Nasa's Failure

NASA has earned the nation's trust over the past half century. There is another side of NASA that no news agency or magazine ever focuses on, however. They have drawn attention away from their mistakes and even possibly covered up disasters. All of the attention goes to only a handful of successful missions and none to their crippling inefficiencies.

NASA was originally created to counter the Soviet space program. The first astronauts were merely Air Force test pilots and had no training in the fields of science. The goal of NASA was plain and simple: beat the Russians into space.

The American space program was designed to be relatively safe. This meant it was on a much slower timeline than the Russian program. While the United States was sending monkeys into orbit, the Soviets were prepping for a manned flight. This culminated with the launch of Yuri Gagaran into orbit. He was the first man in history to ever achieve this feat. The Soviets did not beat the Americans through better technology; they simply did everything more quickly. The results from this were many fatalities of cosmonauts. This was NASA's first major failure. There were no dead astronauts, but in the political climate of the time, the government regretted not opting for an accelerated program. The next failure was being the second country to have a man orbit the earth. Russia had again bested the American space program.

The quest for the Moon was the only major goal left. NASA was out for blood this time. The American Moon program was very accelerated when compared to the Soviet one. Unfortunately, this resulted in the death of three very experienced astronauts. This was from saving time and cutting corners. The accident set the program back two years.

Of course it is common knowledge that we did make it to the Moon first. This single victory was and has been the only ammunition for NASA's guns. Nothing developed out of the Moon program. After letting a dozen men walk on it, we just left. It has been nearly 30 years since man last walked on the surface of the Moon. For an agency that touts itself as a scientific institution, there has been no further interest in learning about our closest neighbor.

During the seventies, there was a renewed interest in

the other bodies of our solar system. The Voyager deep space probes were designed to study the outer Jovian systems and carry a message from earth to the stars. They were two bright stars in NASA's skies.

Mars was the second target of study during this period. The Viking landers were sent to look for life on the red planet. Both landed successfully and carried out their missions perfectly. No life was found at the landing sites however. This presented NASA with an interesting situation: they could send more probes to different parts of the planet to try again or take the second option. This option was to completely write off the world as dead. If you were to look at a ten square foot section of the earth, how likely is it that you would find evidence of Human kind? When you think about the vast deserts and oceans, the chances are very small, but that is what NASA did in a way. Based on data from inconclusive tests and a miniscule amount of data, they labeled an entire planet as dead to all life. (Space Flight now)

In the late seventies, NASA anticipated that the United States would possess a space station. A shuttle was obviously needed to service it. This was a very good idea on NASA's part. What they needed was a vehicle that could launch on it's own and deliver cargo and passengers into space. The problem with using a large rocket is it must separate into different stages. This launch system is very complex and costly. A "Space Shuttle" would cure the agency of all these problems.

The technology of the time simply could not produce what was needed. What did NASA end up with? Basically a truck that had to haul more than its own weight in fuel, and devote a tiny percentage to cargo. Instead of being a single stage vehicle, three stages were used. A reusable booster system and an expendable main fuel tank were the first two stages. The third was the orbiter itself.

The Space shuttle is one very useful machine, but it never fully lived up to what it was destined for. This same problem would plague the replacement for the old shuttle. NASA chose a very radical design from the competition it held. The competitors' plans used off-the-shelf technology and were quite feasible. NASA chose the Lockheed Martin X-33. The plane was to take off on its own and carry twice as much cargo as the current shuttle. All of this on a tenth of the cost of a normal shuttle launch. The engines to be used were not even out of the theoretical stage. They were air-breathing rockets.(x-33 project) Their performance were leagues ahead of any rocket engine that had ever been used. NASA stated that the X-33 would require a very large amount of research and development, but they would stick by their decision. If the X-33 succeeded, NASA would have a vehicle that could out match any in the world.(x-33 project)

After a few years and several billion dollars, NASA pulled the plug on the project. Despite what they had said, no