

What We Lose With the End of the Shuttle Program - naish
http://spectrum.ieee.org/aerospace/space-flight/six-things-we-lose-with-the-end-of-the-shuttle-program/0

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sambeau
Interesting points from Prof. Brian Cox:

    
    
      * NASA costs less than 0.13% of  GDP 
        and provides 9x return on investment
    
      * The entire Shuttle Program cost approximately 
        the same as the UK bank bailout
    
      * The Iraq conflict so far has cost significantly 
        more than a manned mission to Mars
    

Source:

<https://twitter.com/profbriancox/status/88955884390195202>

<https://twitter.com/profbriancox/status/88956654539902976>

<https://twitter.com/profbriancox/status/88957802281840640>

~~~
praxeologist
I wonder how he comes to the conclusion of 9x return. I think that we ought to
invest in dragons instead and that they would bring returns in orders of
magnitude greater than any space program, plus they live longer.

Source: [http://blog.mises.org/6512/socialist-calculation-versus-
magi...](http://blog.mises.org/6512/socialist-calculation-versus-magical-
monsters/)

~~~
michaelchisari
Your link isn't even about NASA, it's just an ideological discussion (and not
a particularly coherent one). For reference, here's a list of NASA spin-offs:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_spin-off>

It's not hard to see the multiplier effect of our investment in NASA.

~~~
rbanffy
Like I said in another related post, the Ludwig von Mises Institute is not the
place you go for coherent discussions. The sooner we drop it as a source of
discussion arguments, the better.

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jerf
Yes, when you pour money down the money hole, you do tend to get a few things
in return. My real question, which we'll see answered hopefully over the next
few years, isn't "Were the capabilities we got with the shuttle _cool_?" but
"Was the shuttle a cost-effective way to obtain those capabilities?"

And it's really hard to look at the Shuttle program and say _yes_.

In general, we really need to get over whining about what we could have if
only we could spend money we don't have.

~~~
jamesbritt
_And it's really hard to look at the Shuttle program and say yes._

How effective/efficient would a tax-payer supported version of Xerox PARC or
the Golden Age Bell Labs be?

Something more pleasant than DARPA, for example.

~~~
russell
Funny thing about that. Bob Taylor ran ARPA and then Xerox PARC. May be that
he was his own golden age.

~~~
maaku
Nothing funny about it. The analogy is good. Garrett Reisman, astronaut, joins
SpaceX:

<http://www.spacex.com/press.php?page=20110304>

The time of NASA-monopoly (DARPA) is fading, and the time of commercial space
(Xerox PARC/Bell Labs) is just beginning. But it really shouldn't be anything
for anyone should get worked up over--Xerox PARC/Bell Labs ushered in golden
age of innovation and wealth creation, and DARPA still exists and still does
amazing things.

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ck2
I'm more horrified they canceled the James Webb telescope (or are just about
to).

~~~
garyrichardson
Holy shit! This just happened:

[http://appropriations.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?Doc...](http://appropriations.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=250023)

    
    
      $4.5 billion for NASA Science programs, which is $431 million 
      below last year’s level. The bill also terminates funding for 
      the James Webb Space Telescope, which is billions of dollars 
      over budget and plagued by poor management.

~~~
mturmon
Thanks for that link.

People should know that there's a lot of turmoil in the astrophysics community
about JWST. In current plans, JWST overruns have resulted in elimination or
long-term postponement of all other NASA astrophysics missions in the next
decade. Even non-flight-project research is being cut significantly.

~~~
nate_meurer
I am utterly incapable of intelligently commenting on the cost effectiveness
of this telescope, but I will note that all of NASA's current money problems
could be solved by allocating it just a tiny fraction of what we instead
wasted in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I'm sorry to keep talking about these fucking wars, but it really does make me
want to cry.

~~~
T-hawk
Expanding NASA's budget by 2x or even 10x would not solve its problems.
Parkinson's Law is as applicable to NASA as to any other organization. JWST
and the other missions will overrun any amount of time and budget allocated to
them.

~~~
nate_meurer
I had that thought as I was writing the comment, which is why I added the word
"current". But you're probably right to a large degree, and my only answer is
that, to the extent that larger budgets _don't_ decrease NASA'a fiscal
discipline, the investment is better made there.

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LordBodak
The Shuttle fails in its primary objective, that of being a "reusable"
vehicle. I attended a presentation by a NASA employee that explained the
Shuttle process from landing to launch, and I was amazed at how much of the
craft is replaced. I think we would have been far better off extending the
Apollo program to new missions, similar to the Soyuz (which is still flying
although much improved from the moon landing era).

~~~
gamble
The shuttle was the worst of both worlds. They replace enough parts to make
each mission absurdly expensive, and keep enough components in place that it's
extremely difficult to be sure they won't fail in flight.

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InclinedPlane
The Shuttle is inspiring, and compared to nothing it looks excellent. But on
the whole it is not a good system. It has unique capabilities that it uses
extremely rarely or not at all (such as the cross-range flight ability) but
which impose tremendous compromises on the system's cost, reliability, and
safety.

All of this added up to the system falling far, far short of its design goals
in payload cost and flight rate, by nearly 2 orders of magnitude. By any sound
measure the Shuttle is a failed experiment that was left to run, and bleed
NASA budgets dry, for far too long. On the whole each Shuttle mission cost
$1.6 billion dollars.

The alternative to not building the Shuttle was continuing with what we had
before, which even at a reduced budget compared to the Shuttle would have
resulted in larger space stations, moon bases, and perhaps manned Mars
missions. The alternative now to not continuing the Shuttle is relying on
commercial launch providers as the base of manned spaceflight, which looks to
be both cheaper and more capable than the Shuttle.

~~~
benihana
The shuttle mission, which was to provide a safe, reusable, cheap spaceflight
platform, failed on two of the three goals. It was reusable, but not cheap,
and not safe. We need a better LEO platform, not more shuttle missions.

~~~
InclinedPlane
3 of 3. The Shuttle is not reusable, it is at best refurbishable. In between
launches the SRBs and the ET have to be replaced and the orbiter itself has to
be processed including replacement of its main engines, draining of all
consumables, and extensive inspection of each one of the thousands of thermal
protective tiles. All in all the process takes months. This is not reusability
in any meaningful sense of the word, it borders on a complete overhaul of the
vehicle. Imagine if on landing a 747 it had to be drained of fuel, the engines
replaced, the center fuel tank replaced.

This is a major factor in why it is so expensive to operate the Shuttles. They
are not truly reusable, and the refurbishment in between launches takes so
long and requires such an extensive permanent staff and facilities that the
per-launch cost is astronomical. If the Orbiters were truly reusable then they
could easily quadruple or more the number of flights per year for little
increased total cost.

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chrismealy
7\. Dead astronauts.

The space shuttle was a bad idea and dangerous from the start. Bring on the
robots!

~~~
rrrazdan
Not to sound insensitive but 134 flights and 2 accidents is a good enough
record. I for one would have volunteered to go, if I was presented with these
odds. Robots can't do everything.

~~~
OstiaAntica
The risk is worth it, if the mission actually does something. Most of the
shuttle missions were just jerking off in orbit or hauling stuff to the space
station.

The shuttle program was an unmitigated disaster that set back space
exploration a generation. By trying to build a "reusable" space plane we ended
up with the most complex machine ever built-- and complexity is dangerous--
that does nothing especially well.

~~~
bdunbar
Shuttle does one thing very well: it's a gorgeous sight watching her lift off.
And seeing her glide to a landing is like poetry.

Too complex, too expensive, not best at any one thing.

But a sight to see.

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protomyth
NASA has been screwed since someone made the decision that we needed to land
on the Moon by the end of the 60's. We didn't build the infrastructure to go
and stay in space. Being first should never have been a goal. Being there to
stay should have been.

------
pnathan
We lose a lot. We gain incentive to go out into space privately and
commercialize spaceflight.

Is living in a Futurama-esque commercialization of space worth it?

I believe so, yes. Bring on the frontier!

------
mcculley
Aren't some of these things possible with the X-37B?

~~~
gvb
Some, with limitations to most of the retained capabilities. The X-37B is
substantially smaller and is not manned.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_X-37>

1\. Gentle delivery of large modules for attachment to existing complexes. -
Probably lost, the main reason the shuttle is gentle is because it carries
fragile humans.

2\. Bringing cargo down gently. - Partially lost: the cargo bay is much
smaller.

3\. Safe "proximity operations." - Lost or at least made much more
challenging.

4\. Temporary deployment of a workbench in orbit for experiments, repairs, and
other assembly. - Lost.

5\. High-precision research orbits with specialized instrumentation. - Likely
not lost.

6\. Flexibility of crew composition. - Lost.

~~~
rbanffy
How many times did we actually need those capabilities?

edit:

> 1\. Gentle delivery of large modules for attachment to existing complexes. -
> Probably lost, the main reason the shuttle is gentle is because it carries
> fragile humans.

I cannot imagine we don't have any launcher that can do that. Any launcher,
when approaching its payload limit, should be very gentle (as in pull low
G's). A Saturn V was much gentler than the SRBs in terms of vibration, BTW.

> 2\. Bringing cargo down gently. - Partially lost: the cargo bay is much
> smaller.

How many times did we need that? We could keep one shuttle operational for
that kind of mission or just build a bus-sized capsule that would go up empty
and land on parachutes.

> 3\. Safe "proximity operations." - Lost or at least made much more
> challenging.

I am not sure I see a scenario where we would need that. The arms attached to
the station are adequate for manipulating objects close to it and capable of
doing it very precisely. Automated cargo vehicles have been servicing space
stations for decades.

> 4\. Temporary deployment of a workbench in orbit for experiments, repairs,
> and other assembly. - Lost.

Do we really gain so much by bringing the workbench back? Why would
"temporary" be an advantage here? Couldn't we just pack the supplies and leave
the workbench there?

> 6\. Flexibility of crew composition. - Lost.

We could have built a larger Apollo capable of launching 7 people. For a
fraction of the price, most likely. If putting people in LEO were cheaper (a
promise the shuttle never fulfilled) we would have far more diverse crews in
space.

And all of that negates the fact the shuttle is useless for anything beyond
LEO. And LEO is costly because we have to take everything with us.

~~~
icegreentea
When we did need it, we -needed- it. Hubble for example.

~~~
nate_meurer
Wait, I'm sorry, I see what you mean. You're right; manned shuttle missions
were the only way to keep Hubble from going to waste.

~~~
hugh3
Perhaps, but what's the cost of "fuck it, we'll just build a replacement
Hubble" in Shuttle mission equivalents?

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lcargill99
Blame Nixon. Or OPEC.

~~~
maaku
Interesting that this is at the bottom; people who downvoted this probably
don't know their NASA history...

(EDIT: for context, most of trouble NASA has gotten itself into stem from
commitments made for political reasons to appease the Nixon administration and
a Congress dealing with fallout from the OPEC oil embargo in '73--when Apollo
was winding down and Shuttle revving up.)

