Kyle Boatright wrote:
NASA's big problem with the shuttle is that they over promised 35 years ago
to get it funded. They promised a safe, inexpensive, reusable space truck
with quick turnaround time. Arguably, they missed each of those marks. In
addition, they tried to sell space travel as routine, and people hold them
to that standard.

That's true. Unfortunately, they have to oversell in order to continue
to get funding.


Unfortunately, space travel is anything but routine, and the shuttle (or any
other space vehicle) has more than a few single points of failure that have
fatal consequences.

NASA, Congress, and the US public need to recognize and admit that if we're
going to continue manned space flight, we will suffer losses. We need to
accept that fact and move forward without all of the hand wringing and
political posturing that we get with every accident. Not that we shouldn't
strive for a perfect safety record, but even if NASA had unlimited funding,
riding rockets would still dangerous.

For me, it comes down to this (choose 1):

- Continue manned space flight and recognize that people are likely to be
killed from time to time, despite the best efforts to prevent accidents.

That's absolutely correct. This is the main reason why I don't think we
should be messing around with sending people to Mars. There's a REALLY
good chance that the first crew we send will probably die. Maybe even the
second or third crew. It's not really worth the risk compared to robotic
exploration.

--- Jay

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