May Abandon the International Space Station

[Brent]

I just saw on the news on TV that they may have to abandon the international space station now. Found this link, just now, there may be others come out today on this topic.

http://blog.al.com/space-news/2011/08/nasa_may_temporarily_abandon_s.html

We just built the darn thing, and now we may have to abandon it. That is just all kinds of screwed up. I am sad for the state of manned space exploration and science. What's going to happen is that others may take up the slack, if America is no longer up to the job. We use to be the leaders in this, but no longer. It's really sad, the IIS was a great accomplishment.

 

[Dukhat]

The abandonment is temporary, if it even happens at all. Or would you rather have the six astronauts and cosmonauts stay up there and run out of supplies?

And it's not like the ISS is going to come crashing down to Earth if it's not manned for a few months.

 

[Lindley]

This isn't about the station itself, it's about the safety of human launch vehicles, specifically Soyuz. Until they determine what went wrong on the freight rocket, they don't want to risk another manned launch. And the astronaughts and cosmonauts up there right now can't be expected to stay indefinitely.

Don't panic yet. Even if the investigation takes more than a few months (likely), the station can probably manage on its own for a while until a replacement crew can be arranged.

 

[Brent]

Don't you see a problem, that we have to rely on another country to get to the station? I wish we still had the ability to get people in and out of there. I'm still not happy about that decision, and here lies our first issue, with no backup plan.

 

[Dukhat]

Don't you see a problem, that we have to rely on another country to get to the station? I wish we still had the ability to get people in and out of there. I'm still not happy about that decision, and here lies our first issue, with no backup plan.

If you're upset that the US now does not have its own manned spacecraft for a shuttle replacement, fine. I'm upset about that as well. But hitching rides on a Soyuz for a few years isn't necessarily a bad thing. For one, they're TONS safer than the space shuttle ever was, and far cheaper to build and launch. And Americans and Russians are in this together, you know...have been since the '90's.

 

[brian577]

Don't you see a problem, that we have to rely on another country to get to the station? I wish we still had the ability to get people in and out of there. I'm still not happy about that decision, and here lies our first issue, with no backup plan.

If you're upset that the US now does not have its own manned spacecraft for a shuttle replacement, fine. I'm upset about that as well. But hitching rides on a Soyuz for a few years isn't necessarily a bad thing.

And what do you call this? A good thing?

 

[YellowSubmarine]

It's a plot between the Russians and the aliens so that they can reside temporarily on our space station as they are preparing for the invasion.

 

[Canadave]

Don't you see a problem, that we have to rely on another country to get to the station? I wish we still had the ability to get people in and out of there. I'm still not happy about that decision, and here lies our first issue, with no backup plan.

If you're upset that the US now does not have its own manned spacecraft for a shuttle replacement, fine. I'm upset about that as well. But hitching rides on a Soyuz for a few years isn't necessarily a bad thing.

And what do you call this? A good thing?

I'd call it logical international cooperation, myself. Speaking as a resident of a country whose space agency has always had to hitch rides from other countries...

 

[Wanderlust]

And what do you call this? A good thing?

A necessarily thing. We are on a team playing for Humanity.

 

[brian577]

And what do you call this? A good thing?

A necessarily thing. We are on a team playing for Humanity.

Team players usually contribute and don't sit on the sidelines while someone else does all the work and BOTCHES IT UP ROYALLY!

 

[Lindley]

It's unfortunate that the Russians happened to have a problem that needs investigating at this particular juncture. However, I believe the decision to end the shuttle program was ultimately the right one.

LEO is no longer a research problem. At this point it's pure engineering. We don't need to continue pouring money into that which could better be spent figuring out how to do things we haven't done yet, especially when there are other options to take up the LEO slack either present or on the horizon.

 

[Dukhat]

Team players usually contribute and don't sit on the sidelines while someone else does all the work and BOTCHES IT UP ROYALLY!

Explain what you mean by this, please.

 

[brian577]

Team players usually contribute and don't sit on the sidelines while someone else does all the work and BOTCHES IT UP ROYALLY!

Explain what you mean by this, please.

What's there to explain? In terms of space flight we are on the sidelines with the Russians doing all the work. We leave them in charge for ONE MONTH and look where it gets us. How many times are we going to have to abandon the station in the next two years because we only have one country with functioning spacecraft?

 

[YellowSubmarine]

I still don't understand what you mean by “BOTCHES IT UP ROYALLY”.

 

[Dukhat]

What's there to explain?

Yes, that's what I asked, and you haven't given me a satisfactory answer yet.

In terms of space flight we are on the sidelines with the Russians doing all the work. We leave them in charge for ONE MONTH and look where it gets us.

How are the Russians doing anything that they wouldn't already have been doing? You do know that American astronauts have been going to the ISS in Soyuz spacecraft for several years now, right? And your statement "look where it gets us" is obviously referring to the Progress supply ship crash. That's just a minor setback, not a major disaster.

How many times are we going to have to abandon the station in the next two years because we only have one country with functioning spacecraft?

No one's abandoned anything yet. And even if it happens, the station is fully able to function independently of crew for enough time to deal with the problem. They've already determined what the problem was; for all we know they may just let the crew stay and have SpaceX send their Dragon with supplies in November.

 

[RoJoHen]

If you're upset that the US now does not have its own manned spacecraft for a shuttle replacement, fine. I'm upset about that as well. But hitching rides on a Soyuz for a few years isn't necessarily a bad thing.

And what do you call this? A good thing?

I'd call it logical international cooperation, myself.

International cooperation?! To get to the International space station?! Crazy talk!

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

It's unfortunate that the Russians happened to have a problem that needs investigating at this particular juncture. However, I believe the decision to end the shuttle program was ultimately the right one.

I don't blame the Russians for grounding their rockets; in their position, I would do the same thing. It's no different than how we grounded our shuttle fleet after the Challenger and Columbia accidents...though fortunately this accident didn't cost any lives.

I even agree that the shuttle fleet was too antiquated to continue and that we couldn't keep flying them.

However...I think the lack of planning and foresight, that we didn't have a successor for the shuttle prepared in time, is really inexcusable. Granted, I'm not as well-versed in these issues as some of you, but the fact that we didn't even plan enough to contract out our space travel to the private sector for the long term when there are businesses like SpaceX, and encourage them so they'd be ready to go and they could continue operations at reduced cost to the US government, compared to NASA, strikes me as ridiculous.

 

[Wanderlust]

The man rating of Atlas 5 should have happened 5 years ago. The Ares 1 debacle and the shuttle still existing got in the way of it. [btw, the russians have been doing the heavy work for crew since 2009, thats the last time a shuttle played a role in rotating an expedition member.

 

[Yminale]

However...I think the lack of planning and foresight, that we didn't have a successor for the shuttle prepared in time, is really inexcusable.

The issues is money and commitment. Building a manned space vehicle is not cheap and various programs have been cut and then cancelled.

The European Space Agency and the Japanese Space Agency were the backups but both had to cut funding on their manned return vehicles.

SpaceX, if you believe Elon Musk can get the Dragon ready for manned missions in 3 years. Lockheed Martin if there are no bumps can get their vehicle up in 5 years.

Of course there is the Chinese who have an open invitation to join the ISS.

 

[Dukhat]

SpaceX, if you believe Elon Musk can get the Dragon ready for manned missions in 3 years.

I don't believe Elon Musk can get the Dragon ready for manned missions in 3 years. I believe he can get it ready in 2 years.