The loss of the shuttle is a tragedy beyond words. It is a testimony to the success of western civilization that such projects can be achieved, even at great risk. It is a hallmark of the nature of this civilization that men and women willingly risk their lives in this endeavor.
To tell the truth, however, I’ve never liked either the shuttle or the ISS. They consume all the resources of the manned space program, and produce marginal return. As an engineer in the semiconductor industry, I can say almost nothing of the research done on crystallography on the ISS has been used in industry. Neither the shuttle, nor the ISS produce anything of benefit in terms of exploration, or pushing back the frontiers of knowledge, which justify either their expense, or their risk. We’ve lost 13 brave men and women. It’s time to seriously reconsider the objectives of the space program.
To me, there’s only one goal worth pursuing now: a manned mission to Mars. This would be of far greater risk to astronauts than the shuttle, but it would answer a question that is definitely having answered: is there life in the universe beyond ours?
As a chemist, I find the experiments previously done, which gave inconclusive answers very frustrating. Surely, with a manned mission, scientists and equipment could be sent which would have the flexibility to design experiments to finalize the issue.
Such a mission would also recapture the nature of NASA in the early 60’s when it really WAS at the frontier of knowledge. Today NASA’s manned program yields little. It’s time to junk the shuttle, and the ISS, and have the US lead an international program, with the world’s best researchers, for a mission to Mars.
