots of launches a year during which more problems could be shaken out, the launch frequency was reduced to only a few per year.

        Instead of scrapping the program once hindsight revealed it to be an albatross, they played the statistics game to appear to be safer. (one boom every 50 la
    • Isn't it about time we start calling the shuttle the Albatross?

      Way I remember it, albatross was a ship's good luck... till some idiot
      killed it. (beat) Yes, I've read a poem. Try not to faint.

      It was a bad idea from day one.

      Actually, there's very simple economics behind it. If you can build a reusable rocket with low maintenance, you can lower costs - and rocketry costs are ridiculous (and with good reason; these are incredibly complex and delicate beasts due to the tremendous task they have to perform; i
      • Hmm, slashdot ate part of the post. Let me fix it:

        among the best in the world with over a 98 percent success rate. There are a lot of bogus comparisons made, however. Yes, the Shuttle has had more casualties on it, but that's because it caries far more people. Yes, Soyuz hasn't had lost a crew member in decades, but it's killed almost a hundred ground crew and unmanned Soyuz craft keep exploding (it's pure luck that only the unmanned craft have been exploding, not the manned ones). And Soyuz has had so
    • Before the shuttle NASA had a perfect inflight record.

      That's a neat little way you have of disqualifying their previous accident(s?). The way I see it, if astronauts died on a NASA mission, then they died on a mission, regardless of whether it happened inflight or on the launchpad.

      NASA's safety record wasn't perfect before the shuttle, and I doubt it will be after the shuttle. We've been building cars for a hundred years, and people still die in them every day. Do you really expect space exploration to b

  • Space shuttle overruns? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Dekortage ( 697532 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @06:19AM (#14668197) Homepage

    So we're spending billions of dollars to preserve old spaceships, when things like SpaceShipOne [scaled.com] only cost tens or hundreds of millions [space.com] for test flights?

    This is kind of like my father's insistence on maintaining his 1972 Cadillac (at a ridiculous annual cost) instead of purchasing a newer vehicle (say, a Honda) that gets three times the mileage and has much lower support costs. Of course, it just isn't as big or masculine... that's probably what this is all about.

    • Re:Space shuttle overruns? (Score:5, Informative)

      by linc_s ( 653782 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @07:34AM (#14668394) Homepage
      Oh, and how about the fact that SpaceShipOne can't even get in to orbit? I'm sorry.. but it always frustrates me when people go on how much cheaper SS1 is for getting to space... when they neglect the fact that it can barely carry any load, and promptly falls back out of space just after getting there. Wake me when they create an orbital vehicle...

  • #1 replacement candidate = 2 words... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Zantetsuken ( 935350 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @06:19AM (#14668198) Homepage
    Mass... Driver...

    IMO most economical if all you are doing is heavy lifting/cargo - thats all the Shuttle ever was in the first place - a glorified bus to take up people and supplies. Go ahead and try to argue that the shuttle was also used for science expirements, the only reason that happened is it has a decent amount of space inside to put shelves with expirements in the shuttle.

    BTW: previous points I've made here on /. as to why a mass driver would be economical is

    One: no more buying million dollar per pound of thrust rocket fuel.

    Two: If you make it an electromagnetic rail (a rail-gun) or a gauss gun system and power it with a nuclear reactor, you could sell the electricity being produced when you arent launching things, and so in the long run cutting costs and maybe even paying for the whole launching system (mass driver and reactor). If you are worried you might not get enough energy at once, do what that laser-fusion facility is supposed to use - basically a bunch of capacitators with a fast discharge rate - the fusion facility claims it only costs a few pennies (actual pennies, not just that it doesnt make a dent in their budget)

    • and power it with a nuclear reactor, you could sell the electricity being produced when you arent launching things

      Actually this may may not be as simple as you would think. I suppose you'd build a reactor that's not magnitudes too powerfull for the mass driver, so when you do are launching things you'll not be delivering much electricity. The problems lays with that that electricity has to come from somewhere else. And generators that can start fairly quick, diesel powered generators for example, are expe

      • Then you use it for launch purposes when electricity is cheap. Sell it to the grid when it isn't. On the other hand, launch windows can be pretty specific, so maybe use it as a hydrogen production facility otherwise.

        And this would generally be sharp high power pulse demand, so some sort of super-capaciter bank would help spread out the load.
    • Wouldn't an electromagnetic rail gun induce massive currents in any conductors in its payload? I'd assume that pretty much rules out putting anything electronic into space with it.
    • Capacitators? Is that what Mr. Potatohead uses in his EE designs?
      This is the first time I've heard that term used for capacitors. Maybe it's from some other country or era?

    • How does a rail gun work for launch from Earth? Have you done any serious analysis, because I don't see it. It's isn't just a matter of getting up some speed. Thos speeds (around 7 km/sec) are impractical on the ground, and you need a second boost at high altitude to get into Earth orbit, which the rail gun can't give you.

      With carbon nanotube technology maturing, there is some hope for space elevators, although the engineering issues are non-trivial.

    • Mass... Driver... IMO most economical if all you are doing is heavy lifting/cargo

      Sure - once they finish developing the unobtanium heatshield to protect the cargo during it's passage through the atmosphere.

      no more buying million dollar per pound of thrust rocket fuel.

      The current costs per pound of thrust as somewhere down around $.01/lb, not even remotely near your claim. Rocket fuel is cheap. (Last time I heard a price, the LOX and LH2 for the Shuttle cost about $10 million per launch.)

    • Better yet:
      Build the thing on the summit of Mona Kea in Hawaii. We already have telescope observatories there (I don't remember if Keck is on Hawaii or Maui). We have tracking radars at Barking Sands. The muzzle of the thing is at 10,000+ ft altitude, taking a significant chunk of lower atmosphere out of the friction component, plus a virtual guarantee of good weather most of the time, UNLIKE Florida, and Hawaii is at a reasonably low lattitude that takes advantage of momentum from the Earth's rotation.
  • Science is important, but not as important as living and working in space. If the scientific discoveries wait 1 extra year or 100 it makes little difference in the scheme of things. Personally I'd rather increase manned exploration, which will have more immediate benefits.

    • Re:Manned programs are more important (Score:4, Insightful)

      by BarryNorton ( 778694 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @09:39AM (#14668826)
      What immediate benefits? How about turning that around and saying: "living and working in space" is not something that's going to be done on any scale for decades, so what does it matter if it's delayed a few years when the funding could be used for research that has more immediate benefits? Rather than talking out of my hat I'm saying that as someone who's done some work at the Langley Research Centre...
    • Personally I'd rather increase manned exploration, which will have more immediate benefits.

      Such as?

      Don't get me wrong. I'm all for manned space research (and one day I hope to be up there, too). But seriously, think about what "living in space" alone would accomplish in the next decade or so. Especially on board the ISS, which cannot function in the foreseeable future (I'm thinking the number of 10 yrs right now).

      At this point the ISS is simply a money drain. It's not doing anything at all. It cannot do muc

  • Misconceptions (Score:5, Insightful)

    by tsotha ( 720379 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @06:55AM (#14668296)
    Wow! Does anybody really believe this is about science?

    1. NASA isn't about science. NASA exists to funnel tax money to specific congressional districts. The shuttle can't be cancelled because that would put too many people out of work. As far as Congress is concerned, well, if we get some science it's a great side effect, but jobs is the motivation.
    2. For reasons given in the above point we will never pay the Russians for launch services. Space is not the point, jobs are the point. Congress would rather accomplish nothing with 20,000 extra American jobs than go to Andromeda on a Russian rocket.
    3. Enough with the Spaceship 1 talk. It's nothing close to an orbital craft and doesn't lead to an orbital craft. What Rutan did, while pretty cool, is orders of magnitude less difficult than what the shuttle does. That's why SS-1 is orders of magnitude cheaper. SS-1 pretty much a copy of the X-15, which is a dead-end as far as getting into orbit is concerned.

    Note I'm not saying this is the way things should be, but if you want an actual space program instead of a white-elephant jobs program you have to address the real problem. The continued existance of the shuttle program is a symptom of a structural problem in Congress, and that has to get fixed before you can expect anything useful from NASA beyond the odd robotic probe.

    • Re:Misconceptions (Score:4, Interesting)

      by 0123456 ( 636235 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @07:56AM (#14668467)
      "SS-1 pretty much a copy of the X-15, which is a dead-end as far as getting into orbit is concerned."

      A bizarre claim, given that there were plans to turn the X-15 into an orbital spacecraft launched on an expendable booster (similar to the Dynasoar).

      Odds are very high that Rutan will put people into orbit in the next decade in a spacecraft he's designed and built. I can't say the same about NASA.
      • Odds are very high that Rutan will put people into orbit in the next decade in a spacecraft he's designed and built. I can't say the same about NASA.

        Rutan was using design information derived from NASA. I've heard him speak, he and his engineers read NASA technical papers, the engine manufacturers read NASA technical research. They didn't start from square one. They made use of millions of dollars and many man-years of NASA research. You can't say that Rutan did it all. He used a lot of NASA research and
      • A bizarre claim, given that there were plans to turn the X-15 into an orbital spacecraft launched on an expendable booster (similar to the Dynasoar).

        Yes, and what came of those plans? That's what I meant by "dead end". They couldn't make it work.

        Odds are very high that Rutan will put people into orbit in the next decade in a spacecraft he's designed and built. I can't say the same about NASA.

        We'll see. Rutan's a smart guy, but he simply doesn't have any experience with hypersonic flight control or h

  • A little gift from those folks who can't stand to see a pad program die.

  • This has been going on for years now (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @07:31AM (#14668385)
    The shuttle and space station have been sucking funding from other programs for years now. I recall reading an article in Aviation Week a couple years back talking about how NASA had eliminated all funding for rotorcraft (helicopter) research. Much aviation related research has gone the way of the dinosaur, needed to keep the space station and shuttle going. The first A in NASA used to stand for aeronautics, now I'm not sure what it stands for.
  • At least for those of us who have been asking NASA to rid itself of the shuttle for a decade, way back when Mike Griffin was doing really neat things at DoD. It was a neat experimental craft. Should have never been an operational one. Shouldn't ever fly again.
  • Reward failure, punish success: that's the way big government works... which is why it's always such a screwup and even when it does something useful it costs more and is less efficient than having private business do so. Well, unless it's a big business that's fallen into the same mindset.
    • even when it does something useful it costs more and is less efficient than having private business do so.

      Government isn't supposed to be efficient. It's supposed to do the things that don't get done or don't get done right, by private business. For a few obvious examples:

      universal education
      national defense
      space flight
      food and drug safety
      automobile emissions regulation
      wilderness management

      While, of course, we all want government to be as efficient as it can reasonably be, the actual services are the fundame
  • I predict the shuttle will retire way before 2010. I just hope that astronauts will survive the process of early retirement of the shuttle, though this hope is bleak.
    • 2 fatal accidents in 114 flights, the causes of which are both understood. One cause has been fixed with a high degree of confidence, one is in the process of being fixed, with fallback plans in place. Why should we expect the outlook for shuttle astronauts to be bleak for the remaining 15-20 launches?
  • The last paragraph of the story says that the science committee will have a hearing on the budget on February 16th. So, if you disagree with this decision, write your representative [house.gov] and air your concerns. IMHO, the action most likely to succeed is holding the shuttle program to its budget and leaving the science funding untouched, so suggest that.

  • Jamacian Bobsled Team in Space (Score:4, Informative)

    by PaulModz ( 942002 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @10:42AM (#14669257)
    If SETI makes contact anytime soon, I could see the Shuttle becoming a pop-culture phenomenon in alien societies. Of course, it would be popular in the same way that the Jamaican Bobsled Team and William Hung are. The shuttle and the ISS might be the least efficient fleet of spacecraft that will ever exist in this universe, which might be good in the long run as the aliens will take pity on us and hand over the Warp Engines so we can stop going in circles.

    If we knew the shuttle would end up like this, I don't think we would have bothered. We've spent $145 billion on the shuttle for just over 1,000 days in orbit. This makes the math so depressingly simple even the president can do it in his head.

    The lifetime cost of Voyager, Pathfinder, Spirit and Opportunity, Galileo, Cassini-Huygens, and the Hubble Space Telescope combined is about $10 billion, while the ISS alone has cost $35 billion so far. Why throw good money after bad, pull the plug already and rethink the strategy.

    There's no point sending humans to the moon (or anywhere else for that matter) unless we plan to stay. There may be large deposits of Platinum-group metals (PGMs) on the moon, and PGMs will be a cornerstone of the hydrogen economy, since each fuel cell needs a few ounces. There isn't much on Earth, and mining/refining the quantity needed to run a full scale H2 economy might cancel out the environmental benefit of fuel cells.

    Moonrush by Dennis Wingo is a great read on the subject - http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1894959108/103-98 70913-1427800?v=glance&n=283155 [amazon.com]

    Our only saving grace is the work being done by small entrepreneurs like Burt Rutan. It looks like the X Prize actually did a good job of jump starting the space economy.

  • Reduction in Force (Score:3, Informative)

    by carambola5 ( 456983 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @11:08AM (#14669452) Homepage
    I personally know ~30 people who got laid off last summer because of NASA's recent penchant for cutting science programs. And I know of another 50 who received the same fate. And that's just for one small payload project.

    But if you listen to the talking head that is Michael Griffin, "The science program has not--in our forward planning, we do not take one thin dime out of the science program in order to execute this architecture." (http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=1812 2 [spaceref.com])

    Yes, Mr. Griffin, but you take out a few thousand employees overall.

  • How is this news? (Score:2, Informative)

    by JoeQuaker ( 888617 )

    From what I had been reading, the American shuttle has been grounded for the next few years. Perhaps even until 2012...

    And despite other comments I've read and the lack of coverage of this in the news, we WILL be depending on Russia during this period to get us to the ISS. We are buying Suyoz vehicles.

    The sale of them WAS out of the question since NASA could not purchase any space equipment from Russia because of the Iran Nonproliferation Act. Only a U.S. President could "bypass" the legislation.

    Read

  • NASA is scrapping the shuttle in less than 5 years. The replacement will be just as expensive, but FAR more capable and safe. It will get us to the moon with far greater capability for a much smaller cost. Not only that, but the lunar capability is designed to allow us to get to Mars.

    NASA's plan:

    Finish the obligation to the ISS and retire the shuttle fleet before 2011.
    In the meantime, use shuttle propulsion technology to develop new launch vehicles (Crew Launch Vehicle CLV and the heavy lift Cargo Launch Ve
    • The replacement will be just as expensive, but FAR more capable and safe. It will get us to the moon with far greater capability for a much smaller cost. Not only that, but the lunar capability is designed to allow us to get to Mars.

      Look we appreciate the PR blurb here, Mr. Deutsch. But like we told you this morning [slashdot.org]--YOU DO NOT WORK FOR US ANYMORE!

      -Eric

      • My statement is true. Sure, it sounds like a PR blurb, but I'm basing it on the results of the study that I linked to. The study uses standard cost-estimate techniques and is based on sound data. Now, personally, I think that T/Space [transformspace.com]'s plan is much more cost effective (and therefore more desireable, since it could allow for like 10 times as many missions for the same cost, but most likely would have same missions but less cost), but my statement was contrasting NASA's current plan with the Shuttle and Apoll
  • I actually don't mind the space science is getting cut, if it means getting the CEV up in time for STS retirement. The problem I have is it's being cut to cover "overruns" in the CEV. Really, the Shuttle isn't at fault here... you have to do X number of Shuttle missions before retirement, any way you slice it, so it's not really something you can adjust much in terms of funding. I'm more annoyed that the CEV is costing too much, or perhaps, being forced out the door too quickly.

    I also don't like WHERE th

  • Terrestrial Planet Finder (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Zobeid ( 314469 ) on Wednesday February 08, 2006 @05:34PM (#14672901)
    What chaps my hide the most is the loss of the Terrestrial Planet Finder. That's the one project with the biggest potential to change the whole way we look at the universe and our place in it. It could be the biggest thing since Galileo pointed his telescope at the planets and discovered they were worlds, they were places, not just specks of light.

    Can you think of anything that would light up the public's imagination, and interest in space exploration, more than finding Earth-like planets? Even if we didn't have any clear idea how to reach them, just knowing they exist would be huge.

    If I were calling the shots, we would fly one more mission with the existing shuttle -- to service Hubble -- and then pack the shuttles off to museums. This whole mad scramble to update the shuttle and make it safe to fly, just when we are on the verge of retiring it, is ridiculous.

    As for ISS, I say let's put it in mothballs until the CEV is ready -- and then restart ISS only if we can figure out what we're really going to use it for. Yeah, I know we have international agreements involving the ISS. We can re-negotiate them. Our partners have to realize the old plan no longer makes sense, if it ever did.
  • There's an interesting post over on Clark Lindsay's RLV and Space Transport News [spacetransportnews.com], part of which I've pasted below:

    http://www.hobbyspace.com/nucleus/index.php?itemid =894 [hobbyspace.com]

    * Florida Today points out that "In the past three years, Congress has given the [Shuttle] program $13 billion, and all that money has resulted in just two flights". Sword of Damocles: NASA must safely launch the space shuttles this year, or the program wont survive - Florida Today - Feb.5.06 [floridatoday.com].

    To put that into perspective:

    * Elon Musk has spen

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