Successful Launch of the Shuttle 26-7-05

23 years the space shuttle has been probing the near-space around the planet Earth. The maintenance record is not much better than Ford at making reliable cars. Ford cars are known to breakdown and so does the shuttle. The good thing about when a Ford breaks down, it is Found On the Road Dead if you don't Fix Or Repair Daily. The shuttle actually kills the crew of seven repeatedly when it breaks down.

The point is Not 'is the shuttle ready to fly again'? The point should be 'why are we sending this barking dog into space again'?

The USA, as a nation of technology, has had 23 years of R&D to come up with a new and better design. The Shuttle unit design is probably from over 25 years ago. That is before the invention of the first home resonal computer.

Why hasn't the USA started using the newer scram jet technology to skim the upper atmosphere and power up the rockets at the near-space entry level. It is much easier to take a large Scram jet up to 100K feet travelling close to Mach 6 and launch into space with rocket power. The space shuttle uses rocket power from ground zero. That is old, out-of-date technology.

The USA and mankind needs an innovative design now, not later. We need to bury this oversized coffin called space shuttle in the ground never to fly again. We need to do this soon. It's design and technology is antiquated.

My hope the crew of the Space Shuttle is 'God's Speed' and a 'successful mission'. I worked at NASA, Johnson Space Center for a while and I do miss the excitement of a good mission. However, I know the technology of the old toys there as well. All of the equipment could and should go straight to the Smithsonian Space Museum as it is almost considered antique.

I'm with you there...all the way.
Well said.

I work at NASA now, and it was very exciting. If you did indeed work there, I think you'd know the reason why there hasn't been any real advancement...politics.

No one has pushed NASA to do something useful, until W Bush. Every other president has looked more for a way to regress NASA...

All I can say is, I hope this kick in the ass keeps up. Finally we have outlines, and goals to meet! Haven't had that in decades!

You are correct, I do know the reason. Hate to point fingers but the former President was more interested in Cigars and Monica than space or anything else of value. Viva La Bush hope we can simmer the mess in the middle east and get our troops home. Then maybe we can really focus in on space. Maybe the next President will carry on the persuit. I do miss the Center, I was more of a behind the scenes support person into most every building on site. You just explained why I left. No real goal in decades.

I worked for NASA/JPL in the late 90s and it was crap. Clinton and the Dem had hacked appart our funding and put no goals toward us except the ISS planning.

The ISS is great and all, in theory, but its usless in many ways too.

We need real funding to build sustainable space bases, we need to go to Mars, and we need to send probe to other star systems.

Nice to see a successful shuttle launch, good luck.

(and jayzuss wept guys you're scrapping out the barrel to blame all NASA's problems on Clinton.

How about Congress?
How about H Bush?
How about Reagan?
How about Carter?
How about Ford?
How about Nixon?
none of that crowd did much behind the razzamataz and the endless 'we're gonna........' plans that came to naught.

.......and I'd hold judgement on 'dub-ya' to see if there is any actual product at the end of the day too, if I were you)

i agree with the ideas of this thread
yes politics is the main problem

GWB did set goals yes; but hes not as "out of the box" as mr JFK was

oh how i wish they didnt kill JFK

JFK was a thinker ahead of his times. He was a true visionary when it came to space. I'm surprised that LBJ and Nixon didn't try to sabatoge JFK's vision and our efforts to succeed in the incredible walk on the moon. Too bad we will never know all those involved in the conspiracy of assassinating President Kennedy.

Another death that I'm not going to be thrilled about is the Hubble Telescope. The pictures are awsome. They have showed us so much about our universe. Stephen Hawkings, one of the greatest Astrophyists ever has come out and said his theory that Black Holes swallow all information is incorrect. He now thinks some of that information escapes. I believe some of this hypothesis has come from the study of Quasars and the material around black holes and can be attributed to Hubble.

To further the study of black holes, we must use other- than visual instruments and I understand that. However, it would be so nice to keep the Hubble close to the space station where repairs could be continued into the distant future.

We need a launch of a new era in space exploration with visionary politicians at the wheel.

Politics is definately the problem with NASA.

I doubt you can say JFK was the "great thinker" people label him. He was fighting the cold war and NASA and the moon were "POLITICAL" tools for him not some great intellectual challenge. I like the benefit we got from it, but don't confuse cold war politics with real desires for progress. In fact I can't name a US president that had anything other than just his "legacy" in mind while in office. Any great technical challenge since WWII has been politicaly influenced.

Let the Chinese start construction on a moon base. See if whoever is president at the time doesn't suddenly find a need to "challenge" NASA. NASA is a government agency so therefore it is subject to the politics of the time.

I believe that the next really "BIG" thing in space travel will be privately funded. Several of the world's wealthiest men (Branson, Allen, etc.) are scrambling to position themselves for what might be the game of the century, cheap access to space for companies and individuals. Cheap satellite lauches and reletively cheap space tourism. That's where the excitement is. I feel that even some of the scientific programs at NASA will get farmed out to private companies in the near future.

There is a downside, though, to all this private space racing.

Las Vegas Mercury
Few journalists have been allowed inside the secure confines of the 50-acre "space campus" Bigelow Aerospace has built in North Las Vegas, and with good reason. Bigelow has long shunned any kind of publicity for himself, and since he is investing up to $500 million of his personal fortune into the aerospace company, he's reluctant to give away too much information to potential competitors. It's the same reason his facility is surrounded by fences, gates, cameras and an imposing security force made up of ex-military types.

The company's website
www.bigelowaerospace.com...

Branson is hoping to have Virgin Glactic up and running by 2010. That's less then 5 years away! He's already dumped a ton of money into Burt Rutan's SpaceShip 1, and Scaled Composites is building the fleet.
www.virgingalactic.com...
www.scaled.com...

Did it cost a $billion to build that camera crane and attach it to the shuttle? Oh wait they developed that glue to mend tiles didn't they, .......unbelievable isn't it.