The full House Science Committee is scheduled to hold a hearing Wednesday morning (10am, Rayburn 2318) on “Options for Hubble Science”. The witness list currently stands as follows:
- Dr. Lou Lanzerotti, Chair, Committee on the Assessment of Options for Extending the Life of the Hubble Space Telescope, National Academy of Sciences;
- Dr. Steve Beckwith, Director, Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, MD;
- Dr. Colin Norman, Professor of Physics and Astronomy, Johns Hopkins University;
- Dr. Joseph H. Taylor, Jr., James S. McDonnell, Distinguished University Professor of Physics, Princeton University;
- Mr. Gary Pulliam, Vice President, Aerospace Corporation; and
- Dr. Paul Cooper, General Manager, MD Robotics.
A notable omission is any representative from NASA. This is not surprising: the agency doesn’t want to be forced to tip its hand (and face stiff questioning about it) in advance of its February 7 budget release, allowing NASA to describe its plans for Hubble on its own terms.
Most of the invited people are Hubble and astronomy experts.
It would be logical to also invite experts on the shuttle (eg. CAIB) and robotics, since these are the options for servicing Hubble.
Yeah, looks like the panel is stacked in favor of Hubble. I wonder whos’ idea that was?
From this hearing the astronomical community at Hopkins seems to come to the conclusion that building a new Hubble with the repacement equiptment is the bet way to go. Seems we heard of this option on the space blogs for almost a year now!