Science and technology
Babbage
The last shuttle
Goodbye to all that
Jul 8th 2011, 15:40 by G.C. | CAPE CANAVERAL
YOUR correspondent, as regular readers of The Economist will be aware, has never been much of a fan of the Space Shuttle. It was an expensive answer to a problem that did not need answering in the first place—namely how to put humans into orbit, at taxpayers’ expense, to do jobs which robots could manage more safely and cheaply.
Nevertheless, to witness the last ever shuttle launch, of Atlantis, on July 8th, was a poignant moment. A spacecraft—any spacecraft—is an awesome machine. And the shuttle is not just any spacecraft. For all its flaws, it was a bold idea: to replace the throw-away rockets that began the space age with a truck that could go in and out of orbit routinely. But trucks are no use if they do not deliver the goods, and the shuttle never did. If it had, then it would not, for instance, have remained a hostage to the weather. Routine transport systems do not quail in the face of the odd thunderstorm, but NASA will not launch a shuttle if storms are forecast within 20 miles of the Kennedy Space Centre and, with clouds gathering around Cape Canaveral, the final decision to let Atlantis fly was not made until 15 minutes before liftoff.
Nor, if shuttle launches had become routine, would they attract much attention from the general public. Train and plane spotting are regarded as eccentric precisely because they make a fetish of something quotidian. But more than half a million people came to watch the launch of Atlantis, because it was not quotidian. And that number was not just because Atlantis was the last; it was not untypical of other launches.
It also meant that your correspondent was advised to get to Kennedy early—and, indeed, he rose at 2am and was on site at 3. It was probably wise advice. He passed tourists staking out their places on bridges and shores with good visibility, even at that time in the morning. But it did mean a long vigil, listening to the latest details of the fuelling of Atlantis, the breakfast habits of her crew, and the appearance by one of the Muppets at something called a “tweetup”, which was, apparently, NASA’s acknowledgement of the phenomenon of social media.
It also meant watching the clock tick backwards.
Sergei Korolev, the father of the Soviet space programme, despised the manufactured drama of the countdown. When the appointed time came to blast Yuri Gagarin into orbit, he simply pushed a button that completed the ignition circuit and watched the motors start. But NASA, the space agency of the land that invented Hollywood, has always understood that what it does is as much a branch of show business as it is a scientific and technological endeavour. Countdowns are an integral part of the theatre, even though the clock seems to spend as much time stopped as it does ticking towards zero. Indeed, there was at one point the minor absurdity of a countdown to the resumption of the countdown.
Eventually, though, the moment came. After a small delay caused by worries about the retraction of one of the supporting gantries, the engines ignited, the air shook and Atlantis rose into the clouds on a Biblical pillar of smoke. Eight and a half minutes later she was in orbit, ready to complete her mission of carrying supplies to the space station. In that respect, at least, she has fulfilled her goal of becoming a space truck. But acting as a grocery-delivery van was probably not what, more than 30 years ago, the original shuttle’s designers had in mind.
Read on: The end of the Space Age
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I am flabbergasted at how ignorant and uniformed the author of this article is. Has he ever read anything regarding how the Shuttle works, or how incredibly complex the vehicle is? For starters the reason why there is a bad weather limitation is because of visibility issues both during launch and after a launch abort contingency. The sensitive tiles can also be damaged due rain impacting the vehicle at the launch vehicles high speeds, not to mention the minor issue of lightening strikes. Our humble correspondent is also stating that the shuttle “did not deliver goods”. I would highly recommend that he educates himself on how International Space Station came to be, and to deduce what elusive vehicle put the modules up in orbit out of the launch vehicles that exist. It would also be informative for our correspondent to read on why there are holds (I’ll give you a hint: in order to ensure the safety of the crew and ensure that all systems are working properly). This article is downright insulting to the people that have supported this program, I’m well aware that the economist tries to author provocative articles and ideas, but this correspondent obviously did not do any research before he wrote this article!
-Lowly NASA Engineer
Farewell, space shuttle. So long, and thanks for all the fish.
The countdown is necessary. Launching the space shuttle is hardly as simple as pressing a button.
If there's any benefit to the end of the shuttle, it's that, at long last, The Economist can shut the hell up about it.
"When the appointed time came to blast Yuri Gagarin into orbit, he simply pushed a button that completed the ignition circuit and watched the motors start."
Yeah, and we see how successful *their* space program was...
Farewell, good bye or so long but forgotten. Despite all the criticisms, the STS has done more good than can be measured. May the best is yet to come.
For everyone's sake I hope this launch marks the beginning of a new and exciting chapter in space exploration rather than an ending and foreboding sign of things to come.
@noles82 So successful, in fact, that they're the only one still able to ferry people up to the ISS...
....for the sake of argument, if we were to say the Shuttle program's ONLY significant contribution was that it launched the Hubble Space Telescope into orbit, we would still have been able to say it was SMASHING success!
Flouster, I'm afraid, misses the point. The sensitivity and complexity of the shuttle are precisely why it could never become a quotidian truck. Its original selling as such was, to be charitable, a case of being economical with the truth.
As to Noles82's comment, it is true that the USSR never reached the moon with a manned mission, but the Soviets were the first into space with both unmanned and manned satellites, under Korolev's tutelage. They also put up Mir, a space station which lasted 15 years - a record the ISS has yet to beat. And they have lost only four cosmonauts on active service, while America has lost 14 astronauts. They still have manned-launch capability, too.
I agree with the notion that NASA's Space Shuttles were - however defined and whatever that is - "overly successful", but some points, esp. as to being subject to weather conditions is something that even the best aviation-related bodies, devices, and the like cannot beat perfectly.
That being said, yea, TE, I believe, is right with success rate etc. - As for weather, count-down necessity ... not sure
The author of article argues that robots are better suited for space exploration than humans. This is surely true today, but robotics technologies of the seventies, when the shuttle was conceived, was not at that standard.
The shuttle was a worthy project of the 80's. Now is time to retire it and use the best technologies of our time to explore and exploit space.
The countdown is not for drama purposes. A launch of a spacecraft consist of a carefully planned sequence of events which are to happen at specific times before and after lift off. The timescale used for this purpose defines time 0 at liftoff. Therefor time counts down before liftoff and counts up afterwards.
Which is it, G.C.? Either manned-launch capability is a waste of money or it's an accolade of achievement. But it can't be both. According to you, it's wasteful in lieu of robots for the US. For Russia, it's an indication that they are still superior to us.
That aside, Soviet satellites were trash. During the Cold War, Soviet Satellites were de-orbiting and/or failing to respond at a rate exponentially faster than US satellites. (For more on this, see "The Fallacy of Star Wars", pages 196-197.)
Anyway, the criticism of the "countdown" as some ad hominem on the superficiality of the US space program is weak and ultimately indicative as to the lack of knowledge regarding the benefits the program has provided.
Science exploration is rewarding in it self. Science is not about economics and how can you put a price on things like Velcro that leads to other things. The success to have the ability to compensate so may variables to send something into space. I do agree that machines can do it better but that does not put a dollar value.
I just like space exploration because it puts the great and wonderful humanity, gods ultimate creation, in place and perspective. The great Pale Blue Dot.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Blue_Dot
Helping to understand the universe is a reward in it self that can not be measured in economical means. Just remember for Voyager 1 as it is now entering interstellar space passing the reach of our sun, all that economic value goes out the door.
Dave Mosher's blog on Scientific American also had similar criticisms of NASA's space shuttle program, complaining on behalf of the "Next generation: We want a spaceship, not a freight truck." I grew up in the 70’s & 80’s, an era that was most arguably more excited about the future possibilities of the approaching new millennium than the current new generation. We had high hopes that cars would fly the way they did in Back to the Future’s 2010. But that tends to be the naivety of a new generation. From an engineering perspective, space flight has been a larger challenge than anticipated half a century ago. It requires significantly more resources, skill and technology than most people care to understand. Criticizing NASA’s shuttle program as an unreliable delivery van is an example of such lack of understanding, or possibly even unwillingness to understand. NASA has been more successful than any other organization at space missions and they should be credited for the knowledge gained through their endeavors. Like many others I also hope a new phoenix will rise out of the ashes of the shuttle program, but we should be thankful for the valuable lessons learned from it.
Further, your comparison of cosmonaut to astronaut deaths is unfair. There have been far more American astronauts and launches than Soviet/Russian cosmonauts and launches. Naturally, there would be more American incidents and deaths.
Source: http://www.worldspaceflight.com/bios/stats1.php
You can't wreck the car if you never leave the driveway.
gusz:
Please don't tarnish Carl Sagan's good name by referencing earth as god's greatest creation in the same sentence as mentioning Sagan's pivotal book. He was an atheist. He explicitly states in Pale Blue Dot that there's no one coming to save us from ourselves. That includes a divine superbeing.
In respond to Sir. Noles82, the Soviet Space Program has been quiet sucessful - first man in space, first woman in space, first space station, first satelite (Sputnik). The US was the first one to land on Moon. To conclude, both US and Soviet/Russian Space Programs have been successful, so to say that one (Soviet)was a failure would be an incorrect statement. There is tons of material out there, you just got to Google it.
In respond to Flouster, ISS came to be thanks to the International effort, not just because of a single country - The ISS is a synthesis of several space station projects that includes the American Freedom, the Soviet/Russian Mir-2, the European Columbus and the Japanese Kibō. Budget constraints led to the merger of these projects into a single multi-national programme. The ISS project began in 1994 with the Shuttle-Mir program, and the first module of the station, Zarya, was launched in 1998 by Russia. Since then, pressurised modules, external trusses and other components have been launched by American space shuttles, Russian Proton rockets and Russian Soyuz rockets.
What is this author's issue with the shuttle? You'd think it insulted his mother or mugged him. From the weather delay to the countdown, this guy won't give it a break.