Where exactly did it go wrong? How do get your calculations off by such an amount? Did someone get a decimal point confused on their calculator?

There's almost certainly a good lesson in applied bleeding edge technology in there somewhere. I'm not an expert; i'll regurgitate some stuff i've read over the years, but there are a number of people out there who are better informed.

To a first approximation, there are two sets of costs to the shuttle program--fixed costs and per mission costs. The fixed costs are those that you pay regardless of how many birds fly--these would be salaries, amortized R&D, facilities, upgrades, that sort of thing. This is a large cost of maintaining the shuttle fleet. A lot of these costs would be present regardless of whether you're flying the shuttle or expendables. The other is are the per-mission costs--fuel, extra pay for the astronauts, refurbishing the shuttle, wear and tear on the shuttle, whatever.

Obviously, if you fly lots of missions, you cut down on the percentage of the fixed costs on a per mission basis. I believe that the Shuttle was supposed to have a lower marginal cost but a higher fixed cost than expendables; it could only be justified economically if all possible US flights were routed to the shuttle. Which was US policy until Challenger. Even so, i believe they had to factor in a growth factor to make things work out (something along the lines of "if you build it, they will come").

NASA had to redesign the shuttle on the fly to get military buy-in; even then, the military wasn't all that keen on it (with good reason). Some of the Shuttle's shortcomings can be blamed on the redesigns and budget limits.

As it happened, the Shuttle wasn't quite as reliable as anticipated. The engines had to be essentially torn down and rebuilt from scratch after every launch. Tiles fell off, every tile had to be inspected. Cracks developed. And so on. It became evident that the anticipated launch rate was hopelessly optimistic. Some of these were to be expected--teething pains. Still, there were a lot of them.

And then came Challenger. Which exposed a host of problems. Several key systems were redesigned (many of the redesigns were heavier, more robust, lower performance. Exactly the opposite direction i would have hoped for (design the prototypes pessimistically, remove weight and add performance as your understanding of the dynamics improves)). The space program was offline for a year. Philosophies shifted--only missions requiring the shuttle were launched on the shuttle.

Anyway, as to what went wrong, probably lots of stuff. The shuttle was sold as a space truck. But it was a truck made with bleeding edge technology. And it was a truck made to be all things to all people. And possibly it was a truck made for a task that never quite materialized.

I thought someone might jump all over my comment about the cost/benefit of science with regards to Apollo. The truth is that claims of the science rewards were somewhat exaggerated by NASA. Of course the moon rocks we've got are an amazing source of information, but we really didn't go to all that many scientifically interesting places on the moon. Apollo was an engineering feat: not a scientific feat. While it's true that the kind of science that was supported by Apollo in the 60s could not have been done cheaper by unmanned missions, there was a lot of science (and engineering) that was not done because we spent the money on a human expedition and had to worry about keeping them astronauts alive and healthy. Maybe no rock samples, but if we had established a firm scientific base in the 60s and 70s we might have been able to develop more sample return missions today.

Glad to oblige

Not sure what your point is here. First, if we had taken all the money that we spent on an Apollo mission and used it for unmanned exploration of the moon, we wouldn't have had all that money. Apollo was more about politics than exploration.

However, if somehow we could have used all that money on developing a real infrastructure, then we might have a real manned space program now. However, that doesn't appear to be what you're proposing either.

I'm not sure what "firm scientific base" was intended to mean. I don't think you meant a permanent unmanned scientific base on the moon--that doesn't seem to have many advantages over a series of Apollo-type missions, and i don't see any feasible way of doing it with existing technology--but i don't see what else you could be suggesting.

Well, daver, I imagine some of that money would have gone to projects other than the moon.

Sorry, i misunderstood the thrust of your argument.

Impossible to say what would have happened if there had been no Apollo program. There's a good chance that the space program would be healthier now. The Apollo money probably wouldn't have gone into other science programs--it would probably have gone into more military spending, more social spending, or wouldn't have been spent at all.

Flies take next giant step for mankind
Scottish scientists have received a massive Nasa grant to work out whether humans can successfully reproduce in space and colonise other worlds.
The team have been given £800,000 by the US space agency to breed several generations of fruit flies in zero gravity and then examine any genetic changes in the insects.
http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com...cfm?id=1432006
The unique project is an essential first step towards discovering whether mankind can survive for generations in space and establish permanent homes elsewhere in the solar system.
The grant has been awarded to Dr Douglas Armstrong, a behavioural geneticist at Edinburgh University, who hopes to get his experiments into space aboard the shuttle by the end of 2007.
Four astronauts are due to fly to the moon by 2018 and later crews are expected to set up a semi-permanent base, with astronauts living there for up to six months at a time. Nasa is also hoping to have a manned mission to Mars by 2030 with a round trip to the Red Planet taking at least 30 months.

The U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration plans to send six astronauts on a 500-day mission to Mars, according to its final draft report on the Mars exploration program.
U.S. President George W. Bush promoted a new vision for NASA's space exploration in a speech he gave in January 2004. NASA is aiming to realize the mission before 2030.
The human mission to Mars is planned to take 2-1/2 years for the round-trip and will comprise three sets of vehicles.
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/features...30TDY01003.htm
According to the NASA report, the first stage of the two-part planned journey will be to launch two unmanned transport rockets carrying habitation modules and other equipment two years before the six-member crew's departure. The two rockets will enter Mars orbit after an eight-month journey. This will be followed by the launch of a transport spaceship carrying the six crew. members for a manned Mars landing.

The problem with the human spaceflight program is not only that it takes money away from good science (which it may or may not do) and is inefficient. It also gives NASA a bad name. Human spaceflight does bring publicity but for the last few years it has been bad publicity. Lots of successful missions like Galileo, Hubble, SOHO, the Mars orbiters and landers, Spitzer and Chandra, Cassini, Swift etc. Most of these were good value for money too. Yet the impression is that NASA is wasting money becouse the Shuttle program and the ISS _are_ wasting money, and a lot too.

More importantly there are ways to generate publicity without human spaceflight. Although Discovery's last flight probably generated as much interest as the whole Cassini mission so far and Mars lost some of its appeal when people realized there weren't any Martians, the discovery of the first Earth-like planet will have a huge impact. It will bring something familiar to the strange world of astronomy. Which will mean publicity without the bad press human spaceflight usually gets.

No Buck Rogers, no bucks. Robotic missions catch they eye once in a while, especially if you are an incorribible geek like me, but they fail to inspire hope or even enthusiasm.

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Well put. Especially in the United States, where spending priorities are rated in Congress based on human interests first and foremost.

There's got to be a compromise here. The fact remains that some of the best science is done by robotic missions, but those robots have definite limits. They've got the range, they've got the staying power that human missions simply do not have. Nevertheless, no robot can match human flexibility and short term capability. We deal better with the unexpected, and in exploring new areas, the unexpected is the rule rather than the exception. We adapt much better than our machines to difficulties as well. Machines to date don't fix themselves very effectively, something a human can do, even if they have to improvise a bit. In the end, it is our adventure, not theirs.

Exploration is as much adrenaline as it is education. You say space flight is expensive and dangerous...well, welcome to the human race, the vast bulk of us high maintenace adrenaline junkies at heart. We do have a paranoidly vocal group of people who live in fear of living making a lot of noise and writing constrictive rules, seldom opposed by those who don't, quite frankly, because they're out living. There's a difference between riskiness and recklessness, when you determine where the line is, the human side of the space adventure can move forward.

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is there a difference between science and exploration?

Jon

As I meant it in my post, the difference is the human connection. I don't dismiss at all the excitement of what we learn through probes, but really Galileo, Cassini, Magellan, Voyager, Spirit, Opportunity and Sojourner are no more "exploring" as I see it than looking through a telescope. You can send cameras that can see the grains of sand for the Martian desert, but until someone leaves footprints, we've really not "explored" it. You could give Sojourner, Spirit and Opportunity half credit because they've actually let us do more than drop in and look around, but its still not the same experience as being there. Its still just another remote camera view.

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The last time I felt a warm fuzzy feeling, I was informed by my doctor that it was just gas.

That's an interesting definition.

So, for you, deep sea investigations by means of side scan sonar, towed sledges, ROVs and other tools of the oceanographer are not exploration but science. Studying white smokers with a crewed submersible however is exploration, not science. However both programs are science driven and both are primarily scientific in output.

I see two other probelms with this. First, others have different definitions. ESA for example classes Mars Express and beagle as science but Exomars and Mars sample return as exploration.

Second, if you class crewed missions as exploration and robotic missions as science it risks heightening the false dichotomy between crewed missions (which don't "do" science) and unmanned missions which do.

Is there a better definition, or is the whole classification funadmentally flawed?

Jon

The shuttle's development costs and operational costs are approximately in line with the earliest official estimates. Also development schedule was not late -- it was on schedule based on the earliest official estimates. Statements about cost escalation and slippage in the development schedule are a myth. For details see the Columbia Accident Investigation Board (CAIB) transcript: http://caib.nasa.gov/events/public_h...script_am.html

This is another myth. NASA wanted military support, but did not redesign the shuttle just to get this. NASA wanted the capability the shuttle now has, and that coincided with what the Air Force wanted. The shuttle's shortcomings are not the result of redesign and budget limits. Again, for details see the CAIB transcript: http://caib.nasa.gov/events/public_h...script_am.html

The SSMEs are not torn down and rebuilt after every launch. They are merely inspected. Until the latest SSME version, the turbopumps were removed and refurbished. Current SSMEs don't require that.

NASA never projected an extremely high launch rate. The talk of 52 launches per year were one theoretical study from an outside group. The absolute maximum launches per year were 24 per year, limited by external tank manufacturing capacity. The earliest official estimates projected possibly 10 or 12 flights per year.

In 1985 one orbiter -- Discovery -- flew four times. With a four orbiter fleet, it's obviously possible to fly 12 missions per year. Before the Columbia disaster, NASA was planning about 8 missions per year to finish ISS.

Not sure what you're talking about here. To my knowledge there was no performance loss because of the post-Challenger safety improvements. In fact current shuttles have greater payload performance due to various performance upgrades.

From NASA's standpoint, as originally planned the main priority of the shuttle was to service the space station. That's exactly what it's being used for. Other uses were secondary. It was understood the shuttle would also launch both civilian and military satellites, and maybe other things. However these tasks were secondary. The main purpose underlying the shuttle's design was servicing the space station. Of course NASA understood the space station wouldn't be built for years, but nonetheless that was the shuttle's main design purpose. For details see http://caib.nasa.gov/events/public_h...script_am.html

Secondary? In the 1970's, NASA decided to phase out expendable rockets and to launch all satellites from the space shuttle. Here is a little lawsuit which resulted from that decision:

http://online.ceb.com/calcases/CA3/214CA3d1.htm

When Challenger exploded, all production Delta, Atlas, and Titan vehicles was already terminated by the US government, and consequently the entire US space lift program was shut down for almost a year. That does not sound like "secondary tasks" to me.

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What I meant was during shuttle development any features needed to launch satellites were secondary next to features needed to service the space station. Payload mass, payload size, orbital altitude, cross range, orbital endurance, crew size, etc, etc, were driven mainly by space station servicing needs, not by satellite launching needs.

Of course there were plans to use the shuttle as the primary launch vehicle, not expendables.

But from a shuttle development standpoint, capability requirements were primarily driven by need to service the space station, not launch satellites. That was the shuttle's main feature development priority, because that was the envisioned top operational priority. Launching satellites could be an important and frequent task without that task being the primary driver of features during development, or the top operational priority once the station materialized.

Some aspects of this are obvious if you think about it. You don't need seven crewmembers or 2-4 week on orbit endurance to launch a satellite from the payload bay. The shuttle wasn't given those capabilities to launch satellites, but rather to service the space station.

So you are saying that Shuttle was not BUILT to be "all things to all people", but was USED (for a while) as "all things to all people". Which was still a terrible policy. Primary payload of Challenger on its last flight was a TDRIS communication satellite. There was no need to have seven people -- or any people for that matter, -- on board a TDRIS launch.

Joema, you keep defending the original Shuttle policy, but it remains indefensible. Whether it originated with NASA or with Congress, the "one launch vehicle" policy was moronic, and the post-Challenger "one manned launch vehicle" policy is not much better.

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Fiction has to be plausible. Reality is under no such constraint.

I'm not defending the shuttle but simply pointing out historical facts, which are often different from popular perception.

Just because the shuttle design features were primarily driven by space station servicing doesn't mean it was wrong to launch satellites from it.

E.g, you may buy a pickup truck primarily to haul wood, and the suspension, transmission, engine, tires, bed length, etc. may be selected mainly for that purpose. However you may end up frequently fetching groceries in it. Because you have a wreck going to the store doesn't mean it was wrong to get the truck or wrong to use it for various tasks.

In hindsight the "one launch vehicle" wasn't a good idea, but that's largely separate from shuttle design features, and how they originated.

My main point is many oft-repeated items about the shuttle are myths and have no basis in historical fact. This includes it being over budget, late, compromised by Air Force requirements, not meeting original flight rate projections, SSMEs totally overhauled after each flight, and made for a task that never materialized -- each of those are largely incorrect.

It certainly cost more than they said it would, but they also had to substantially change the design because of budget limitations and "sneak" it in under the allowed budget.

It was certainly much later than predicted. Of course, the project was "stretched" - funding was put off to later years, so that increased development time.

Are you saying the Air Force didn't play an important role in shuttle design?

Sure, just look at that amazing flight rate.

No, but they are very high maintenance.

What, the space station? It very nearly didn't, took far longer than expected and we can barely get the shuttle off the ground now that it is there.

.... hummm. In your opinion.

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The shuttle did not cost more than the earliest official NASA estimates. You can read about that here: http://caib.nasa.gov/events/public_h...script_am.html

The flyback booster wasn't selected due to budget issues, but it wasn't eliminated after development began. No flyback booster wasn't necessarily a negative thing, nor was the shuttle "sneaked" in under the budget. Because of the extreme cost and complexity it's plausible the entire program would have failed had the flyback booster been used.

It was not late -- it was on time. You can read about that here: http://caib.nasa.gov/events/public_h...script_am.html

The Air Force was involved, but the current shuttle features were NOT selected primarily based on Air Force needs. Rather they were selected based on what NASA needed to service the space station, which in many cases coincided with Air Force needs.

The statement WAS NOT that the SSMEs were high maintenance. Rather that they were torn down and rebuilt from scratch. That is not correct, and that's what I was replying to. You're right, they are high maintenance and the White Sox won the World Series last year, but both of those are equally unrelated to the original statement I was replying to.

I was replying to DaveR's statement "it was a truck made for a task that never quite materialized." It's obvious the task DID materialize, as a space station is up there right now.

How long it took ISS to begin, and whether the shuttle has problems is unrelated to my reply to Dave or your reply to me.

It's not just in my opinion. See http://caib.nasa.gov/events/public_h...script_am.html

This article covers most of these issues pretty well:

http://www.space.com/spacenews/busin...ay_050815.html

For instance:

At the start of 1971, NASA told the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) that it could build such a fully reusable two-stage workhorse for $10 billion. OMB told NASA it could have $5 billion.


And it is plausible that it would have reduced operational costs. That's an interesting argument, but that change and the SRBs among other things were selected due to budget constraints.

Funny, I remember it was going to go up in time to save Skylab. It didn't make it. I also remember "budget stretching" which is common on military projects as well.

I repeat: Are you saying that the Air Force didn't play an important role in shuttle design?

The article I mentioned provided three examples of Air Force design issues - the width of the cargo bay, cargo payload mass and extended glide slope.


Okay, but it is a fact that extensive SSME maintenance issues have substantially reduced flight capability and increased operational costs - which, I thought, were the key concerns here.

Again: Barely. For all the good it and the shuttle are doing us, it might as well not be there.

I think we're close to splitting hairs. The shuttle certainly hasn't come close to meeting expectations, it just barely managed to get some parts of a minimal ISS up very late in its lifetime, and the ISS is pretty much just sitting there. Technically, yes, it did part of the "space station" job. In practice, it is a poor result for a very great deal of money.

And clearly, many look at the same history and reach different conclusions.

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The article is wrong. Dr. John Logston, who was quoted in the article, heard with his own ears the truth in the CAIB testimony. I heard him ask the funding question and he heard the answer -- I saw it live on TV. Example:

Logston: "OMB gave you a budget ceiling, I believe, in May of '71...and the ultimate presentation, at least to the White House level, said you could do that, or 5.5 billion"
Thompson: "one of the big myths on the shuttle is that it was way over budget. That's an absolute myth...we prepared...a one-page letter. That letter said that we felt we could build the configuration that you now know as the shuttle for a total cost of $5.15 billion...and we'll probably fly it in early '81. That was in the document"

I'll spare further details, but you can read about it here: http://caib.nasa.gov/events/public_h...script_am.html

It would only have reduced operating costs if there were something to operate. It's quite possible the immensely complicated expensive flyback booster would have doomed the entire program. Just the orbiter as built was so bleeding edge there are problems today. How could something immensely bigger and more expensive even be guaranteed to work? Thompson commented on this in the CAIB hearing:

" in my judgment, it would have cost more per flight to operate the two-stage fully-reusable system than the one we built...that's what the two-stage fully-reusable system was; and I think, had the system tried to build it, we wouldn't have a shuttle program today."

The point isn't that they were selected due to budget constraints, but whether they adversely impacted the reliability and materially affected the operational cost today. The Challenger accident wasn't a technology failure but a management failure. Any system will develop problems, and they must be managed properly. Had the shuttle used liquid fuel strap-on boosters or a flyback booster, those would also have had problems. Had those problems been equally mismanaged, the results would have been equally disastrous.

Re cost, SRBs aren't the major contributor to the high operational cost of the shuttle. Therefore selecting SRBs (for whatever reason) isn't the problem.

As the above indicates, the official NASA projection was first flight around 1981. You have to differentiate between what the media says and what really was.

It's not what I'm saying, but what the most senior managers involved in the decision process say. Yes the Air Force played a role, but not the primary role. The primary decision criteria affecting shuttle design was what NASA needed to support the space station. The thing about the military "forcing" large wings for cross range on the shuttle isn't correct. The shuttle aerodynamic capability was selected because of NASA's needs, which happened to coincide with what the Air Force wanted.

The article isn't quoting NASA, nor anybody involved in the decision process at that time.

No, I was simply correcting the statement that SSMEs must be "torn down and rebuilt from scratch after every launch". That is not correct. Yes they are complex and require more maintenance than desirable. That's one reason the current block II engines were significantly improved to require less maintenance.

I'm not saying the shuttle hasn't had problems. However the two disasters were not caused by out-of-the-blue technical failures. Technical problems like that happen with any complex system. The key is how management handles it. As the CAIB said, in both Challenger and Columbia disasters, the system was repeatedly sending messages there was a problem, and gave plenty of time to act, but management didn't listen.

It's important to differentiate between the final result (which is an underperforming system) vs the system design itself. In this case the main problem isn't the vehicle design but the management. Future systems, no matter what the design, will have similar disasters if management reacts similarly.

It's not splitting hairs when I correct a clearly wrong statement. E.g, Daver: "it was a truck made for a task that never quite materialized."

That is totally incorrect. It's not a question of semantics.

Your reply statement was "the space station? It very nearly didn't, took far longer than expected"

You're right, but that has no bearing on my correction of Dave's statement.

I don't disagree with that, as it finally worked out. However it's vital to differentiate between problems with the technology and problems with the associated management. E.g, the new SLDV "stick" launcher is very different from the shuttle -- conventional capsule design, series (not parallel) staged. Yet whether it will be significantly cheaper to operate is unknown. It will probably be more reliable, but that will depend on management as much as the vehicle design.

All launch systems have problems -- that's obvious because most launchers have had major failures. Even the Saturn V 2nd stage came very close to complete structural failure on Apollo 13.

The final result of the shuttle hasn't been good, but it's less than clear the technology itself or any alleged "compromises" during development caused it. Rather the human management had a greater impact than the system itself.

Yes and in that case you must go to the original source, not popular articles which often don't even attribute a source, or when they do the source had no first hand decision making involvement.

In what way does that contradict this statement:

At the start of 1971, NASA told the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) that it could build such a fully reusable two-stage workhorse for $10 billion. OMB told NASA it could have $5 billion.

You're talking about the design that they came up with after OMB said "No, redesign it!"

I had seen that before, but it has been awhile. It has Thompson's "behind the scenes" take on the issue. Some selections with editing (see the source for the complete version):

"MR. THOMPSON: In December of '71, [...] we prepared a letter [that] said that we felt we could build the configuration that you now know as the shuttle for a total cost of $5.15 billion in the purchasing power of the 1971 dollar but that it would take another billion dollars of contingency funding over and above that to handle the contingencies that always develop in a program like this. So you need to budget 6.15 billion in the purchasing power of the '71 dollar and that we could build it and fly it by 1979 if everything went perfectly, but the $1 billion and 18 months ought to be planned in the program because that's probably what will really happen and we'll probably fly it in early '81. That was in the document.
[...]
President Nixon approved it. [...]they [OMB] took the letter and said we'll take the 5.15 billion but we won't give you the 1 billion because we never budget contingencies. We'll hold you to the 1979 launch date because we never launch budget contingencies there, and we'll put it in the '73 budget at those numbers.
So we lost two years of inflation in that little maneuver in OMB. I went back and talked to Bill Lilly. He said, "Shut up. You got your program. Go on about your business."


So the end result was that the program was stretched and the allowed budget didn't reflect the actual budget. They did, in fact, sneak it in. He later talks about being annoyed at a media question about why the project now was running over 8 billion, which is "of course" because of inflation. Regardless of what may have been requested initially, the end result of the process is a stretched, over budget project. Just because it was a way to get it through the process with a "wink wink, nudge nudge" doesn't change the reality.

On the number of flights:


"MR. THOMPSON: All right. Operating costs. [...]

Mathematica sat down and attempted to do some work on operating costs, and they discovered something. They discovered the more you flew, the cheaper it got per flight. (Laughter) Fabulous.

So they added as many flights as they could. They got up to 40 to 50 flights a year. Hell, anyone reasonably knew you weren't going to fly 50 times a year. The most capability we ever put in the program is when we built the facilities for the tank at Michoud, we left growth capability to where you could get up to 24 flights a year by producing tanks, if you really wanted to get that high. We never thought you'd ever get above 10 or 12 flights a year."


So they lied about the flight frequency and made it look like it would have a far lower operational cost then it actually did.

That's all very interesting, but the primary issue I was discussing was your contention that the budget wasn't cut (it was) and that it wasn't over budget (it was).

As you can see, the Federal government said 1979.

Which probably includes a wee bit of CYA.

Despite the additional issues that causes? I'm not convinced. Nor does it address other changes requested.

Certainly there were major management problems. You argue that the original "pre cut" design would not have been as good, but there is clear disagreement on that. At best, we can say we will never know for certain whether it would have been a better design.

It is clear that:

The requested budget was substantially cut.

They knowingly snuck it in under the allowed budget.

It was substantially over budget.

It wasn't flown when it was said pubically that it would.

It did not begin to meet predicted flight rates.

Operational costs were radically higher than predicted.

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By the way, the article "Thirty Years of Fudge" is where I first read about Thompson's statements. Like me, they certainly do not think his statements were a glowing recomendation of NASA's budget actions. For instance:

"Thompson delivered a whole series of bombshells [...]

The first is his casual official confirmation of the astonishing degree of deliberate, flat-out dishonesty that went into NASA's tactics to persuade Congress to approve the Shuttle program in the first place -- plus his apparent revelation that, to some extent, President Richard Nixon himself collaborated in it.

It has been known for some time that, in order to persuade a reluctant Congress to reject Sen. Walter Mondale's campaign against the Shuttle, NASA told outrageous distortions about the frequency with which it could be launched, and thus its cost-effectiveness."

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NASA told the White House (in writing) in 1971 the shuttle program would cost $6.15 billion and would fly in 1981. That is essentially what it cost and when it flew.

NASA told the White House (in writing) in 1971 the shuttle program would cost $6.15 billion and would fly in 1981. That is essentially what it cost and when it flew.

It was not stretched, nor did it materially go over budget. It cost what NASA told President Nixon it would cost, and flew the year NASA projected.

Nobody lied about flight frequency. The early statements about 52 missions per year were a mathematical extrapolation by one outside group. It did not represent NASA's position on the matter. It was physically impossible to fly more than 24 missions per year, and according to Thompson, they expected 10-12 missions per year.

Re operating cost, nobody lied about that. There are many different ways to calculate operating cost. You can use the incremental cost of adding another flight to the manifest. Or you can include the overhead costs of ground personnel during the interval between flights. Or you can include a pro-rated percentage of the capitol costs of all the ground facilities associated with the program. Or you can include a percentage of program development cost divided by the estimated number of flights over the program life.

No one way is right or wrong, and stating one vs the other doesn't mean somebody lied.

The shuttle was built within the budget and NASA told President Nixon in 1971, and flew the year NASA told him in 1971.

The shuttle was developed within the budget NASA stated to President Nixon in 1971, and flew the year they projected, in 1981. It met the flight rates NASA expected, at least before Challenger. The shuttle flew 10 flights within 12 months, at least before Challenger. It certainly hasn't met the desired flight rates afterward.

The shuttle program isn't perfect and NASA's operational management of it has been very flawed. But statements about a compromised design being responsible for the problems aren't correct. Likewise statements about it being greatly over budget or late to fly aren't correct, based on what NASA told President Nixon in 1971 when the decision was made to start the program.

There's some evidence the shuttle didn't achieve its targeted weight/payload capability.

Did it meet the original operating cost projections? To repeat, there are many different ways to calculate operational costs. This isn't unique to space launch operations.

E.g, consider a presentation about projected per vehicle operating costs of an automobile plant. The presenters say "if we made 50,000 cars per year, our per vehicle operating costs would be $x". That in no way commits to making that many per year, it's just one perspective of many in evaluating costs.

Likewise if shuttle incremental launch costs were estimated at a hypothetical launch rate of 52 per year, that in no way commits to doing that many launches, it's just one perspective in evaluating costs.

The typical statement is "NASA promised a space truck that would deliver payloads for $100 per pound, and failed to deliver it". That is just not correct. To achieve that would require 52 launches per year which was physically impossible, and which NASA never committed to. Plus that figure was only for incremental launch costs, not the fully burdened system cost.

I don't see much point in carrying this further. I've provided the comments from Thompson himself in the testimony that you were using as evidence. What he says NASA asked for isn't what NASA got and he knew it.

THAT IS NOT WHAT NASA SAID PUBLICALLY. This is getting ridiculous. Flight frequency was fundamental to operational cost, and they knew it couldn't do what they told Congress it could.

Okay, enough. I've shown you where you were wrong, but you are still saying the same thing. What went on in negotiations, what management may or may not have known is one thing. The fact is that the shuttle was sold under false pretenses and didn't begin to match what they said it would do.

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The Leif Ericson Cruiser

Maybe you're mixing up NASA's official position as stated in writing to the president for the shuttle as built, vs earlier deliberations for various shuttle designs.

It's similar to early in the Apollo/Saturn program where NASA deliberated over various Saturn designs. Like the shuttle, they didn't have infinite money and had to choose what would fit the available funding. But that doesn't constitute a budget cut, as the word is normally meant, in either Apollo/Saturn or shuttle programs.

It's not a budget cut if there's no project at that point. Before starting any project you decide based on available funding how to begin. Once the project starts then you have a budget. If after the project starts you get less money than was initially agreed, that's a budget cut.

E.g, the Apollo budget was cut, which killed Apollo 18, 19, and 20. There was no significant budget cut or budget overrun for the shuttle program, based on what NASA committed to the president.

You may be thinking about the technicality whereby OMB rules didn't allow bookkeeping for the portion of shuttle development NASA classified as contingency funds. However this doesn't change the fact that NASA developed the shuttle for the amount they initially told the president.

However -- even if you hypothetically say the "official" development cost was 5.15 billion and NASA overran 1 billion, that's only a 19% overrun, which is small in historical terms for projects of this type. It's not an amount that constitutes gross mismanagement or a troubled project, as the media often states.

You're mixing up what the media commonly reported vs what NASA officially said. Can you find anywhere where NASA officially committed to 52 flights per year, or a launch cost of $118 per pound, or officially committed to launching the shuttle before 1981? I'm not saying it absolutely never happened, just that I've never seen it straight from NASA.

The budget and flight schedule NASA committed in writing to the president was NASA's official position.

You have not shown anything from NASA or former NASA officials in a decision making capacity that contradicts that. What the media reports does not constitute reality, although many people think it does.

It is true the shuttle program as it exists today is in trouble and unsatisfactory. But the statement starting this entire line of discussion was that the current problems stem from compromises made during shuttle development. That is not necessarily true, and is what I responded to before you began.

See the testimony. I already provided quotations.

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Disclaimer: Avatar is not an official NASA image and does not imply any specific interplanetary or interstellar capability.

The Leif Ericson Cruiser

Would the General Accounting Office do? Here's an official report to Congress from 1972 (warning: PDF file), based on NASA inputs, that projects a minimum of 514 flights in the 1979 to 1990 time period.

Additionally, the letter requesting the document reads, "NASA claims that each shuttle flight will cost less than
$10 million and that the cost of placing a pound of payload in orbit can be reduced to less than $100. Thus, it is argued
that the Space Shuttle will be a cost effective vehicle for the space program."

Now, unless you can find somewhere that NASA distances itself from these figures, I have to assume they reflect what NASA was saying at the time.

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ToSeek, thanks for that information, that's the kind of reasoned discussion I was looking for.

The document is very interesting and illustrates why evaluating the shuttle is much more complex than simplistic viewpoints often espoused by the media.

The document clearly shows even in 1972 the shuttle was not forecast to have significantly lower life cycle costs than expendable boosters. Thus the current shuttle cost situation should be no surprise -- the situation was known in 1972, and in public documents. It wasn't a secret.

The document also shows the original budget was about $5.5 billion (1972 dollars) with a 20% overrun allowance. NASA clearly stayed within that, as Bob Thompson said during the CAIB testimony.

Re flights per year, the document mentioned 514 missions in 10 years, but NASA never committed to that. Rather it was a paper number, a hypothetical figure Mathematica devised to illustrate per launch and per pound payload costs at one theoretical extreme of the usage spectrum.

Likewise Walter Mondale (second only to William Proxmire as opponent of space exploration) claimed (with no reference) that NASA said a mission would cost $10 million and payload cost would be < $100/lb. In reality there's no fixed number for mission cost or payload cost; it varies based on number of flights.

Furthermore in that same memo, Mondale said the booster alone (not orbiter) would cost $50 million. How could the booster cost $50 million and each mission cost $10 million? Think about it. That shows the lack of understanding by the person writing the memo, so you certainly can't rely on that memo to accurate represent anything.

The document actually said: "The shuttle's actual average cost per launch will not be known until the system reaches operational status. Consequently these costs cannot be estimated with certainty." Therefore any statements about meeting or not meeting per launch costs are questionable, in the least.

The shuttle program as a whole is clearly flawed as implemented, but not because of design compromises. It has not met reasonable expectations, but not primarily because of technical factors or design decisions.

There are many frequently made statements (as seen in this thread) which are totally incorrect: the SSMEs must be removed and overhauled after each flight, the shuttle's performance was much lower after Challenger, the shuttle problems today result from design compromises, the shuttle features were a compromise forced by the military, the shuttle was greatly over budget, shuttle development was significantly late, etc. All incorrect.

Media-espoused simplifications are often embraced by people since it's easier than doing independent thinking. However this prevents understanding the true reason for the shuttle's current problems. In turn that will cause future disappointment and confusion.

It's important to understand the true reasons for the shuttle's current situation, and not commonly-held (but often incorrect) simplifications. Not opening your eyes to the true reasons and actual shuttle development history invites future disappointment when similar problems befall newer launch systems. As philosopher George Santayana said, ""Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it." You have to know the actual reality of history to learn from it.