NASA at the Turning Point

On August 30, 2011 the AAAS (the publishers of Science magazine) held a webinar entitled “NASA at a Turning Point”. The expert panel included Wayne Hale former manager of the Space Shuttle program, John Grunfeld former astronaut who performed some of the ETA’s during the last Hubble repair mission, and Pat Duggins a writer known as the voice of NASA on NPR.

A major issue tackled by this group was the use of robotic science missions versus manned exploration. Grunfeld said that a manned Mars mission, if possible today, would cost $100 billion compared to about $1 billion for the Mars Rover mission. But when you compare the scientific return per dollar spent the missions are comparable. That’s because there is so much a geologist on the surface could do. Wayne Hale compared the few grams of lunar rock that the Soviet Union succeeded in returning to earth compared to the 850 pounds the U.S. returned during the 6 successful Apollo landings. “We got a bargain” according to Hale.

There was some concern voiced by questions from the webinar viewers regarding the resupply of the Space Station. Wayne Hale said that the Progress launch vehicle that failed in August is the most reliable rocket in the world. The ISS has supplies for a full year but that the Soyuz spacecraft currently docked at the ISS have a kind of freshness date and those dates expire around the end of November. Another questioner wondered why the shuttles couldn’t be pushed back into service. Hale says that people have been laid off, there aren’t any external tanks that are available and “you can’t go buy one on EBay”. It would take 2-3 years to put the shuttles back in service.

It is interesting to hear people argue over the success or the failure of the Space Shuttle program. You can hear people like Amos Zeeberg compare the shuttle launch rate compared to the original objective of once per month - falling short by a factor of 13 ( http://discovermagazine.com/2011/jul-aug/22-how-to-avoid-repeating-debacle-of-space-shuttle). But Wayne Hale says the problem is that the shuttle worked too well. It was only supposed to last for 10 years. There was little incentive to develop something better. The result is that the spacecraft didn’t evolve. Instead, the developers of the space shuttle starting as early as 1972 were building a spacecraft that would still be in service almost 40 years later. “That’s like asking the Wright brothers to build a DC-3” said Wayne Hale. That’s actually an understatement. The DC-3 was built only 30 years after the Wright brothers. Grunfeld said the Space Shuttle program achieved every objective except for cost per flight. Certainly the Hubble/Space Shuttle combination exceeded all expectations. Grunfeld is looking forward to the Webb Space Telescope which he calls Hubble 2.0.

Wayne Hale went through some shuttle numbers: 135 launches, 852 filled seats, 355 different people from a total of 22 nations. Yes, the program should have done more but it did do a lot.

The ultimate question on this day was “What should NASA be doing?” Wayne Hale didn’t hesitate, send people to Mars. Pat Duggins said NASA should be building bigger heavy lift rockets. John Grunfeld said “Hit the simple button”. Do what NASA can do now with Mars missions in the future.