"David Nakamoto" wrote in message
news
I'm very worried about the Hubble's end. It's big enough to have some
of
its bigger parts survive re-entry, and it definitely doesn't have enough
fuel to change course enough to guarentee a splashdown somewhere.

Boosting it to any higher orbit would have to be done with an attachable
expendible, since the Shuttle can't go high enough to guarentee it won't
fall back. If we're talking about putting it up in a higher orbit without
worrying about using it again, then the only problem is to fly the shuttle
up there, grab Hubble, attach the rocket, release it, have the rocket
align
itself and Hubble in the right direction, and fire away. Knowing NASA, I
suspect they're going to take their chances and let it fall rather than
spend the money building the rocket, training the crew, and doing the
mission, all of which is going to cost hundreds of millions of bucks.


The plan is to fly up a booster to guide it into a controlled descent.
Without the Shuttle the booster will have to go up on an unmanned launcher.

uray