There are a number of issues which could probably have been planned better or risks which could have been allowed for but the plain fact of the matter is that NASA takes risks on every launch, and the astronauts must know and accept that. As I would if I were offered the opportunity to get a ride in a shuttle. Are they looking for 50-year-old astronauts who are myopic and overweight, who have no particular scientific skills, who like their eight hours' sleep, can't stand dried food and who smoke? I did hear they were liberalising. Maybe they even have real ale in casks on the shuttles these days. Wahooo!

Rubrick was misinformed a little: If a shuttle is ready to fly and if lots of corners are cut (i.e. more risks are taken), they can get one up in a week. This could have been done as a rescue mission, but remember that the engineers assessed the risk of damage from the exfoliating insulation as small. They were wrong this time, but give them credit - they're not often wrong. If they were, the world would be littered with the remains of failed launches and/or landings. I don't believe they should berate themselves too much or start being afraid to make decisions in case they're wrong. As I said in an earlier post, the ground crews and mission control staff will not be happy bunnies at all. But they need to get it back together for the next launch.

Aborting to the ISS just wasn't an option given Columbia's mission profile. Her orbit was well below the ISS and was on a completely different plane, so that getting to the ISS was beyond her fuel endurance. End of story. You could say, of course, that they should have planned a possible abort to the ISS in and ensured that the shuttle was in the same general orbit as the ISS. But I'm sure that the credo is that each mission stands on its own and if every mission is planned around a possible accident, i.e. they always ensure that an abort to the ISS is possible, the damned things may as well just sit on the ground.

There are no other possible abort options that I'm aware of.

I was surprised to hear that they didn't have EMUs on board. I thought they were standard equipment. They certainly were in the early years. Still, what could they have done even if they found the gash, presuming it existed? Duct tape is amazing stuff, but in this instance, well, maybe not.

One thing that could be done is to have a Saturn V on standby with a big Apollo capsule specifically to carry out rescues, although it wouldn't take seven people, of course. But it would be costly; they don't have any Saturn Vs left, dammit. They were amazing machines. If you ever get to the Hutchinson Aerospace Museum in Kansas, take a look at the F1 engine they have on display there. Absolutely, mindblowingly amazing. Even if it was the Huntsville Nazis who designed it. The Saturn remains the most powerful booster the US ever built and the most reliable.

They also have the actual Apollo 13 capsule there.

Maybe the Russians could be contracted to keep an Energia on tap. They'll do anything for dollars.

Anyway, they have to keep on truckin'. Getting the space plane built and up and running will reduce the number of heavy-lift shuttle launches necessary and each SSTO mission will cost peanuts alongside shuttle launches.



- Pfranz