The End of Discovery

Have a good long look at the picture above. Notice the guy in the lower right hand corner with the “Yeah, Im gonna be out of work soon,” look on his face? That look encompasses the feelings of both NASA employees and fans of spaceflight all over the world. What we are witnessing above is the disassembly of what was arguably the best of the orbiter fleet, Discovery. Originally designed for 100 missions, Discovery successfully flew for only 39 before being taken to the hanger for the last time after its final flight earlier this month. The large section in the yellow crane in the picture is the entire forward reaction control system which must be removed, gutted and cleaned as part of a process that will eventually ship Discovery to the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum later this year, certainly, the creme de la creme of retirement homes for such an amazing vehicle. And yet as a fan of manned spaceflight this picture seems more like another solid punch to the gut than a progress report.

There is a clear analogy to be drawn with the disassembly of America’s shuttle fleet, and that is the disassembly of our manned space program in its entirety. The wealth of knowledge and expertise that will be lost with the dismissal of the various NASA personnel is staggering. The value of something that was uniquely American which served as a uniting influence being shelved may hurt us far worse. In a time when every day it appears that our country has become a little more polarized, a little more divided, our government decided that shutting down the shuttles and freeing up less than a whopping six tenths of a percent of our national budget would bring more value to our nation than keeping them afloat. The NASA budget figures come as a shock to many. The budget for the entirety of NASA in 2009 was 17.2 billion dollars. Sound like a lot? Lets compare this figure to some other numbers from 2009:

• $613 Billion – Defense
• $612 Billion – Social Security
• $682 Billion – Medicare/Medicaid
• $303 Billion – Mandatory Government Spending
• $249 Billion – Interest
• $520 Billion – Other Discretionary Spending

“But Doug,” you counter, “Those are all necessary and vital fields which the government must cover.” Ok. While I don’t agree, I will spot you this one. So how about some other numbers just to make things interesting?

• $27 Billion – Pizza purchased in America
• $50 Billion – Total scammed by Bernie Maddof
• $88 Billion – Tobacco products purchased in America
• $97 Billion – Alcohol products purchased in America
• $313 Billion – Treatment of tobacco and alcohol related illnesses
• $586 Billion – Gambling in America

As Texas Jack once famously said, “NOW GIVE ME SOME FIGHTIN’ ROOM!”

Please keep in mind that I’m not here to stomp my feet in anger or put out a call to ban alcohol, tobacco or even worse, pizza. I’m not here to champion the continuing use of the space shuttle as it was time to begin thinking about the next generation of spaceflight vehicles. What I would like to remind everyone of is the fact that with the retirement of the shuttle fleet we are finished as a leader in spaceflight. There is no new lift system on the table at NASA. There is no budget allocation for the next generation of lift system to be developed. In a scenario where a budget was allocated tomorrow and everything went perfectly we would not have a vehicle ready for manned spaceflight for at least a decade optimistically. Will private companies be able to pick up the slack vaporizing the need for NASA to be the transport experts in space? Perhaps. Space X is looking pretty good so far with their program and hopefully will continue to, but even they are several years away from putting people on top of their candle. In the meantime we will be hitching rides to get into orbit with any of our international friends who are willing.

America…hitching a ride.