The space program must fly higher

Town Hall ^ | 2-4-03 | Charles Krauthammer

[vannrox]

February 4, 2003

The space program must fly higher

WASHINGTON--First we will mourn the brave and beautiful who fell out of the sky. Then, however, we will proceed to the usual post-catastrophe ritual: investigation and recrimination. We will search for the culprits. Some human agent will be hauled out to bear the blame. And we will search for the cause: flying foam, wing damage, insulating tiles, whatever--we will find it. But we will miss the point. The point is that the first 150 or so miles of space travel--braving the gravitational well of Earth and shooting through the atmosphere--is the most difficult and dangerous; the next million miles are comparatively easy. Yet going up and down that first 150 miles is the least glorious, least inspiring of all space adventures; it is the stuff beyond low-Earth orbit that speaks to our yearning as a restless, seeking species. Everyone notes how Columbia's flight was almost totally ignored until disaster struck, but it is hard to excite people about a space truck taking off every couple of months on service missions.

Here then is the heart of the problem: The shuttle does (BEG ITAL)nothing but this most dangerous, yet most mundane, short-haul trip, over and over and over again--until the odds catch up with it.

The risk of catastrophe for a commercial jet is one in 2,000,000. For a fighter jet, one in 20,000. NASA's best estimate for the shuttle was one in 240. Our experience now tells us that it is about one in 50.

That is a fantastic risk. It can be justified--but only for fantastic journeys. The ultimate problem with the shuttle is not O-rings or loose tiles, but a mission that makes no sense. The launches are magnificent and inspiring. But the mission is to endlessly traverse the most dangerous part of space--the thin envelope of the atmosphere--to get in and out of orbit (BEG ITAL)without going anywhere beyond. Yet it is that very beyond--the moon, the asteroids, Mars--that is the whole point of leaving Earth in the first place.

We slip the bonds of Earth not to spend 20 years in orbit studying zero-G nausea, but to set foot on new worlds, learn their mysteries, establish our presence.

Why was Columbia up there in the first place? It was conducting scientific experiments. But almost all such experiments can be conducted by robot. Sending human beings through takeoff and re-entry to study spider behavior in weightlessness is crazy.

It is almost as crazy to risk lives to act as trucking agent for the space station, which was the mission of nearly every other shuttle flight for the past three years. It is hard to justify the space station in the first place. It is not a platform for further space travel. It produces very little science. It is basically a laboratory for the biology of weightlessness. That's about it. Yet the shuttle has become its slave, hauling up huge pieces of equipment and bringing up astronauts to do the construction work.

What an end. What a dead end. After millennia of dreaming of flight, the human race went from a standing start at Kitty Hawk to the moon in 66 years. And yet in the next 34 years, we've gone nowhere. We've gone backward. We've retreated from the moon and spent our time spinning around endlessly in low-Earth orbit.

The way to consecrate the memory of those noble souls on Columbia is not to mindlessly repeat the last 20 years but to rethink the whole enterprise. For now, we need to keep the shuttle going because we have no other way to get into space. And we'll need to support the space station for a few years, because we have no other program in place.

But that is not our destiny, nor our purpose. If we're going to risk that first 150 miles of terrible stress on body and machine to get into space, then let's do it to get to the next million miles--to cruise the beauty and vacuum of interplanetary space to new worlds. Back to the moon. Establish a lunar base. And then on to Mars.

The Columbia tragedy will give voice to the troglodytes who want to give up manned space travel altogether. But the problem is not manned flight. The problem is (BEG ITAL)this kind of manned flight, shuttling up and down at great risk and to little end.

Icarus fell because he flew too close to the sun. Columbia--and the whole American manned space program today--fell because it flies too close to the Earth, repeatedly, gratuitously braving the terrors of takeoff and re-entry. It is time to once again raise our eyes and our horizons, and return to our original path, so inexplicably abandoned: to the moon and beyond.

[vannrox]

I agree with him. Space adventure is not about low earth orbit taxi drivers running spiders into space.

It is about the hope, dreams and wonder of the future of the human race; it is about loss; love; life and prosperity. It is about the natural human desire to explore and to reach to the fartherest points known...it is about heroes and daring. It is about the extreme.


We should be on the MOOM and MARS now. In over 20 years of space shuttle launches what great adventures have we been exposed to?

[First_Salute]

"mourn"

The proper word for expressing what is.

[A Vast RightWing Conspirator]

Space Trucking



Well we had a lot of luck on Venus
We always have a ball on Mars
We're meeting all the groovy people
We've rocked the Milky way so far
We danced around the Borealice
We're space trucking round the stars



2 times :
Come on, come on, come on,
Let's go space trucking



Remember when you did the woonshot
And Ponny Treeper lid the way
We'd move to the Canaveral moonstop
And every night would dance and sway
We got music in our solar system
We're space trucking round the stars



2 times :
Come on, come on, come on,
Let's go space trucking



The fireball that we rooled was moving
And now we got the new machine
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, the treaks said,
Man those cats can really sing"
They got music in their solar systems
They're rocked around the Milky way
They danced around the Borealice
They're space trucking every day



Many times :
Come on, come on, come on,
Let's go space trucking.

[happygrl]

Mourning is a way of expressing grief. If this writer, who's writing about what going on is Israel describes it as grief, who are you to argue ?

[Alberta's Child]

One of the things that's started to bug me over the last few days is the constant references to the need for "space exploration" and the acceptance of risks involved.

With all due respect -- those seven astronauts were not involved in much "space exploration" at all. The author makes this point very well. We stopped exploring space (from a manned perspective, that is) the moment we decided not to go beyond the moon. Maybe that's a practical reality, but let's not pretend that we are pushing any limits here -- we're just playing the odds until they catch up to us.

I agree that there needs to be a serious assessment about the future of the shuttle program. Not that we should eliminate it altogether, but that we should stop the costly, dangerous use of human crew members on missions that could be accomplished without them.

Columbus was truly an explorer, but if he dragged an extra 100 people along who had no real function on his ships just for the hell of it, we'd be calling him a moron.

[happygrl]

I am not referring to Krauthammer; he can use what ever term he desires. My post refers to your comment on another thread.

If you wnat to write a piece and use your volcabulary, feel free to do so. Who appointed you word cop ?

[Physicist]

Yet the shuttle has become its slave, hauling up huge pieces of equipment and bringing up astronauts to do the construction work.

It's worse than that: the ISS has become--as it was designed to be--the Shuttle's justification.

Here's what the space program should look like, right now. Robotic exploration, first and foremost. A heavy lift vehicle (Saturn V was a nice one). A simple, inexpensive capsule for moving astronauts (Soyuz). A simple, inexpensive cargo vehicle (Progress). A space station constructed of a few (preferably one) large, self-sufficient modules assembled on Earth and launched in one piece to orbit with the heavy lift vehicle (like Skylab, only not half-assed). A ground-controlled space tug capable of hauling and manipulating large pieces of equipment (station modules, for example).

If we had all of that, we could do FAR more in space, FAR more safely, for FAR less money. We have (or had) all of the necessary pieces except the space tug.

[Congressman Billybob]

Of course we will fly again. And fly more complex missions, to farther venues. And of course we will do that because as human beings, and as Americans, we could do no other.

I was delighted to hear Charles Krauthamer express these views on Sunday on Fox with Brit Hume. I am pleased to see the same views expressed in this piece on Townhall. (Like many Freepers, I never miss a Krauthammer byline.)

I also wrote similar sentiments before Krauthammer did. My latest column for UPI, first link below, was submitted to UPI late Saturday, though it is not on the wire yet. It may, I think, fairly be read as a companion-piece to Krauthammer's.

Congressman Billybob

Click for latest column for UPI, "Those in Peril on the Sea" (Not yet on UPI wire, or FR.)

As the politician formerly known as Al Gore has said, Buy my book, "to Restore Trust in America"

[Alberta's Child]

I'll add another comment to Krauthammer's, and it was something I first said after the Challenger disaster in 1986: You can be sure that the space program is ripe for a disaster when the sub-plots and stories about individual crew members become bigger than the missions themselves.

I knew the space program was going nowhere when I heard that some guy from the Back-End Boys (or whatever their name is) wanted to train for a trip on the shuttle.

[Frank_Discussion]

That's one of the most tragic things about the loss of Columbia; despite all the complaints about mere;y circling the Earth, this mission was pure science. It was exploration, not so much of space as a place, but as a tool for very special research.

And now we lost a bunch of the data, along with some great human beings.

[Alberta's Child]

That was one of the author's points -- 99% of the "research" that is done in space can be done just as easily without humans. In fact, I believe the only research that requires humans is the research on the effects of space travel on humans.

[hopespringseternal]

The biggest problem with the space program is the inability to come to terms with and admit that the shuttle is a failure. At least part of the reason this can't be admitted is that the blame lies with congress.

The shuttle is so hideously expensive it precludes anything but itself. It should have been replaced ten years ago. In 1986, it became abundantly clear that it was never going to provide the number of flights needed, nor was it going to reduce the cost of getting to orbit. In fact, it greatly increased it.

Lets first outline goals of reducing mission cost and decreasing turnaround time. Once the problem of reaching orbit is solved, the rest can be tackled.

[Brett66]

I think NASA needs to rethink their mission statement to include colonization of other worlds. If any current program doesn't work towards this goal, then it's terminated. That would mean the shuttle goes and ISS construction is halted immediately. They would immediately begin construction of a forward base at a lagrange point to facilitate contruction and servicing of spacecraft bound for the moon,Mars and near-Earth asteroids. Then they would build outposts on all of these and begin laying the groundwork for colonization. That's the best way to pay tribute to those that have given their lives for the exploration of space. In the back of the astronauts minds, the dream of space colonization is what they all yearned for. Why don't we at last acknowledge what this all about officially and stop playing these expensive contractor games?

[joesnuffy]

Whose paying the bill?

[Frank_Discussion]

OK, let me put it another way: The SpaceLab module contains experimentation that primarily requires at least human tending, and usually active participation to complete. This was a SpaceLab mission. Some of NASA's most intense and valuable data and discovery has come from SpaceLab missions. A bioreactor was flying on STS-107, growing cells. Big deal, right? Yes, it is a big deal - in microgravity, cells grow much faster, and when properly cultivated start to build internal structures, such as blood vessels. Imagine growing new patient-specific replicas of failed organs, to facilitate transplants. It's not pie-in-the-sky stuff, speculation, it is real.

Don't get me wrong: I certainly don't want to keep running laps around our beautiful ball of dirt. Hopefully, this will energize NASA to go exploring again.

Understand this, however: There is a general feeling among a lot of people (especially the media know-nothings) that all can be performed via robots. Human intuition and adaptability simply doesn't exist robotically, and despite rosy optimism for the future, it isn't a development you can bank on when planning space missions. Physically, the robots can't compete, the human form is too flexible and natually useful for the task of material collection and other acts of dexterity.

Beyond all of that, a lot of people want to BE in space, to work and live. Robots can't tell us very much at all about how to do that, but human experience can teach us what we need to know. Did you learn to ride a bike by reading about it, or did you just get on one and skin your knees a few times? I bet you did the latter.

[Anticommie]

What an end. What a dead end. After millennia of dreaming of flight, the human race went from a standing start at Kitty Hawk to the moon in 66 years. And yet in the next 34 years, we've gone nowhere. We've gone backward. We've retreated from the moon and spent our time spinning around endlessly in low-Earth orbit.

Very true and sobering. That sums up the whole space program.

[Alberta's Child]

A lot of the points you made seem to be refuted by NASA's own experience. NASA recently overhauled the Columbia to eliminate a lot of instrumentation and other things that were no longer needed -- the orbiters have become so automated that the human contribution to flying them has been greatly reduced.

And the capability of robotics may be overestimated in many cases, but there is no question about where the trends are taking us -- even areas as sensitive as human surgery are getting more involved with automation and robotics.

Despite the need for "human flexibility," it should also be noted that the human element is also the source of most errors in any complex process.

We'll see what happens over time. One thing I am quite sure of is that there is no need to have more than 3-4 crew members on any of these shuttle flights.

[Stefan Stackhouse]

Frankly, I am far less interested in Mars than in the asteroids. We need to develop an infrastructure so that asteroids can be nudged into (safely far away) earth orbit (or maybe in the same solar orbit as the earth, but leading or trailing us). The asteroids could then be mined, and the minerals processed into manufacturing feedstocks in space. We also need to develop massive solar energy farms in space. There is also speculation that He3 can be mined on the moon, and that this can become a feedstock for fusion power (and fusion reactors may also have to be built in space due to their size and potential hazards). With energy and material supplies developed, manufacturing operations can commence in space. The goal should be to develop a self-sustaining infrastructure in space, so that we don't need to send up everything from earth. Perhaps it could even get to the point where space is the preferred location for most manufacturing operations, yielding some huge environmental benefits on earth.

Most of this commercial activity can and should be private sector. But there are numerous crucial things that the govt will have to do to develop the infrastructure so that it can become possible.

Western exploration and settlement didn't happen because of scientific curiosity -- it happened because there were resources to be had (gold, land, etc.) Space exploration will have to be driven by the same basic economic realities.

[Frank_Discussion]

A lot of the points you made seem to be refuted by NASA's own experience.

Not to be too terribly hard on you, but the points that you are (not) making are refuted by your ignorance.

NASA recently overhauled the Columbia to eliminate a lot of instrumentation and other things that were no longer needed -- the orbiters have become so automated that the human contribution to flying them has been greatly reduced.

Nope. The shuttle avionics were upgraded to a more reliable and more flight-friendly digital system. No instruments were removed, in fact capability was added to the system. The new avionics weigh a great deal less and make more room up on the flight deck.

And the capability of robotics may be overestimated in many cases...

As I said, you can't plan space missions on technology that is speculative in the extreme. Robots have their uses in space - Pathfinder's little Soujourner robot taught us a lot about Mars in a very short period of time, and then surprised everyone by lasting much longer than expected. It was a coup for JPL and NASA. Humans in place on Mars would have done a lot more, but we can't go there yet. The robots in this case bridged the gap for work people will do in the future.

Despite the need for "human flexibility," it should also be noted that the human element is also the source of most errors in any complex process.

Yes, humans are error-prone. Especially when they build things like robots and spacecraft. The difference is, when we make mistakes, if they don't kill us, we can correct ourselves. Robots and automation, even self-correcting ones, tend to ride themselves down to destruction, lacking discernment to avoid pitfalls outside their data set. To make a robot that approaches the self-correction ability of humans, you'd essentially have to create a fake human, in a sense. Perhaps not in form, but in function. I expect that to occur someday, but it's not on the near horizon. Waiting for such advancement is a rather timid way to learn about the universe.

One thing I am quite sure of is that there is no need to have more than 3-4 crew members on any of these shuttle flights.

Here's where I agree with you somewhat: The Shuttle is overly-complex. It is a system that requires more tending than is desirable, and does require a lot of crew to accomplish its tasks.

But it is what we have to work with. It was revolutionary at its birth, and it is still the only ship that can do what it does, period. The test of American leadership in space is how we progress to a less-complex but capable next-generation system. I look forward to that.

[John Jamieson]

Dittos