One Last Flight
Thoughts on the Last Flight of the Shuttle, Dennis Wingo, SpaceRef
“I was at NASA Ames last week when the final flight of the final space shuttle Endeavour on its way to its final destination occurred. As many people did, I stood outside, on top of our MacMoon’s at Ames and took pictures. There were over 20,000 people at NASA Ames that waited hours for an event that took no more than one minute to consummate. Beyond that there were hundreds of thousands more people all around Silicon Valley who were outside and watching when the shuttle flew overhead.”
Keith’s note: There is a comment posted by Mark Uhran, former Assistant Associate Administrator for the International Space Station. Normally I’d refuse to allow ad hominem insults – especially those directed at someone’s family – to be posted. But I think Uhran’s coworkers might find his bitterness to be noteworthy.
> “It is if Americans collectively all wanted to be a part of a history that many fear is passing us by….”
I second that. It was exciting being out on the Moffett flightline with the carnival atmosphere but also sad that this country can never have something like Shuttle ever again even if we wanted to. I read all this stuff about the Next Big Thing but yet much of the industrial base that built Shuttle no longer exists. Maybe the future is small spacecraft i.e. Dragon, Lnyx, etc. On the other hand even if we still had the means to built something big (something that can put items size of a railroad boxcar into orbit), the constant need to present a sound financial plan and business case will kill it.
We do have the means to ” put items size of a railroad boxcar into orbit” They are called Delta IV and Atlas V. They actually have more performance than the shuttle.
No they don’t. They can’t take 7 astronauts along and they can’t bring 25,000 lb of downmass to smooth landing. The capability of the shuttle will not be duplicated until 2060.
Those are nifty things but not necessarily useful things.
The case for taking 7 astronauts up in the same vehicle as cargo has yet to be proven; in spite of thirty years of trying. There has been no need to bring 25,000 pounds of anything “out of orbit to a smooth landing in the last sixty years”, excepting of course the shuttle itself. That’s not to say there might not be a requirement in the future, but the architecture for such a requirement will depend upon the nature of the mass itself.
Well said! The capabilities of the shuttle that actually turned out to be useful could have been achieved much more cheaply and safely. We’re finally starting to do that now that the shuttle is gone.
The shuttle was amazing, but as amazing as it was, it was not a smart way to use resources.
The shuttle was hideously expensive — the program costs averaged over all the flights comes to more than a billion dollars per flight. The $200 billion we spent on the shuttle could have done so much more for us in space.
Good for us for finally killing off the shuttle program. Now we can use those resources to better effect — that is if we can keep Congress from wasting them on SLS, which is really just a way to keep the money spigot flowing to those who benefited from all that money wasted on the shuttle.
“The case for taking 7 astronauts up in the same vehicle as cargo has yet to be proven; in spite of thirty years of trying.”
Actually it proved to be a very effective way to build a space station from a logistics viewpoint. A large piece such as a module or truss was brought up, along with a crew trained to install it via SRMS (and sometimes SSRMS) and EVA. The big advantage was that the crew training was conducted all the way up to launch so that they were current. If they had used Expedition crew members to do the installations, their training would possibly be several months prior, and also the installation work would have impacted their other station activities.
For Hubble servicing the ability to bring up replacement cameras, FSS (berthing platform with electrical connections), along with the previously mentioned SRMS and recently training EVA crew, is what made the Hubble servicing missions so effective, actually spectacularly so.
Am I saying that the Shuttle was a cost effective way to do all of this? No but that’s a topic with a lot of different sub-topics. Am I saying that there was no other way that they could have done it? No but the point is that it was an effective method and had many advantages.
The budget for shuttle ops was about four billion a year in the final years. The average flights per year were four or less. We will call it four, for the sake of argument. That’s a billion per flight. The five to seven astronauts who flew were not all necessary to the installation of the cargo. Usually, two were. So we are talking, in practical terms of a billion dollars for the exercise of lifting and installing a 25 thousand pound piece of equipment.
The shuttle was a marvelous Rube Goldberg device. I also admire such contraptions. As a practical method for moving people and cargo to orbit, it was a disaster. No matter how much lipstick you put on a pig, it’s still just a pig.
Thanks for agreeing with my assertion that the Shuttle wasn’t cost effective, I’m pretty sure that we are not in the minority on that opinion. But you seem to be using the high cost of Shuttle as proof that single-launch missions are not practical. Using that rationale, would you say that Shuttle proved that winged re-entry vehicles are not practical, and for that matter re-usable spacecraft and re-usable boosters are not practical either?
I don’t think it’s that simple. Single-launch has logistical advantages. Dual-launch also has advantages, mainly in the size of vehicles needed, and to some extent crew safety. It’s a complex equation which type of system is better for a particular task. Just pointing to the high cost of one particular legacy system as proof that single launch is not practical doesn’t really advance the argument, in my opinion.
“The five to seven astronauts who flew were not all necessary to the installation of the cargo. Usually, two were.”
If I understand correctly you are saying that on most of the ISS assembly flights, two astronauts could have filled the rolls of commander, pilot, EVA coordinator, robotics specialist, and on top of that performed all of the EVA’s. But for some inexplicable reason NASA sent up extra people just because, well I guess for no real reason other than it’s their spacecraft and they can do what they want. Is that correct?
A group of us from UCLA Engineering slept in a van on a bluff above Edwards for the STS-1 landing, I can still remember Crippen saying “What a way to come to California” over the PA.
Yea some where in my stuff I have a couple of the pictures that I took of Columbia on her descent for STS-4 along with a t-shirt with a detailed engineering drawing of the STS Stack that I bought that day.
personally, i don’t get the interest in this. the shuttle should be flying on it’s own, not being lugged about on a ’47 like some cancerous growth. for me this is more of a wake than something to be celebrated, spectacularised (if that’s a word !?).
Of course it was a wake, that is the point. You celebrate the life just departed, and it was a good life.
Spoken like a pallbearer at the funeral of his victim. Who do you think built the space shuttle and space station, Dennis? What Agency had the vision, marshaled the resources, and prevailed over years, no decades, of development to deliver the two premier space systems of the last 30 years — possibly the last two ultrahigh performance vehicles of the western world. These two investments have enabled virtually all that follows in the quest for human space flight
NASA has been bashed to near death and you are eminently complicit. You should be ashamed of yourself. I hope you get to read this message before its snuffed by the blog editor, as have other posts, because they don’t conform with his 20 year NASA vendetta.
Shame on anyone that has been complicit in persistently bashing the organization that both inspired your dreams and invoked your wrath for its imperfections.
I sure wouldn’t want to be your parent.
NASA has been bashed to near death and you are eminently complicit.
You have to be kidding me. I don’t think that the real Mark Uhran would say this as he knows differently and knows that I have been one of the biggest proponents of ISS.
What drives me to distraction is that NASA, like the military, likes to fight the last war. The emphasis on heavy lift today is going to be the death of another generation’s dreams like ours were crushed in the early 90’s with the demise of the Space Exploration Initiative.
I saw so many cool technologies and mission applications killed because NASA wanted the next big thing. Here we are today blowing $3 billion a year on SLS and Orion, which is nothing more than a warmed over Saturn that was too expensive to the governments in the days when the letter T was not associated with the national debt.
I expect better out of NASA and when it does not do it, I say what needs to be said, and of congress as well.
The real Mark Uhran used to talk to me about this in his office at NASA headquarters and knows what I am talking about.
It is good that Mark left NASA. With an attitude like this he was clearly part of the problem — not part of the solution.
I take it Keith that you believe this really is a post by Mark Uhran and not someone simply using his name (as I first assumed). If that is really the case, it’s a sad epitaph to his long career at NASA. The bitterness and perceived persecution is shocking.
Feel better now? Normally I would delete unwarranted personal attacks like this but I am going to leave it up so that your former co-workers can see just how bitter you are. Have a nice day.
While there’s no doubt that the Shuttle and the ISS were/are “high performance systems” and monumental achievements in their own right, they also have their much discussed warts. Moreover, there it’s highly likely that those two systems have diverted much needed money away from HSL projects that could have been at least as high performance and could have gone beyond LEO, where we’ve been stuck for roughly 30 years.
As a taxpayer funded agency, NASA has to fully expect criticism. Criticism is one of the avenues via which changes are sought and found to be needed. Moreover, a lot of that criticism comes from folks who have great affinity for NASA and want to see it succeed at its mission. The day the criticism stops is the day that NASA heads should really worry.
The unprovoked, uncalled for attack was shameful.
It’s very emotional at funerals – grieving takes things in many directions. Things get said that shouldn’t have been said, because of anguish.
I recommend that people ignore such, and see it as an aspect of being all to humans. Let it go.
And frequently, animus is directed at those critical, as much as for their ability to change/challenge things, as for that they didn’t change things.
Let me be clear. NASA’s problems IMHO start and end with Congress. Not those outside who are critical of it. End of story. Move along, nothing more to see.
Very well written and nicely spot on Dennis. Your Shuttle memories jump started some of my own…
I remember visiting the Cape as a kid during the gap between Apollo and the Shuttle and seeing the tile and blowtorch demonstration. I remember listening to the first Enterprise drop test on the radio and the frenzy that surrounded the fall of Skylab.
I remember watching STS-1 on TV and my dad reminding my brother and I that we were witnessing history. I vividly remember going to my first landing for STS-41C in 1984. There were far less than 10,000 people on the lakebed to watch. I certainly remember where I was when Challenger was lost.
I remember being back on the lakebed in 1988 for STS-26, only this time there were closer to 100,000 people there to watch. Sadly, when I returned for my next landing on STS-31 in 1990 the numbers were back down below 10,000 (as they were for the final three landings I observed).
I remember Columbia’s loss and the sickening feeling of deja vu. I remember flying all the way across the country just to see the launch of STS-117 in 2007.
I remember taking my wife and daughter at the last minute to see the diverted landing of STS-125 in 2009.
Good times and bad times. Now I wake my daughter up to see rockets from Vandenberg go streaking past at all hours of the night and tune into SpaceX launches with an enthusiasm I haven’t felt in years.
I wonder what her memories will be like?
Why was there so much more interest in this event by most Americans than there was for most of the thirty years that shuttles were flying in space?
I am surprised by Mark Uhran’s suggestion that NASAWatch, Keith Cowing, Dennis’ writings or a blog has been responsible for NASA bashing and the current predicament that the agency finds itself in.
That NASA has no capability to launch humans into space after hundreds of billions of expenditures over decades did not come about because of bloggers. Yes, it is a sad situation for an agency that once could do so much but which now and for many years seems unable to orchestrate the leadership to even define a direction. Mr. Musk and others seem to be showing that with well managed projects, new capabilities can still be developed in the US at a reasonable pace and on a reasonable budget. But NASA seems unable to lead such an effort.
Many of us love and support the program. Many of us, current and past space workers, have been responsible for making Shuttle and ISS happen and earlier programs too. We look with incredulity on an agency and a program that is in need of a reboot. This is because the current management failed to make use of the experience and expertise they had available, instead placing those with so little experience in charge of critical functions.
NASA has no capability to launch humans into space after hundreds of billions of expenditures
Let me be blunt.
Since Apollo, its been “one big project to rule them, and in the darkness bind them”.
We could have had an “A/B” program, starting with continuing Gemini. IMHO, what killed that was that it was getting too easy for a small program to threaten a larger program (with larger outlays to congressional districts). To this day, anyone who claims to be against continued Gemini – there’s the guy to blame.
That is the recurring theme. A false economy, a logical fallacy.
So isn’t it possible Boeing will develop the X37 to the point where it will carry Astronauts and/or cargo to LEO? and then there’s Dream Chaser. Dropping out of the sky on a parachute still seems a kind of brutal way to return to Earth.
Dennis I enjoyed your article. I hope my comment attached to it assists the point and helps to explain the paradoxical responses of others in mourning for it.
In the earliest parts of the Shuttle program were the roots of many misgivings. Perhaps they have been forgotten by many, and in some way are seen as a kind of hidden curse button pressed by imagined enemies thought to be blamed for its imagined untimely demise.
The root cause of the failure to maintain America’s greatness in space, is the belief that critical feedback to compel “Gold Leader – stay on target!” is instead seen as a kind of lèse majesté.
Keith and Dennis (and many, many others), thank you for being critical and encouraging critical discourse, with all its warts. Only by communicating can we get better.
Perhaps American culture will change to be able to clearly accept shortcomings such that it can struggle with hard things once again with balance.
My take away from JFK’s “we do these things not because they are easy, but because they are hard”, was that he meant not just going to the moon as being hard, but by having a mature and vibrant culture that could ask itself hard questions continually to aspire to greatness through wrestling with ideas – which is even harder as is demonstrated here.
Not as Mark Uhran has unfortunately demonstrated (as Mike Griffin before him), that we restrain ourselves from criticism out of fear from injuring a unexamined great undertaking done by supreme leaders who must be unquestioned, otherwise the least doubt might cause the entire facade to fall.
This is a challenge for the great experiment of America itself – with the increase in openness presented by technology / cultural shifts, do we react by forging our steel more strongly, or purify our culture in reductionism by rooting out the witches that find flaw with its preordained, predetermined greatness already.
Interesting post. I try to look at things with a historical cast of mind. If you look back at the writings of Von Braun, the Disney shows with him and Walt, and the hopes and dreams of the early visionaries, it was not of a space program staffed with government employees checking to see how many microbes could dance on the head of a drill bit on Mars.
It was about humanity, and the first steps of humanity to climb out of the cradle of its birth and begin the journey to the stars.
Von Braun understood and if you read the congressional testimony of the early to mid 1960’s the space program was moving in that direction. However, that fateful year of 1968 turned the tide against space.
We all were thrilled with the beginnings of the Shuttle program and what the guys and gals were doing on orbit.
Then, all that got cut back after Challenger and the shift was made to “science” missions.
The Space Exploration Initiative was a viable path back outward but some of the same players who killed SEI returned to put a stake in the heart of the VSE.
Again, this whole thing is not about building a rocket, it is about what we need to do to climb out of that damn cradle. This is why it always amazes me to read the naysayers who claim that ISRU is not a workable technology. Well hell, we might as well quite mining on the Earth as this is what we are doing today after all the really high value resources have been/are depleted.
There is a biblical saying “Where there is no vision, the people perish”. The word vision is a translation of a word that originally meant “Sense of Purpose”
Science alone as a sense of purpose is not compelling to anyone but the scientists involved. Without a larger sense of purpose, which includes the economic and industrial development of the planets in our solar system, that also includes people living and working there, all we are left with is the swirling of the water down the toilet of our future.
The
top of every single page in this blogsite says “This is not a NASA
Website. You might learn something. It’s YOUR space agency. Get involved. Take
it back. Make it work – for YOU.”
How
about “make it work for US?”
In my
opinion, kcowing has no interest in being a team player or supporting
the agenda of team players. I don’t think this website is even about NASA.
In my
opinion, kcowing has no interest in being a team player or supporting
the agenda of team players. I don’t think this website is even about NASA.The focus of this website is the
individualism and second guessing that make big projects impossible.
Uhren has every right to question your motives when this
stream of hurl seems to take pride in publishing a constipated
attitude. Sure, NASA HQ makes mistakes. All decisions have a goodness of fit – but this place focuses on
the three sigma and schadenfreud.I read this website because your team of pissants make my job easier by occasionally leaking something I need to know before the congressman’s staff picks up the phone.Angry? On this topic – you bet I am. This website presents opinion as fact and confuses ego with righteousness. Then it has the gall to insult the leaders that make LEO possible.
In my
opinion, kcowing has no interest in being a team player or supporting
the agenda of team players. I don’t think this website is even about NASA.
The focus of this website is the
individualism and second guessing that make big projects impossible.
Uhren has every right to question your motives when this
stream of hurl seems to take pride in publishing a constipated
attitude. Sure, NASA HQ makes mistakes. All decisions have a goodness of fit – but this place focuses on
the three sigma and schadenfreud.
I read this website because your team of pissants make my job easier by occasionally leaking something I need to know before the congressman’s staff picks up the phone.
Angry? On this topic – you bet I am. This website presents opinion as fact and confuses ego with righteousness. Then it has the gall to insult the leaders that make LEO possible.
I guess typing the same thing twice means something?
No one is forcing you to read this website. So …. let me suggest that you stop reading NASAWatch and you won’t get upset any more. Have a nice day.