NASA Says Fleet Could Fly Again by September  

Despite a critical report by the investigating commission, NASA officials said on Tuesday the space shuttle fleet -- grounded since last year's Columbia disaster -- could fly again by September.
 
"There's not a show-stopper that says we can't get there," NASA's Michael Kostelnik said of a possible launch window of Sept. 12-Oct. 10. At the same time, he and other space agency officials acknowledged in a telephone news conference that there is much to be done before then.

Five days before the anniversary of shuttle Columbia's fatal Feb. 1 mid-air disintegration, NASA was at pains to show progress following a scathing probe of the tragedy's underlying causes and a report released last week that said the shuttles were nowhere near ready to return to flight.

"It's been a tough year, it's been a hard year, it's been a year full of lessons," said former astronaut William Readdy, now NASA's associate administrator for space flight. "We're about fixing the problems right now and returning to flying safely again."

Readdy said NASA is addressing problems with the shuttles' reinforced carbon-carbon material, which covers parts of the vehicles' wings. This material was damaged by falling insulation foam during Columbia's launch, allowing superheated gas to penetrate the craft and cause its break-up during re-entry. All seven astronauts were killed.

NASA is working to develop a way to spot and repair damage to the shuttles while they are in orbit, said Michael Greenfield, the agency's associate deputy administrator for technical programs. Greenfield said testing should be complete in time for a shuttle mission "in the fall of this year."

This may not tally with a report released on Jan. 20 by an independent expert panel that is monitoring NASA's return to shuttle flight. The panel found that schedule pressure had become a "destructive force" at NASA, and that plans to correct this were "in development." The report also said it was too early to say when the shuttles might fly again.

This report was released less than a week after President Bush (news - web sites) unveiled a vision for space that includes a human mission to the moon by 2020 and an eventual human mission to Mars. This vision also provides for retiring the shuttle fleet by 2010, after the International Space Station (news - web sites) is complete.

While Russian vehicles can ferry supplies and personnel to the orbiting outpost, only space shuttles can lift the heavy loads needed to continue construction.

Beyond the immediate physical problems that caused the Columbia accident, Readdy said the agency was also targeting those "cultural" problems at NASA that were specified as underlying causes by the independent Columbia Accident Investigation Board last August.

Noting the board's criticism of NASA's internal communication about safety issues, Readdy said members of the space shuttle team were sent to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, mission control for the robotic Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity, to see operations there.

When controllers at the lab had to contend with a lost communications signal from the rover Spirit, Readdy said, "It was very instructive for us to see how they went about their fact-finding, trouble-shooting process."

FMI:  www.nasa.gov