Re: Soyuz TMA-11 Comes Home, More or Less...

fairwater@xxxxxxxxx (Derek Lyons) wrote:

Which, in my book, makes the person who thinks that's a condemnation
of the Shuttle... an idiot. Because that was the goal of the Shuttle
from Day One, to work with a space station.

The seemingly neat circularity emerged after the fact. With cheaper
and more frequent access, the station could have been built soon and
cheap enough, equipped and staffed adequately, to actually *do* the
kinds of research originally promised.

But with the successive delays and downscoping, that has never been
possible. Unfortunately, that has discredited the whole premise and we
get the "all we do is go around in circles in LEO" mindset, and a
vague sense that "they tried all that free-fall science and nothing
panned out" -- when in fact, all but a few token bits of science have
been squeezed out by the demands of just getting it "complete" before
the oldest parts reached the end of safe service life.

(NB: I'm not claiming the most hyped promises -- the giant protein
crystals, perfect ball bearings, breakthroughs in undersatnding
free-fall physiology etc -- would have paid off; I'm saying there's
never been a chance of finding out with the very limited equipment and
even more limited time available for them).

It's as if I'd tried to build a house on a mountaintop using a
Lamborghini to carry materials and workmen. Surprisingly, the house
ends up a lot more expensive, less spacious and well-equipped than I'd
hoped... and I conclude "well, that proves a house on a moiuntaintop
is a dumb idea."

Monte Davis
http://montedavis.livejournal.com/
.

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