NASA Chief: Shuttle and Space Station were mistakes
 

NASA administrator says space shuttle was a mistake
By Traci Watson
USA TODAY

The space shuttle and International Space Station — nearly the whole of the U.S. manned space program for the past three decades — were mistakes, NASA chief Michael Griffin said Tuesday.

In a meeting with USA TODAY's editorial board, Griffin said NASA lost its way in the 1970s, when the agency ended the Apollo moon missions in favor of developing the shuttle and space station, which can only orbit Earth.

“It is now commonly accepted that was not the right path,” Griffin said. “We are now trying to change the path while doing as little damage as we can.”

The shuttle has cost the lives of 14 astronauts since the first flight in 1982. Roger Pielke Jr., a space policy expert at the University of Colorado, estimates that NASA has spent about $150 billion on the program since its inception in 1971. The total cost of the space station by the time it's finished — in 2010 or later — may exceed $100 billion, though other nations will bear some of that.

Only now is the nation's space program getting back on track, Griffin said. He announced last week that NASA aims to send astronauts back to the moon in 2018 in a spacecraft that would look like the Apollo capsule.

The goal of returning Americans to the moon was laid out by President Bush in 2004, before Griffin took the top job at NASA. Bush also said the shuttle would be retired in 2010.

Griffin has made clear in previous statements that he regards the shuttle and space station as misguided. He told the Senate earlier this year that the shuttle was “deeply flawed” and that the space station was not worth “the expense, the risk and the difficulty” of flying humans to space.

But since he became NASA administrator, Griffin hasn't been so blunt about the two programs.

Asked Tuesday whether the shuttle had been a mistake, Griffin said, “My opinion is that it was. … It was a design which was extremely aggressive and just barely possible.” Asked whether the space station had been a mistake, he said, “Had the decision been mine, we would not have built the space station we're building in the orbit we're building it in.”

Joe Rothenberg, head of NASA's manned space programs from 1995 to 2001, defended the programs for providing lessons about how to operate in space. But he conceded that “in hindsight, there may have been other ways.”

TMQ must be happy to see this.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/fea...-fulltext.html

Interesting.

Over the years I always thought of the shuttle program with a great sense of pride and awe. Seeing that sucker launch in all its glory, and then return a few days later like a giant airplane always seemed so damn cool. The Challenger tragedy was obviously a major blow, a kick in the collective American stomach, but I never felt that was anything more than a temporary setback.

Yet here we are. Apparently it wasn't all it was cracked up to be, from a programmatic sense. But I still will always look back fondly on those "glory days."

The problem with the shuttle was you still needed a rocket to get it into orbit, and we never tried to improve the capability of take-off/landing like an airplane.

Also, NASA needs some direction. What did we really gain from going up in the shuttle, sure we conducted some cool experiments, but without a larger goal in mind, the missions had no focus.

Never going to happen. Unless the US wants to stop by the Station established on the moon in 2017 by China.

Funny, this is a case where you snooze you win. China was a country that wanted to help with the international space station , but was blocked by the US from doing so.

There space program is in full swing and will beging orbitting the moon in 2007 with an unmaned space craft. 2010 they plan to start landing probes on the moon leading up to building a station on the moon by 2017.

I wonder where the Space Station will be in 2017?



I wonder what would of happened if the shuttle program never came into place and we had continued to see the moon as our future in space?

LOL That would probably be about right. :D

I always thought the shuttles were really cool. It just seems like a step back to begin using spacecraft like the Apollo missions.

The problem with the shuttle has always been the compromises made when funding dried up at the end of Apollo.

Do we care if they build a space station on the moon? Heck, we knew 30 years ago there would be no practical point to building one on the moon.

Yet we are planning to build one now.

And, they (edit: the Chinese) are going to build it with our money. That's the real kick in the teeth. We don't have enough money to fund the space program, yet our interest payments on the debt instruments they've bought over the past few years will be a nice annuity for them to fund their own programs.

I think a space station on the moon is a very good idea. As we start to explore deeper into space, we need to learn more about surviving for long periods of time in space. A moon base would be a good step.

Although, I don't think we a quite in the space age. Once we find a cheap, reliable method to defeat gravity, we will have entered the space age.

Shut down NASA and give the education dept all the money.

Yeah, because they've been an effective branch of government.

:rolleyes:

Same results.

I long for the day when the head of departments in each of the federal agencies would have the guts, as Griffin had done, to say that the trillions spent in the past 30 years have been failures. Yes, including DoD.

Shut down NASA and give the money to taxpayers.

Sorry, but I believe we need less astronauts and more scientist working at NASA.

I know we have to finish the damn space station, but I think we need more R&D, more unmaned missions, and less space walks. Right now there is not a big need for Astronauts in space. You get A bigger bang for the buck if you leave those pesky air breathers at home.

We don't really have to finish it. You can write it off and watch it burn up in the night sky.

I don't know how many "scientists" there are, but I would guess there are a lot more than 134 of them.

Don't forget their support staff. The people in charge of their training, their health, and all their other humanly needs.

BTW--- When I say we need more NASA Scientist, I mean we need more Scientist employed by NASA, not those bargain basement sub contracted Laborers.

Oh you mean college students? :D

...

This perception is the problem.

Those Apollo type spacecraft are much better suited for re-entry from space to atmosphere than something that looks like an airplane. I think the problem here is that congress got in the way and demanded 're-usable' spacecraft, which ended up costing way more per launch, even in adjusted dollars, than the disposable ones. The idea should have been shitcanned after the first study about heat on the wings. Just atrocious to carry on after that.