NASA Grounds Shuttle Fleet While Probing Columbia Disaster

voanews.com ^ | 02 Feb 2003, 01:22 UTC | David McAlary

[Palladin]

This TIME magazine article reinforces everything you have said here:

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101030210-418518,00.html

[onedoug]

May I ask you to look at post #14 of this thread?

Best.

[Orion78]

[UnChained]

Why Mars? A Mars landing would be much less significant symbolically than the lunar landings. I think the asteroid belt has more potential for space industry. If pure science is the justification, we can get that without manned landings.

I'm pro space exploration but Mars seems like a total dead end that would siphon off resources from more productive missions.

It's really hard to get anything into orbit. Once we have climbed out of a hole, why would we want to descend into another one?

[Destro]

Why Mars? Because going there would build up the scince to then go to the asteroid belt which is not economical for generations to come.

Yes for pure science. I am all for spending on science and I just think private industry could do a better job of getting us to Mars and back if there was competition for a congressional prize.

I am all for a moonbase too. If we can have scientific camps in the Antartic we can have them on the moon too. My palmpilot has more calculating power than the computers that Apollo used so the Moon is way do-able.

[Regulator]

Shuttle mission usually runs around $500 million; they don't charge all of that to one satellite (but then, they haven't carried a commercial satellite since the 80's).

A geosynchronous Atlas launch runs around $120 million; Ariane about $130; Proton about $85 million. To use the shuttle for a Geo launch you'd need to fly an upper stage with the satellite; that'd be probably an extra $20-30 million (I don't know the individual costs of upper stages like the IUS, PAM-D or Centaur; just guessing based on other non-upper stage rocket prices).

[UnChained]

Why Mars? Because going there would build up the scince to then go to the asteroid belt which is not economical for generations to come.

Actually, the asteroids are easier/cheaper to reach than Mars. Asteroid missions would ramp up science also. The main advantage to the asteroids is that there is an entire planetary mass worth of pre mined contsruction material that is already in free fall.

If you imagine that humans have a spacefaring future, the asteroid belt is the logical means toward that end. Any Mars mission would just be a diversion.

[Mamzelle]

vicarious rider...

[AdA$tra]

Understanding failure mechanisms in a complex system is crucial to reducing risks, even more so when lives are at stake.

There was a horrible car wreck that I saw on the way home from church today. Do you suppose we should ground all of our automobiles until we have fully investigated all of the possible causes. Thank God Orville Wright, Chuck Yeager and all those brave explorers and pioneers in aviation didn’t have your approach to space exploration and discovery. There have only been two fatal mishaps involving the shuttle in 107 tries. I am sure the B-17 crews over Europe in WWII would take those odds any day.

[Magnum44]

...meaning?

[Magnum44]

I think most of the failure mechanisms in a car are understood. Its not even a close analogy.

There are protocols in this business that are followed, whether it is to reduce risk of loss of life, or the risk of loss to investors. You don't ask companies, or taxpayers to spend hundreds of millions of dollars (or lives) without trying to fully understand the risks they are taking.

[Magnum44]

Come on now, do be subtle. Say whats on your mind.

[Mamzelle]

Meaning you made a silly remark about what I might have seen or not seen. How would you know what I've seen or who I know, and what significance would it have in any case? As a taxpayer, I'm tired of paying for rides instead of exploration. All the baloney about what is worthwhile about the program is reduced to the inevitable "dreams of flight." I don't want to pay to make a hobby pilot's dreams come true, in reality or vicariously. We've been there, done that. I want what is done to matter...bring me home some bacon instead of dreams for a change.

I repeat from my former post...If Nasa can't get back to focusing on exploration, instead of providing ponies for jockeys, I say shut it down completely.

As for what I dare say this day after the disaster, the thread's subject is the fate of the Shuttle program. I say reduce it and refocus on what we were supposed to do, which is explore. That ride Clinton gave to John Glenn to reward him for playing ball about the technology which should NOT have gone to China...well, that says a whole lot about the Mystique of the Astronaut the the Ride of Reward.

[Magnum44]

As a taxpayer, I'm tired of paying for rides instead of exploration

There now, I know that feels better since your true agenda is out there. And I would not insult you about that agenda, disagree maybe, but as I stated, there are two camps on the matter. Sorry you don't think they can coexist.

I also wouldn't argue with you about the Clinton/Glenn payoff ride.

But your earlier comment remains inaccurate and inappropriate. You certainly can't say Dan Golden favored the manned program over unmanned. He complained about it immensely, and he was never an astronaut either.

I want what is done to matter...bring me home some bacon instead of dreams

And better meds, advances in metallurgy, or other sciences don't matter? The development of better fuel cells, solar cell and battery technology, navigation aids, electronics in general, and the jobs and industries that develop out of those don't matter? Just what 'bacon' would make you happy?

[Mamzelle]

re: As a taxpayer, I'm tired of paying for rides instead of exploration)))

I'll repeat it, just in case. Never intended to be cryptic, sorry about that.

Rides were the aim of Nasa because test pilots and their adoring handlers set the agenda. Listen to every astronaut talk about exploration and he only wants to tell you of his dreams of flying. Enough, already. These dreams are not the problem of the taxpayer.

Bacon... for starters, enough of this perennial angst. Three times is plenty. Now the whole program will slow as we investigate all the reasons why it happened, when we could have been sending lots of useful unmanned failures into space.

It's time not to worry about building a better spacecraft. The Russians have decided that question for us.

Let's build a better astronaut.

[Magnum44]

Rides were the aim of Nasa because test pilots and their adoring handlers set the agenda....Bacon... for starters, enough of this perennial angst....Let's build a better astronaut.

Why do I know I am arguing with a woman? Hey, your angry, you got to get those 10,000 words out somehow. I'll be the gentleman and let you get the last say. But then I cant argue anyway if you only answer in esoterics.

[Xthe17th]

IMHO, they need to do something about SPACE DEBRIS. There's all kinds of junk flying around up there that would wreak havoc if it collided with an 18,000 MHP space shuttle. It might already have.

[Mamzelle]

Well, how do *I* know I'm arguing with a pilot? Couldn't be the smugness, the condescension, the sexism, could it?

Esoterics?

Just in the past ten years, since Desert Storm, we've made tremendous strides in robotics. Time to dispose of the frail humans, and build us some astrodroids. Cheaper, less sentimental, and far less corrupt.

[Jim Noble]

>>We should have an SSTO spaceplane to replace the shuttle<<

The same Congress that cancelled the SST crippled the shuttle.

This disaster has been thirty years in the making. And even more of a disaster than the loss of our heroes is the technological stagnation that has come with STS.

We now must make a huge, huge investment to restart R&D that was abandoned in the 1960s.

Or maybe China will sell it to us?

[Jim Noble]

>>We have done this before; it was called the Saturn V. <<

Are we even capable of building a Saturn V today?