Space Shuttle: January 2008 Archives

Space Politic's has a couple of interesting links to pro-space exploration activism and the increasing number of exploration related questions cropping up in the presidential debates but this report of Republican presidential candidate wannabe Rudy Guiliani having a space policy roundtable - and this guy sees Florida as the real start of his election - suggests that there are 5,000 space programme workers and their families who are going to be wanting Rudy to opt for a delayed end to Shuttle

Following on from NASASpaceflight.com's report that NASA has decided to keep its orbiter Atlantis going till 2010 I emailed the agency to ask them about this. And the answer is...

(Accompanied by recovery vehicles, the Space Shuttle Atlantis is towed up the taxiway at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center following its 1249h local time landing on 22 June 2007 at Edwards Air Force Base in California, following its mission STS-117)

Reuters has reported in the last hour that NASA's Space Shuttle Atlantis is to launch on 7 February and not 24 January

I can only find this NASASpaceflight.com report identifying the 7th and there is nothing on NASA's website

It is an interesting choice of date becauswe it is the same day as Energia's Progress M-63 was supposed to go up. My source expected maybe a 24h advance from the Russians but NASA must have done a good job of persuading the Russians so the two-days grace between launches normally preferred is achieved. NASASpaceflght.com reports that the Russians will try for the 5th

I had also heard that the launch window time on the 24 January was about 0200h local time. So I'm rather glad of the slip to 7 Feb as I am expecting to be blogging live from Kennedy Space Center come Atlantis' launch day

According to this 2007 article at Salon.com the Floridian primary is on 29 January and I am beginning to wonder if the prospect of up to 5,000 job losses in the sunshine state, due to the Space Shuttle programme's retirement, will have an impact on the presidential race

Could we see any or all of the candidates, fighting it out for their party's nomination to be their presidential candidate, answer in the affirmative to questions during the pre-vote caucus that Shuttle's demise should be delayed?

Being a British engineer cum journalist I am straying off my home patch, or comfort zone if you will, when talking about the US presidential elections and entering Jeff Foust's domain but covering the very political US space programme it can't be helped

The Salon.com article says, "Florida potentially becomes Hillary Clinton's firewall state -- the primary in which she could launch a comeback even if she endures a string of early defeats."

Care of Hobbyspace.com, The Washington Post is worrying about proposed Shuttle schedules with six launches allegedly planned for this year

With 14 flights left (including Atlantis/STS-122 that NASASpaceflight.com is expecting a 2 February launch for), NASA could do five this year, five next year and four in 2010, with a February, April, June, August timetable, to retire the fleet within fiscal year 2010. Then again that could become 15 flights if Congress gets its way with its demands for a flight to International Space Station for the Alpha Magnetic Spectrograph (AMS)

Personally I think we are seeing a drift into 2011, and with 5,000 jobs potentially going with Shuttle's retirement in 2010 I wonder how significant that figure will become as we get closer to the November 2008 date of the US presidential election. Expect renewed candidates' commitments to a programme that employs a lot of voters in a state that has been crucial in past elections, me thinks

And then there is something else that has little hope of getting to ISS, Shuttle or not Shuttle. The British Interplanetary Society's latest issue of its Spaceflight magazine has a proposal for a UK built habitation module that would be attached to ISS' Node 3. This UK blog has some issues with the idea.

While I would recommend the latest issue of Spaceflight because there is an article about the Chinese manned space programme, by, well, me, of course! Or you can read my blogs about my China trip

NASASpaceflight.com had a great story about a re-entry experiment that will be conducted during STS-126

And the same website had some interesting detail about the work to sort out the External Tank (ET)-125's engine cut off sensors

And at one point NASAWatch.com thought this contract meant Shuttle operations were drifting post 2010 - but NASA said no