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Comment by firefoxd | Hacker News Reader

I was in the building overlooking the airport when endeavor landed at LAX. People literally parked on the freeway to watch [1]. Highway patrol parked as well and enjoyed the show.

Couple years later, I'm walking down the street and I see this giant orange tank and a slew of workers dismantling traffic lights to make space for it [2].

I'm gonna make sure I'm there for this as well, right on my kids birthday.

More pics: https://idiallo.com/photography/39/los-angeles-space-shuttle...

[1]: https://cdn.idiallo.com/photo/39/freewaypark.jpg

[2]: http://cdn.idiallo.com/photo/39/spfuel_tank_back_lg.jpg

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Regardless what any critics might have to say, the Space Shuttle Orbiters (and all their accessories) are practically heroes wherever they go. They're a kid's dreams brought to reality and then some.

I hope we can fly something as cool looking and mindblowing as them again some day.

> Regardless what any critics might have to say, the Space Shuttle Orbiters (and all their accessories) are practically heroes wherever they go. They're a kid's dreams brought to reality and then some.

They certainly have enormous cultural cachet. There's a reason why, even now, it's pretty common for movies to use a shuttle when they want a rocket that takes people to space.

Too bad they were hot garbage when it came to actual performance.

> I hope we can fly something as cool looking and mindblowing as them again some day.

I like to think that we're already doing that right now.

The Falcon 9 is doing the job the Shuttle was created do to: it's a cheap, powerful, and reliable taxi to LEO.

Can the falcon 9 fix the Hubble? I agree having a space plane as your only launch vehicle is very short sighted but I think a space plane has some very unique capabilities.

> Can the falcon 9 fix the Hubble?

Maybe. There's a plan to use the Dragon capsule to reboost the Hubble and possibly EVA to it. No one knows what exactly will happen, although if you're interested in learning more, the potential mission is Polaris II[1].

But that ignores the bigger point - the Shuttle had a bunch of rarely used capabilities. And the tradeoff for that is that it's main mission: taking people and cargo to space was severely compromised.

It would have been easy to just buy a new Hubble with the savings if the US had a reasonably designed and priced rocket instead of the Shuttle.

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1. https://polarisprogram.com/

The NRO offered NASA multiple Hubbles, but the cost to retrofit them was outside of NASA's budget. Also, how are you getting that new Hubble off the ground without a shuttle?

> The NRO offered NASA multiple Hubbles, but the cost to retrofit them was outside of NASA's budget.

Well, yes - that's kind of the point. If NASA didn't have the Shuttle's fully amortized $1.5B/launch cost weighing it down they'd have been able to do a lot more things.

> Also, how are you getting that new Hubble off the ground without a shuttle?

Who knows what rocket NASA should have gone with. But the easy answer is: they could have kept Saturn V around for the few really big payloads they needed it for.

Another option is the Delta IV Heavy. It's longest fairing is just a little bit short of what's needed for Hubble. I'm sure a 1-off xl fairing would be quite expensive, but since the difference between a Delta IV Heavy launch and a Shuttle launch is $1B, there's quite a bit of room in the budget to work with.

>Well, yes - that's kind of the point

"Well, yes" sounds so smarmy. Well yes, I wasn't disputing the fact either. It is just reinforcing information

Titans launched at least some of the Keyhole fleet, right? Wasn’t the Hubble more or less a KH pointed in the opposite direction?

> The NRO offered NASA multiple Hubbles, but the cost to retrofit them was outside of NASA's budget.

Nope. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_National_Reconnaissance_O...

"On February 17, 2016, the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope (then known as the Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope or WFIRST) was formally designated as a mission by NASA, predicated on using one of the space telescopes."

> Also, how are you getting that new Hubble off the ground without a shuttle?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nancy_Grace_Roman_Space_Telesc...

"As of July 2022, Roman is scheduled to be launched on a Falcon Heavy rocket under a contract specifying readiness by October 2026 supporting a NASA launch commitment of May 2027."

Depends on what "fix" means.

Can it get people there to get out into space and turn some wrenches? Absolutely.

Could it haul a new full-diameter mirror? No. It's constrained by it's diameter, and the cargo capacity is the Dragon's trunk. Bigger rockets may be required, but nothing about the shuttle is strictly necessary there.

The thing the "space plane" had that was entirely unique was the capability to load something large into the cargo bay and bring it back down. But in practice that capability was barely ever used. Starship might eventually offer that capability, but it won't be as gentle as a shuttle landing.

There may one day again be a beautiful space plane, should that particular need become important again.

The Falcon 9 is also heavily based on research that NASA conducted in designing and building the Shuttle and its intended successors, which is a large part of why it can be cheap, powerful, and reliable.

Source: NASA, SpaceX.

Why did they have a fighter escort? Were they monitoring the space shuttle during flight or just there for show?

Those are NASA F/A-18s flying chase. Extra set of eyes on the aircraft, photography/video for PR, etc. In this particular case there's almost certainly a "let's put on a show" motivator as part of it; they flew the shuttle around various major cities and landmarks on the way.

https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/armstrong/f-a-18...

Some footage from one of the fighters: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVPNDhOWutk

> Those are NASA F/A-18s flying chase.

Are there particular capabilities they have that would necessitate that type of aircraft specifically? I would think that they'd have really high operating costs compared to (e.g.) a turboprop of some kind.

For this particular mission, probably not; rule of cool probably played a factor. (They also have a much-upgraded 1950s B-57 for similar purposes; https://airbornescience.nasa.gov/aircraft/WB-57_-_JSC) For other missions, though, being able to get up to Mach 1.8 is probably helpful when you might be intercepting a Space Shuttle on the tail end of re-entry. Manoeuvrability is also a factor; being nimble helps get around a test aircraft. Or chasing one of these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_X-59_Quesst

It has the capability of looking fucking cool

Maybe they're using the high definition optical targeting pods for video?

"Chase aircraft also are used as camera platforms for research missions that must be documented with photographs or video. Aeronautical engineers monitor and verify various aspects of a research project by extensively using photos and video."

from

https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/armstrong/f-a-18...

Wake turbulence and pilot experience could be factors. Fighter jets are designed to fly near larger aircraft and their pilots have the training for it.

The entire office found a rooftop to watch it fly over for its final. Simply amazing to see.

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