Griffin: Shuttle-CEV Gap Unacceptable

This is news. From congressional testimony reported at:

"http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=753&e=1&u=/ap/20050412/ap_on_go_co/nasa_chief&sid=84439559"

" Griffin also agreed with senators that there was an
unacceptable gap between the planned retirement, no
later than 2010, of the space shuttle, and the launch
some five years later of the next-generation manned
vehicle, called the Crew Exploration Vehicle."

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (news, bio, voting record),
R-Texas, who heads the Commerce Committee's panel on
science and space, said such a hiatus was "a security
issue for our country."

Griffin concurred: "I do not believe we would wish to
see a situation where the United States is dependent
on any partners, reliable or unreliable" for access
to space."

"Ed Kyle" wrote in
ups.com:

This is news. From congressional testimony reported at:

"http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=753&e=1&u=/ap/20050412/ap_o
n_go_co/nasa_chief&sid=84439559"

" Griffin also agreed with senators that there was an
unacceptable gap between the planned retirement, no
later than 2010, of the space shuttle, and the launch
some five years later of the next-generation manned
vehicle, called the Crew Exploration Vehicle."

As I suspected would be the case; the retirement of the Shuttle
will have to be pushed back, or funding and development of
CEV pushed up. More likely the former than the latter, given
the way Congress does things.

--Damon

On Tue, 12 Apr 2005 17:48:21 -0500, in a place far, far away, Damon
Hill made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
such a way as to indicate that:

" Griffin also agreed with senators that there was an
unacceptable gap between the planned retirement, no
later than 2010, of the space shuttle, and the launch
some five years later of the next-generation manned
vehicle, called the Crew Exploration Vehicle."

As I suspected would be the case; the retirement of the Shuttle
will have to be pushed back, or funding and development of
CEV pushed up. More likely the former than the latter, given
the way Congress does things.

It doesn't say that it has to be closed--just that four years is
unacceptable. Griffin obviously plans to move the 2014 date up.

Damon Hill wrote:
As I suspected would be the case; the retirement of the Shuttle
will have to be pushed back,

So who exactly do you think will be brave enough to take responsibility
for keeping the shuttle flying past 2010?

Currently we have a fixed date to stop flights, and if a shuttle is
lost then Congress can blame NASA for screwing up. If Congress tell
them to keep flying til 2014 and a shuttle is lost after 2010, NASA
will blame Congress for telling them to keep flying.

Do you think there's a single person in Congress with the balls to take
that responsibility?

Mark

wrote in
ups.com:

Damon Hill wrote:
As I suspected would be the case; the retirement of the Shuttle
will have to be pushed back,

So who exactly do you think will be brave enough to take responsibility
for keeping the shuttle flying past 2010?

Currently we have a fixed date to stop flights,

The "fixed" date is in fact completely arbitrary, so stretching it will not
require much bravery.


--
JRF

Reply-to address spam-proofed - to reply by E-mail,
check "Organization" (I am not assimilated) and
think one step ahead of IBM.

In article ,
Jorge R. Frank wrote:
So who exactly do you think will be brave enough to take responsibility
for keeping the shuttle flying past 2010?
Currently we have a fixed date to stop flights,
The "fixed" date is in fact completely arbitrary, so stretching it will not
require much bravery.

It would require the courage, or maybe the cowardice, to contradict a
direct and explicit promise from the President of the United States to
the American people.


--
/\ Greg Kuperberg (UC Davis)
/ \ Home page: http://www.math.ucdavis.edu/~greg/
\ / Visit the Math ArXiv Front at http://front.math.ucdavis.edu/
\/ * All the math that's fit to e-print *

On Wed, 13 Apr 2005 13:35:01 +0000 (UTC), in a place far, far away,
(Greg Kuperberg) made the phosphor on my monitor
glow in such a way as to indicate that:

In article ,
Jorge R. Frank wrote:
So who exactly do you think will be brave enough to take responsibility
for keeping the shuttle flying past 2010?
Currently we have a fixed date to stop flights,
The "fixed" date is in fact completely arbitrary, so stretching it will not
require much bravery.

It would require the courage, or maybe the cowardice, to contradict a
direct and explicit promise from the President of the United States to
the American people.

laughing

Try not to be such an ass, Gregg. Stating a policy is not a "direct
and explicit promise to the American people." The president didn't
stand up there and say "Read my lips! No Shuttle flights after 2010!"

You're one of the few "American people" who give a rat's patoot. He
just stated that this was the new policy. Policies can always change,
if necessitated by events. Particularly after the president that made
them has left office...

Greg Kuperberg wrote:
In article ,
Jorge R. Frank wrote:
So who exactly do you think will be brave enough to take responsibility
for keeping the shuttle flying past 2010?
Currently we have a fixed date to stop flights,
The "fixed" date is in fact completely arbitrary, so stretching it will not
require much bravery.

It would require the courage, or maybe the cowardice, to contradict a
direct and explicit promise from the President of the United States to
the American people.


No you just need to feed another "promise" to some other (or possibly
even the same) president sometime before the date.

--
Sander

+++ Out of cheese error +++

On Wed, 13 Apr 2005 13:35:01 +0000 (UTC), (Greg
Kuperberg) wrote:

In article ,
Jorge R. Frank wrote:
So who exactly do you think will be brave enough to take responsibility
for keeping the shuttle flying past 2010?
Currently we have a fixed date to stop flights,
The "fixed" date is in fact completely arbitrary, so stretching it will not
require much bravery.

It would require the courage, or maybe the cowardice, to contradict a
direct and explicit promise from the President of the United States to
the American people.

Like "Read my lips; no new taxes" did?

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer
or

(Greg Kuperberg) wrote in
:

In article ,
Jorge R. Frank wrote:
So who exactly do you think will be brave enough to take
responsibility for keeping the shuttle flying past 2010?
Currently we have a fixed date to stop flights,
The "fixed" date is in fact completely arbitrary, so stretching it
will not require much bravery.

It would require the courage, or maybe the cowardice, to contradict a
direct and explicit promise from the President of the United States to
the American people.

That was not a promise by any reasonable definition.

And it doesn't change the fact that the date was, in fact, arbitrary.


--
JRF

Reply-to address spam-proofed - to reply by E-mail,
check "Organization" (I am not assimilated) and
think one step ahead of IBM.