Too old to shuttle?

As Discovery stands on the launch pad poised for another attempt at take-off, a debate is raging over how much longer America's workhorse of...

As Discovery stands on the launch pad poised for another attempt at take-off, a debate is raging over how much longer America’s workhorse of space can struggle on. National Aeronautics and Space Administration Administrator Michael Griffin has vowed to end the star-crossed program by 2010, saying the spacecraft has labored long enough. He is setting the space agency’s future on a next-generation shuttle, known as the Crew Exploration Vehicle, that won’t be operational before the current fleet retires.

That plan could create a gap of several years when the US would not be capable of space flight, while Russia and China would continue flying. But others caution that extending the service life of the three remaining shuttles without major investments and upgrades would raise serious safety issues.

In a reminder of the fragility of the spacecraft, a temporary glitch developed late Tuesday when a plastic cover on an overhead window on the orbiter fell 60 feet and damaged several tiles on the left covering for the small engines used to maneuver it in space.

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Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson, R-Texas, chairwoman of the Senate science and space subcommittee, said: “The possibility of a gap in space flight must be eliminated if the US wants to be a leader in space exploration.”

Hutchinson inserted language in a NASA bill pending in the Senate that would forbid NASA from retiring the shuttle before a replacement is completed. A spokesman for Hutchinson said there is broad opposition among both Republicans and Democrats to any proposal for an early retirement of the shuttle.

“There will be enormous pressure to keep it flying,” said Sheila Widnall, an aerospace professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a member of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board. “I would not be in favor of flying the shuttle indefinitely. But I was disappointed when NASA said they were going to retire it.”

Widnall said NASA should recertify the shuttle’s safety systems in 2010, a plan laid out by Columbia investigators, while it develops the Crew Exploration Vehicle.

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Other experts cite a host of major problems with retiring the shuttle in five years. First, it would cause a major loss of prestige to US to lack manned access to space, while both Russia and China have the capability. A long lapse in launches would erode the skilled work force that exists at the Kennedy Space Center, as well as other key aerospace centers across the nation. Finally, the shuttle is critical to using the full capability of the International Space Station.

NASA plans up to 28 more missions over the next five years to complete the International Space Station. “If you are going to fly humans over the next 10 to 15 years, you are not going to do it with anything but the shuttle,” said Richard Blomberg, ex-chairman of NASA’s outside safety advisory panel. “If we are going to fly the shuttle, we should improve it.”

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