Dennis Overbye (NYT): As Clock Ticks for Hubble, Some Plead for a Reprieve

One astronomer compared it to the fate of the faithful dog in the movie "Old Yeller." On Thursday, astronomers will crowd into a hotel ballroom in Washington to discuss when and how NASA should put down one of its and astronomy's most spectacular successes, the Hubble Space Telescope.

Since it was launched in 1990 with a flawed mirror and then repaired by spacewalking astronauts, the Hubble, floating above the murky atmosphere, has been a matchless time machine, providing astronomers with views of unprecedented clarity deep into space and time. "The Hubble is the single most important instrument ever made in astronomy," said Dr. Sandra Faber, an astronomer at the University of California at Santa Cruz.

But its days (and nights) have always been numbered. NASA has long planned to end Hubble's spectacular run and bring it down in 2010 to make way in the budget for the James Webb Space Telescope, scheduled to be launched in 2011.

Still, some astronomers are urging that Hubble's life be extended. They argue that the telescope has grown even more productive in its years in orbit, thanks to periodic service calls by astronauts.

These astronomers say that killing Hubble in its prime makes little sense, either scientifically or from the standpoint of public relations. "Hubble is by far the best news NASA has now," a senior astronomer said.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/27/science/27HUBB.html?hp

A one-year mission I worked on is in its third year, for instance.

You can be sure that schedule for JWST (the new scope) will slip, and won't launch in 2011, so bringing down Hubble in 2010 will leave a large hole.

If I had a large enough budget, I would recommend that they leave Hubble up until JWST has been successfully checked after deployment. If I had an infinite budget, I'd leave both up there -- I'd bet that some joint observations would provide some interesting science.

I think it would be insane to bring down the HST before the JWST is operational, and even then it would probably smart to use it until it breaks down completely. Too bad they no longer plan to bring it back in the shuttle. I would love to see it hanging in the Air and Space museum.

..:mad:

Manned flight consumes 75% of NASA's budget. Some of the shuttle and space station experiments get pretty trivial.

And on another note, I think it is foolish that we used the space shuttle to launch satellites. A booster would do fine.

(Is there a gender-neutral term for "manned" yet?)

The Human Space Flight Budget.

Works for me.