Re: "Space shuttles never lived up to expectations"

"Jim Oberg" <jameseoberg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

OTHER??

For me a lot of the points can be wrapped into:

STS was a very respectable version 1.0. Most of the wrangling over
"was it a success or a failure?" (and all the subsidiary "here's why")
is a distraction from the larger question of why we ever deluded
ourselves that version 1.0 -- rather than a series of iterations, each
incorporating lessons learned -- could or should have solved such a
tough set of challenges.

IOW, I find it easier to understand and make allowance for the choices
made from 1969 through rollout than to understand how it could have
been pronounced "operational" after four flights without a long, loud,
lasting "Say what?!? NFW!!!"

I mean, talk about "declare victory and go home..."

(From that POV, your comment on ISS switches the cart and the horse.
Too much of the Freedom/Alpha period went on, at least at the NASA
HQ-Congress level, *as if* we had something like the flight rates and
costs envisioned c. 1971. Given that waking dream, the downsizing and
downscoping -- and ultimately some salvage maneuver like the ISS --
were inevitable.)


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