Busy Week at the Cape and Beyond
Thus far, the year 2001 is living up to (sort of) the prediction of Director Stanley Kubrick's vision of a space faring world in his movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. We do after all have a regular system of travel to space and a space station that is being built by several nations—OK it isn’t exactly a giant revolving wheel with anti-gravity as in the movie, but we must deal with reality. Some events from the recent past of last week could—almost—come from the scenes of 1960’s science fiction movie.
Shuttle Bottleneck
Early last week, despite the frantic and frenetic preparations for a shuttle launch, two shuttle ferry flights occurred simultaneously for the first time in NASA’s history. After touching down on the Mojave Desert on February 20th, Shuttle Atlantis began its long journey back to the Kennedy Space Center (KSC), Florida to be prepared for another launch. Just as bad weather forced a re-entry landing in California (NASA likes to land at the strip at KSC to save money at time), the shuttle was forced to land in Oklahoma because of inclement weather nearly two weeks ago. On Sunday, February 25th, Atlantis finally made its ways to Eglin, Alabama for refueling before flying on to KSC and landing on their long shuttle runway on Monday, March 5th. At the same time, Shuttle Columbia, which was returning from California for 17 months of re-furbishing, was also making its way back to Florida. Because of the upcoming launch of Discovery, and the slow process of de-mating Atlantis from its 747 carrier and moving it into Shuttle Facilities, Columbia was forced to land at a nearby runway at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. It remained there until Atlantis was de-mated from the 747 carrier last Wednesday. Columbia was then ferried to the KSC complex and thus resolved the world’s first spacecraft traffic-jam. “It was an odd spectacle,” once source said. While this may appear to be a mundane process, having three shuttles at KSC in need of some form of attention can be a serious strain. This is especially true when one of them, Discovery, was sitting on the pad being prepared for launch. It was a scene surely indicative of a space program that is moving forward to meet lofty goals. Atlantis is scheduled for launch in June and Columbia sometime in late November.
Budget Cuts: Russia to the Rescue?
Due to an increasingly large and ever bloated budget, the International Space Station (ISS) faced a serious setback last week. The President’s new budget plan calls for the cancellation of two projects that would aid the station. A Habitat module, which would increase crew capacity and provide much needed living quarters for astronauts, is almost certain to meet the chopping block. The Crew Return Vehicle, or CRV, is also most likely going to be cancelled. The CRV is a spacecraft that could be attached to the ISS and used as an emergency lifeboat in the event of a catastrophic emergency on board. Due to be delivered by the Space Shuttle in 2005, its cancellation is causing functional headaches for the space station planners. The CRV has a crew return capacity of 7, and along with a Soyuz capsule already docked with the ISS, these two ships would enable up to 9 or 10 crewmembers to safely return home if the unforeseeable occurred. Without the CRV the crew cannot grow any larger than 3.
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