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How to Avoid Repeating the Debacle That Was the Space Shuttle

discovermagazine.com

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Re: How to Avoid Repeating the Debacle That Was the Space Shuttle

#21

Post by tokenadult »

carlcoryell wrote: post #11

Maciej Cegłowski's essay "A Rocket to Nowhere" is a much better description of how and why the Shuttle was doomed by political and military considerations. http://www.idlewords.com/2005/08/a_rocket_to_nowhere.htm

Great essay, thanks. "And we must remember that space is called space for a reason - there is nothing in it, at least not where the Shuttle goes, save for a few fast-moving pieces of junk from the last few times we went up there, forty years ago. The interesting bits in space are all much further away, and we have not paid them a visit since 1972."

Re: How to Avoid Repeating the Debacle That Was the Space Shuttle

#22

Post by marze »

econgeeker wrote: post #8

This article makes a lot of good points, but I felt it failed to really break the surface and address the core problem that led to the failure of the Space Shuttle program. That core problem is misalignment of incentives. Or in short, politics. When you've got a public budget and your goals are political ones, you're going to pursue a specific set of capabilities and policies that help your political career. This is…

Since NASA has repeatedly demonstrated its inability to develop a new rocket (something like $21B wasted in failed attempts over the last 20 years), it certainly makes sense to outsource launch services to the free market instead of trying to relive the Apollo era.

However, since there is a lot of interesting exploration and science that NASA could continue to do that no profit incentive exists for (deep space probes, space telescopes, etc.), so recommending the complete dismantlement of NASA goes too far.

NASA should fund commercial launch providers and buy launch services, and focus its substantial budgets on some really exciting exploration.

Launching things into orbit is a solved problem, no need to solve it again. There is an infinity of unsolved problems NASA could attack once they get over their fixation with building new rockets.

Demonstrating the capability of private industry is SpaceX, who spent $250M in NASA funds to develop and fly a large launch vehicle and a capsule. (econgeeker's details are wrong but the low cost is correct, and Orbital is the firm that is using Russian technology)

$250M is nothing compared with the $20000M NASA planned to spend on its launch vehicle and capsule program.

Re: How to Avoid Repeating the Debacle That Was the Space Shuttle

#23

Post by cfgvjkljhgfb »

marze wrote: post #22
econgeeker wrote: post #8

This article makes a lot of good points, but I felt it failed to really break the surface and address the core problem that led to the failure of the Space Shuttle program. That core problem is misalignment of incentives. Or in short, politics. When you've got a public budget and your goals are political ones, you're going to pursue a specific set of capabilities and policies that help your political career. This is…

Since NASA has repeatedly demonstrated its inability to develop a new rocket (something like $21B wasted in failed attempts over the last 20 years), it certainly makes sense to outsource launch services to the free market instead of trying to relive the Apollo era. However, since there is a lot of interesting exploration and science that NASA could continue to do that no profit incentive exists for (deep space probes…

ESA manages to launch telescopes much more complex than Hubble in spite of not owning a single rocket.

Re: How to Avoid Repeating the Debacle That Was the Space Shuttle

#24

Post by cfgvjkljhgfb »

econgeeker wrote: post #9
kingkawn wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would think that the people are hacker news of all places would not get caught up in media-hype trends about how all government spending is waste bla bla. NASA tried to change the paradigm of space travel. It didn't work the way they'd hoped, but that's the risk of trying something different. Comparing it to TARP and Afghanistan is a ridiculous non sequitur that only works if you buy into the anti-government yammer…

So, am I to understand that your position is that NASA is efficient in its spending, and that this who think governments are inefficient (cost wise) at achieving goals are caught up in a "media-hype" that is "antigovernment"? If that is correct, how were SpaceX and Scaled Composites able to do so much with such limited resources?

They didn't have to build components at factories in 50 different states.

They didn't have to include secret USAF, CIA, AAA etc requirements in the design.

They had a simple goal - get payload to LEO cheaply - not a nebulous goal of 'make America look good in space'

Re: How to Avoid Repeating the Debacle That Was the Space Shuttle

#25

Post by cfgvjkljhgfb »

exratione wrote: post #13

This is also a good perspective, albeit old: http://www.spacefuture.com/vehicles/how_the_west_wasnt_won_n... "This country was bounded to the West by a desert. One day a telescope built on one of the country's mountains revealed what looked like sea far away beyond the desert which would have to be crossed in order to discover if there was habitable land on the coast. So the politicians got together and established a…

The funny thing is that it's accuracy hasn't changed - which tells you all you need to know about Nasa

Re: How to Avoid Repeating the Debacle That Was the Space Shuttle

#26

Post by [deleted] »

econgeeker wrote: post #8

This article makes a lot of good points, but I felt it failed to really break the surface and address the core problem that led to the failure of the Space Shuttle program. That core problem is misalignment of incentives. Or in short, politics. When you've got a public budget and your goals are political ones, you're going to pursue a specific set of capabilities and policies that help your political career. This is…

[deleted]

Re: How to Avoid Repeating the Debacle That Was the Space Shuttle

#27

Post by wisty »

econgeeker wrote: post #8

This article makes a lot of good points, but I felt it failed to really break the surface and address the core problem that led to the failure of the Space Shuttle program. That core problem is misalignment of incentives. Or in short, politics. When you've got a public budget and your goals are political ones, you're going to pursue a specific set of capabilities and policies that help your political career. This is…

The problem wasn't NASA. The problem was, NASA was told to build something impossible - a cheap and reliable spaceplane. It was many times more complex than anything else ever made (including the Saturn V). It was never going to be cheap and reliable. (Well, it might be possible today, with decades more experience and technology). Only the "yes men" said it was possible, and they got promoted. The rest of the engineers were forced to work in a bubble where a realistic big picture didn't matter.

OK, you can privatize that. But the same problems will apply. Look at Australia's military acquisitions. Every vehicle we buy costs 10X the MOTS price, because there's always a requirement "modifications for Australian conditions". The private operators read this as "complete idiots in command", and charge accordingly. A privatized space sector would work the same way - stupid government orders will get stupid prices.

Re: How to Avoid Repeating the Debacle That Was the Space Shuttle

#28

Post by stretchwithme »

kingkawn wrote: post #7
stretchwithme wrote: post #5

What amazes me is how uncritically the media usually treats this issue. A great many things the government does follow a similar over-promising, under-delivering pattern. The notion that perception is reality and a loss of confidence is the worst thing that can ever happen conspire to stifle public questioning. We see it with Afghanistan, stimulus spending, TARP. As justifications don't pan out, something else is use…

I would think that the people are hacker news of all places would not get caught up in media-hype trends about how all government spending is waste bla bla. NASA tried to change the paradigm of space travel. It didn't work the way they'd hoped, but that's the risk of trying something different. Comparing it to TARP and Afghanistan is a ridiculous non sequitur that only works if you buy into the anti-government yammer…

Its not based on media hype. If you've had personal dealings with the government, you'd notice that it takes weeks and several people that the private sector does with a single web form.

Its obvious that even software development is bloated beyond belief with no pressure to actually be responsible with the people's money.

From what I can observe, there are plenty of people that believe what politicians say. And that's a far more dangerous thing than listening to all the conflicting superficial voices of the media. There are just as many voices in the media that claim more government is the answer to every problem as say more government is bad.

Government is perfectly efficient at spending money on its pet projects and pet people. 100% of the money go to them.

But what the people who pay for this massive mess care about is what matters.

Re: How to Avoid Repeating the Debacle That Was the Space Shuttle

#29

Post by gus_massa »

cfgvjkljhgfb wrote: post #25
exratione wrote: post #13

This is also a good perspective, albeit old: http://www.spacefuture.com/vehicles/how_the_west_wasnt_won_n... "This country was bounded to the West by a desert. One day a telescope built on one of the country's mountains revealed what looked like sea far away beyond the desert which would have to be crossed in order to discover if there was habitable land on the coast. So the politicians got together and established a…

The funny thing is that it's accuracy hasn't changed - which tells you all you need to know about Nasa

I hadn't read this article before, and I couldn't find the publication date in the page.

The first time it appears in the Wayback Machine is in December 2002. http://web.archive.org/web/20021217044832/http://www.spacefu...

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