First post-Columbia mission is pivotal moment for NASA

Star-Telegram | 07/10/2005 | Return to space: Return to space

First post-Columbia mission is pivotal moment for NASA

By Dave Montgomery

Star-Telegram Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- As America tunes in this week for the first shuttle launch since the Columbia disaster in 2003, few will have a better grasp of the emotions gripping the seven crew members than former astronaut Rick Hauck.

Hauck, who plans to be at Cape Canaveral, Fla., to watch the liftoff of shuttle Discovery on Wednesday as a consultant for NBC News, was commander of the first shuttle flight after the 1986 Challenger explosion.

He recalled last week how in the final minutes before his launch, his mood was one of intense anticipation mixed with a "little bit of nerves."

Those feelings might also sum up the collective national mood as America prepares to return to space more than two years after Columbia broke apart over Texas, horrifying the country, throwing NASA into turmoil and raising renewed concerns over the enormous risks of space travel.

Columbia was doomed during launch, when a piece of insulating foam the size of a briefcase fell from the giant external tank and slammed into the shuttle's wing. NASA is confident that a costly redesign has fixed the problem, but millions of viewers will undoubtedly be crossing their fingers as Discovery soars skyward.

Amid the anxiety over the return to space is NASA's renewed ambition for exploration, spurred by President Bush's pledge to return Americans to the moon for the first time since 1972 and his goal of making manned missions to Mars and possibly beyond.

Under Bush's "new vision" for space exploration, the Discovery launch marks the beginning of the end for the venerable shuttle program, which started in the early 1970s and went into service when Columbia was launched in 1981.

The three remaining shuttles will stay in use through the end of the decade to help complete the international space station. They will then be replaced by a new spacecraft called the Crew Exploration Vehicle, which will be capable of extending manned space exploration beyond earth orbit. Bush has called for a manned lunar mission as early as 2015.

Accompanying the stepped-up government effort is an emerging commercial space industry, now limited to a relative handful of billionaires and multimillionaires who exhibit the same can-do bravado that propelled the early wildcatters. Visionaries such as Amazon.com founder Jeffrey Bezos and Virgin Atlantic's Richard Branson believe that the heavens can yield billions of dollars in commercial opportunities, including spaceship lines and orbiting resort hotels.

The lure of space has also spawned robust international competition, in some ways reminiscent of the space race that pitted the United States against the Soviet Union. China has put a man in space and plans a moon shot within the next seven years. Iran has signaled its intentions to become the first Islamic country to launch a satellite rocket.

"I think the future is incredibly good," space historian Robert Zimmerman said. "There is a confluence of forces all aiming at a bulls eye at the same time to encourage space flight."

Reducing risk

Discovery's launch also offers compelling plot lines that may boost public interest. The shuttle commander is Eileen Collins, who watched Star Trek as a youngster and professes a fear of roller coasters. The Washington Post described her as blue-collar kid from public housing who redirected her career goals from teaching to aviation.

The liftoff is scheduled for 2:51 p.m. CDT Wednesday. NASA weather officers were monitoring Hurricane Dennis on Saturday but had no plans to postpone liftoff.

The launch will replay a scene Americans have watched dozens of times as the shuttle's three main engines push it upward with 37 million horsepower. The mission will last nearly two weeks as the shuttle crew tests new safety equipment and takes supplies to the two-man crew on the space station.

NASA has proclaimed America's flagship spacecraft "safer than ever" after a series of "corrective actions" mandated by a seven-month investigation into the Columbia disaster. Discovery's external tank was redesigned to remove large pieces of foam, and a heating system was added to prevent ice formation.

"I think NASA has done all they can do to get ready in this case," said Hauck, a member of the astronaut Hall of Fame. "I'm looking forward to a safe launch."

Still, after two shuttle disasters, experts say the very nature of space travel makes it impossible to eliminate every risk.

"There will still be the possibility that untoward events could happen," said former astronaut Owen Garriott, who spent 60 days aboard Skylab in 1973. "Just because we spent 2 1/2 years making it safer does not mean all the risks have been removed."

But challenge and uncertainty have been companions of America's space program ever since it started revving up nearly a half-century ago in response to the Soviets' launch of Sputnik in 1957. Even though experts credit Bush with reinvigorating interest in space, they also point out that his father, President George H.W. Bush, made virtually the same proposal in 1992.

As always, the enormous cost is a hard sell, as some estimates for a moon-and-Mars program are well above $400 billion. Bush is also dealing with issues closer to home, including the war in Iraq, Social Security and revisions to the tax code. Sustaining the president's space blueprint after he leaves office is another challenge.

Stellar ambitions

Nevertheless, Americans appear to be displaying renewed enthusiasm about the upper reaches. Although the nation will probably never return to the hero-worship euphoria of the Right Stuff days, nearly 70 percent of the public support missions to the moon and Mars, according to a Gallup poll.

Entrepreneurs such as Bezos and Branson see enormous market potential in the public's widening embrace of the heavens.

Bezos, according to news reports, has chosen 165,000 acres of parched ranch land near Van Horn in West Texas to develop a spaceport that would launch flights into orbit, sending tourists to the edge of space and back. Test flights are scheduled to begin in six or seven years.

Branson has reportedly contracted with Burt Rutan, the designer of SpaceShipOne, a private spaceship that captured national attention after reaching an altitude of 67 miles. Branson would employ enlarged versions of Rutan's technology in a space line called Virgin Galactic; he told BBC that 13,500 potential passengers are willing to pay $190,000 apiece for a ticket.

Another entry into the commercial rocket business is John Carmack, the developer of the Doom and Quake video games who also presides over the four-year-old Armadillo Aerospace in Mesquite. The company's Web site describes the venture as "a bunch of guys, a girl, and an armadillo named Widget."

These entrepreneurs and others believe that steady commercial space travel may be only a decade or so away. Rutan has been quoted as saying that space excursions will be so affordable in 15 years that 50,000 passengers will be making the journey. He also predicts that resort hotels will be in orbit within 15 years and that commercial space lines will be commonplace by 2050.

Safety improvements since Columbia:

A new heater on the 15-story external fuel tank will reduce the buildup of ice, which can break off and damage the shuttle.

A stronger "bolt catcher" will collect the 62-pound steel bolts thrown off when the solid rocket boosters separate from the fuel tank about two minutes after liftoff.

Electric heaters, rather than insulating foam, will protect the mechanism connecting the orbiter to the fuel tank. Foam from the tank damaged Columbia's left wing in 2003, ultimately destroying the shuttle.

Temperature and impact sensors along the orbiter's wings will alert NASA to damage caused during launch.

An enhanced system of digital cameras, including one mounted on a robotic boom in the orbiter's payload bay, can alert NASA to damage.