The lessons from Columbia economist.com
[ I always like to check out the Economist for concise coverage & alternative links . They got shuttle flights at a bargain $400 meg /shot vs. Easterbrookg's $500m, but they're still not pleased. Excerpt: ]
It is difficult to know what impact the accident will have on the development of the ISS and on manned space exploration. In the short term, completion of the station, due next year, will be delayed because the shuttles, with a payload ten times that of Russian rockets, are needed to ferry heavy equipment into space. The ISS, run by a consortium of countries dominated by America, is already wildly over budget and behind schedule. When conceived in the 1980s, it was expected to cost $8 billion. It now looks like the final bill will be more than ten times that amount.
Getting to and from the station is also extremely expensive. One plan is to build a reusable “orbital space plane”, though that will not be ready until around 2012. Even if the shuttle programme were not ludicrously expensive, at more than $400m per launch (compared with the $60m-a-time the Russians charge for a Soyuz mission), the age of the fleet and the supporting infrastructure, and now this accident, make it less likely that the shuttles can be made to limp on until then. And the Soyuz programme is itself winding down: it is thought unlikely that its manufacturer, Energia, will build any more rockets after 2006. Some critics would like to mothball the ISS, but the station needs regular maintenance if it is to remain in orbit.
Sceptics suggest that the whole shuttle and space-station programme should be abandoned and the station gently steered into the sea, like Russia's Mir. After all, what is the point of human experimentation in space, except to improve, in a circular fashion, how humans get on in space? Most experiments would be better done remotely, by computer. Indeed, human intervention may well be dangerous, raising the risk of, say, a spillage, damaging fragile shuttle controls.
But NASA seems to have done well in persuading the American public and politicians that human space flight is part of what defines what it means to be American. (Nor is America alone in this: China is planning to blast its first manned flight into orbit later this year.) Many of those who have commented publicly on the Columbia tragedy think that the best way to honour the dead astronauts would be to persevere with the manned-flight programme. “We can’t step back. We wouldn’t be the greatest country on earth if we did,” said one senator, reflecting the general mood. Just before the accident, the administration had decided to boost funding for the shuttle programme by $770m, or almost a quarter, next year, according to budget details released on February 3rd. And President George Bush reiterated his support for manned space flight in his sombre television address on the day of the disaster. Ironically, the loss of another shuttle and its astronauts may turn out to be a boost for NASA’s manned space programme, its many flaws notwithstanding. |
