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I can imagine an alternative design for a smaller "space plane" designed to carry human payloads only. This smaller vehicle would be mated to a "service module" somewhat similar to that of the Apollo, containing engine, fuel tanks, and perhaps O2, H2O, and fuel cell tanks for in-flight supply, all of which would be jettisoned immediately after the re-entry burn. It would include enough fuel on each mission to assure that the spacecraft could make it to the ISS, and perhaps a rendezvous with the ISS should even be a routine feature of all missions, allowing the ISS crew to do a visual inspection of all tile surfaces.

This assembly in turn would sit atop one or a cluster of solid fuel boosters. Such a design would mean that there would be NO external fuel tank, and nothing adjacent to or above the orbiter as it was ascending -- thus nothing that could break off and damage the tiles. Such a design would vastly improve the safety of the tile system and drive down the risks of catastrophic failure to more acceptable levels.

Your thoughts?

The SRBs are a compromise as it is, and were opposed by most in the beginning because of safety issues (You can't turn 'em off).

I think the manned component and the cargo component should be separated, and soon. I'm not sure I would let the shuttle fly again.

Any manned component, though, will likely use liquid fuel.

A smaller spaceplane on an expendable launch vehicle has been conjectured for 15 years. The project was called HL-10 and was proposed to the Clinton Administration.

I was very disappointed that Vice-President Albert Gore chose to give money to the decaying Russian space team rather than fund US assembly lines to build the HL-10.

Had Clinton-Gore funded HL-10 as Congressional Republicans were requesting, the orbiter assembly lines in California could have remained viable. When Clinton chose to ignore HL-10 as a project, he killed the economy in Los Angeles and forced LA's economy into total control of the entertainment RATS.

Now, we have no way of replacing OV-102 and we can't build HL-10 unless a massive gov't spending program occurs.

Thanks Bill.