The Baltimore Sun published an editorial yesterday proclaiming its support for Michael Griffin as the next NASA administrator. However, the editorial also called on Griffin to put more emphasis on Hubble and less on Mars: “While he is on record backing the Bush plan to send humans as far away as Mars, we hope his reputed reasoned skepticism and grasp of the big picture also lead him to back the mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope.” The editorial later notes that “Hubble’s data are real, meaningful and cost-effective, something the far-out Mars colonizing plans aren’t.”
Which takes us to The Mars Society, whose leadership clearly rejects the Sun’s either/or in favor of both repairing Hubble and going to Mars. Just as he did last year, Mars Society president Robert Zubrin has spoken out in favor of a shuttle servicing mission to the orbiting telescope. Zubrin’s essay covers a wide range of issues, from the relative risks of shuttle missions for Hubble vs. ISS to the technological readiness (or lack thereof) of a robotic repair mission to a claim that spending $300 million on a deorbit-only mission “amounts to the willful killing of roughly 100,000 people – mostly children.” (This is based on an estimate that one life was saved for every $3,000 spent on tsunami relief, and ignores the fact that a deorbit capability of some kind will need to be developed regardless of what servicing approach, if any, is chosen.)
Zubrin believes that “substantial” damage has been done to the Vision for Space Exploration by NASA’s reticence to repair Hubble. “[H]ow can Congress know that after they spend further tens of billions for human flight systems to the Moon and Mars, that the agency leadership won’t get cold feet again?” Zubrin asks. However, I have heard that Zubrin’s attention to Hubble has been a sore point among some Mars Society members, both last year and this, since they view the effort to save the telescope as a distraction to the society’s larger efforts to promote human exploration of Mars.
How about just Mars? Why this obessive behavior over a telescope? If people really cared about the telescope, why does someone form a company to take over the running of the telescope, charge people to see the nice pictures and contract out to someone to fix the telescope?
“How about just Mars?”
Of course, one can turn that argument back on you too: “If people really cared about Mars, why doesn’t someone form a company to explore Mars?”
Do you have an answer for that?
“If people really cared about Mars, why doesn’t someone form a company to explore Mars?”
Perhaps because the cost of getting a visible light telescope up and running on par with Hubble would be hundreds of times cheaper and simpler than a manned mission to Mars. Besides, don’t we already have a scope that outclasses Hubble in the visible light range and aren’t we soon to have another in orbit to take the infrared pictures?
Hubble-mania is founded in ignorance and Zubrin is doing a disservice to his own cause by making such a big deal about it. You’d think he would have the sense to keep out of a political matter as this clearly is. Then again, he is literally accusing his opponents on the topic of killing children. That’s pretty much the definition of political mudslinging.
What’s needed is not a manned, robotic or any other mission to fix Hubble. Rather, NASA needs to educate through the press that Hubble isn’t needed anymore because we can do it better and cheaper.
I like how the Sun article refers to people being “skittish after the Challenger disaster”. (emphasis mine)
While I don’t agree with Bob Zubrin’s choice of hyperbole, the “too dangerous to fix Hubble/too dangerous to go to Mars” argument makes a lot of sense to me.
Dr. Griffin will be the NASA administrator during interesting times.
“Perhaps because the cost of getting a visible light telescope up and running on par with Hubble would be hundreds of times cheaper and simpler than a manned mission to Mars.”
Yes. But why do you insist that expensive telescopes be privately funded whereas far more expensive Mars missions be publicly funded? Do you have any evidence that a private organization can raise the hundreds of millions of dollars necessary to build a new telescope?
“Besides, don’t we already have a scope that outclasses Hubble in the visible light range and aren’t we soon to have another in orbit to take the infrared pictures?”
You should read more closely. Both of those telescopes operate in the infrared, not the visible spectrum. And UV observations can only be done from space.
The astronomy community agrees that ground-based telescopes are never going to be as capable as the best space-based telescopes. There are simply things that they cannot do. UV is one, wide field optical is another.
“Hubble-mania is founded in ignorance”
So the American Astronomical Society and the National Academy of Science are ignorant?
http://www.aas.org/policy/PR/2005/hstservicing2.html
http://www4.nationalacademies.org/news.nsf/isbn/0309095301?OpenDocument
The U.S. Congress is ignorant too?
http://www.spacepolitics.com/archives/000378.html
“What’s needed is not a manned, robotic or any other mission to fix Hubble. Rather, NASA needs to educate through the press that Hubble isn’t needed anymore because we can do it better and cheaper.”
Can you provide some evidence that it can be done better and cheaper? You have asserted this, but provided no proof. Not a good approach for someone who accuses others of “ignorance.”
“The editorial later notes that “Hubble’s data are real, meaningful and cost-effective, something the far-out Mars colonizing plans aren’t.”
I consider a Mars colony to be of infinite value. I love the Hubble but it is a luxury. Ultimately, an off-world colony is a necessity if our civilization is to endure.
Frankly, I would not trade a Mars colony for a flotilla of space telescopes large enough to blot out the moon even if they were free.
Still, I think it is a binary argument. We can and should do both.
The difficulty arises from Sean O’Keefe having said it is too risky to go get Hubble.
If orbiter is too fragile and dangerous to fly for Hubble why is it safe and reasonable to fly for ISS completion? ISS safe haven merely means we save the crew and possibly destroy ISS in the process. To actually use the ISS safe haven will be the end of the STS program anyway and very possibly the end of ISS.
=IF= we deem losing ISS to be acceptable, why spend $50 billion to finish ISS? Cancel further participation in ISS today and ground the orbiter, today. And get going with the VSE.
= = =
If ISS completion is deemed essential, why is ISS safe haven an acceptable risk while an orbiter service mission to Hubble is so terribly unsafe?
= = =
If we are committed to finishing ISS, lets at least do it as efficiently as possible.
If the advantage of EELV over SDV is future spiral development of greater capabilities, then accelerate deployment of the RL-60 upper stage for Delta IV and use that to loft ISS payloads to the vicinity of ISS. Every enhanced Delta IV shot to ISS saves an orbiter flight.
Lets see, $1 billion for orbiter or $250 million for EELV enhanced to loft identical payloads?
Which is better?
Put the orbiter on orbit from Pad 39A/B and hook up with an ISS payload launched from Pad 37 on an enhanced (35MT) EELV. IF these EELV enhancements are as easy as advertised seems like an obvious move.
Or, go with shuttle C and launch TWO (2) ISS payloads to hook up with an on-orbit orbiter.
Deliver and install THREE (3) ISS payloads for every orbiter flight. Either way, we finish ISS for less money that is currently budgeted to finish ISS using orbiter only.
MARS 2050, at constant budget the WHOLE way !!!
That would be one humble step for NASA, and hopefully a GIANT step for WOMANkind !
Buzz Aldrin said of the Apollo program that it was unsustainable, and that next time we must make sure it’s sustainable. He was right.
Whatever we choose to do or not do, we must do it in a way that we can sustain:
If we go to Mars, we must do it in a way that we can return routinely.
Ditto if we go to the Moon.
Ditto if we visit asteroids (or they visit us).
Ditto if we want to be able to robotically fix telescopes in space.
I don’t think the argument that if the risk is too great for Hubble that NASA wouldn’t or shouldn’t take the risk to go to Mars or any other destination. The new systems will have new safety equipment and procedure to cope with as many expected risks as possible. The problem is that CAIB imposes safety procedures which the Shuttle system wasn’t design. Everyone knows that we can go to Hubble; I think it’s just a matter of who will take responsibility for sending the astronauts.
It seems to me that the Mars society is very confrontational and inflexible which doesn’t help space advocacy.
I hope NASA continues the development of robotic repair equipment because I think that has a place in commercial application and VSE. However I agree that there may not be enough time to develop it for Hubble.
I agree with Kevin that whatever we do with VSE, it should be sustainable.
I say we should cancel the Hubble to use the money for a new telescope (if the supporters can drum up the votes), or on colonization of the Moon. I think the most lives would be saved through the use of automatic defibrillators in everyone’s house who is at risk for heart attack. We can easily do both because the economy will be bigger with fewer fatal heart attacks.
Some of the Zubrin/Mars Society comments are troublesome.
Using the tsunami disaster in an attempt to make a point is disrespectful to the dead, disrespectful to those donating funds and disrespectful to those assisting in the recovery. It also makes the Mars Society appear to be a covey of strident, ignorant, myopic activists.
Stating the crew would have a better chance ditching in the South Atlantic versus the North Atlantic as a risk reduction in favor of the Hubble mission leads one to believe they do not understand physics and the relationship between the surface of the ocean and the velocity of a landing shuttle. No one will survive ditching the craft anywhere.
Reading the essay also leads one to believe that they believe the Hubble robotic repair mission is an autonomous one. It is not. The operator would be on the ground and command the robot just…like…the…Mars rovers. If we can succesfully tele-operate with such time delays, I believe we should be able to handle perhaps a delay of one or two seconds.
Personally, I am beginning to pay less and less attention to Mr. Zubrin and the Mars Society.
Add Rick Tumlinson to the list of Hubble supporters.
While the tsunami comparison is probably excessive, it is the case, IMO, that a deorbiting-only mission would be a flagrant and outrageous waste of money. The cost per expected life saved is orders of magnitude beyond other ways the money could be spent.
Tell you what — let’s ask the countries in question, in the UN, whether they’d rather have (say) $100 M in humanitarian aid, or have us spend $300 M on the deorbit package. The former would save orders of magnitude more lives in those countries than the latter.