With the landing of Atlantis bringing a formal end to the 30-year space shuttle program Thursday, NASA now turns over space station runs to private rocketmakers and instead focuses on more distant goals, such as sending astronauts to an asteroid, then Mars. The final shuttle mission is planned to take place on June 28, when the space shuttle Atlantis will orbit Earth for the last time.Americans opinions about the future of US human spaceflight program appear to be as ambivalent and conflicting as the opinions that now vex the space community itself. “If they went back and redesigned the shuttle, they could add a lot more technology that would probably help achieve the mission better.” That’s a problem,” said Collin Weir, who studies engineering at Purdue University, a school with strong ties to NASA. Although many Americans feel nostalgic about the end of the space shuttle era, others see advantages to retiring the program. SpaceX says their rockets will cut the cost of space deliveries to about one tenth of what it cost on a space shuttle, saving taxpayers money. One private company called SpaceX has already signed a $1.6 billion contract with NASA for 12 unmanned delivery missions.
Once the space shuttle program is retired, NASA plans to rely on privately owned spacecraft to transport astronauts into space and fly delivery missions to the International Space Staton. Private companies such as SpaceX have started contracting with NASA to reach orbit and deliver goods to the International Space Station. The space shuttle program has also been marked by tragedy: the shuttle Columbia broke up in flight in 2003, while the Challenger suffered a devastating explosion on its launch pad in 1986.
Many people think the shuttle program did not achieve its goal because sending a shuttle into space is still very expensive – about $1.5 billion today. Before the shuttle program, astronauts were transported into space by rockets in capsules that could not land like planes but had to drop in the ocean and be recovered, making the operation extremely expensive. The space shuttle program was launched by President Richard Nixon in 1972 as a less expensive way to get to space. The Discovery, which flew its last mission in March, will be on view at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C., while the Atlantis will go to the Kennedy Visitor Complex at Cape Canaveral, Fla. The crew of the Endeavour is headed up by astronaut Mark Kelly (left)Īfter this final mission for Endeavour, the shuttle will be retired and will go on display at the California Space Center in Los Angeles. The parrel aboard the Endeavour is more than 500 years old and was used on the Mary Rose, the main ship of England’s King Henry VIII. “Blown by solar winds, they can ‘sail’ to distant locations without fuel.”Įndeavour will also bring a historic artifact into space: a three-inch wooden ball called a “parrel” that was used by sailors to raise sails up masts. “Their small size allows them to travel like space dust,” one of the satellite’s designers told the Cornell Chronicle. Scientists have designed them to be carried by the solar wind, a stream of charged particles emitted by the sun. Then, they will be released on their own to collect data in outer space. Mission will transport satellites, ancient artifact into spaceĮndeavour’s final mission will transport three tiny satellites to be mounted on the International Space Station for a brief time to see how they hold up in the harsh conditions of space. Science Correspondent Miles O’Brien will moderate an upcoming live discussion with the astronauts during which he will pose many questions asked in the online forum. Students have the opportunity to ask Kelly and his fellow astronauts questions during the mission, thanks to an online forum being hosted by Google, YouTube and the PBS NewsHour. Giffords, who is recovering from her brain injury at a Houston rehabilitation center, will be in attendance at the launch. The shuttle will be piloted by astronaut Mark Kelly, whose wife, Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), was shot in the head in January by a lone gunman at a community event. The shuttle launch has been delayed at least several days due to issues with the shuttle’s electrical system. The space shuttle Endeavour sits on its launchpad at Cape Canveral, Florida.
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