Hubble Repair Mission Up in the Air

A top government science agency said Wednesday that the best way to save the deteriorating Hubble Space Telescope was to send a manned space shuttle repair mission, not a robot, which was “significantly more technologically risky.”

A report by the National Research Council, a congressionally chartered group that provides scientific advice to the government, found that it would take too long to develop a robotic repair spacecraft, and even if one could be built it stood a good chance of failure.

“A shuttle servicing mission is the best option for extending the life of the Hubble telescope,” said Louis J. Lanzerotti, chairman of the committee that wrote the 147-page report.

The recommendations dovetail with an earlier report by the Aerospace Corp. of El Segundo, commissioned by NASA, that found a robotic mission would cost at least $1.3 billion and probably would not be ready in time to save the Hubble.

The space telescope’s batteries and gyroscopes need service. The instrument could fail as early as 2007.

Both studies are at odds with NASA Administrator Sean O’Keefe, who has said he considers a manned shuttle mission to the telescope too risky without significant new safeguards.

O’Keefe’s caution was prompted by the loss of the shuttle Columbia in 2003, in which all seven astronauts were killed. It was the second shuttle catastrophe in 113 missions.

Although work is advancing at Kennedy Space Center to return the shuttles to flight in the spring, O’Keefe has said future missions should be contingent upon having a safe haven in space in case something went wrong, or an in-flight repair capacity.

That would appear to limit future flights to the International Space Station, where a damaged shuttle could be abandoned, since an in-flight repair system is nowhere close to fruition.

It was clear Wednesday that despite the new reports and recommendations, O’Keefe remained resistant to a shuttle mission without in-flight repair or a safe haven. “The No. 1 mission is to return to safe flight,” said Doc Mirelson, a spokesman for O’Keefe.

Mirelson said the space station could not be a safe haven for a Hubble repair flight because the two destinations were too far apart.

The space station is 240 miles above Earth, whereas the Hubble is 353 miles high.

National Research Council team members argued that saving the Hubble was worth the risk of a shuttle mission.

“Hubble is important, and it’s important to save,” said Joseph Rothenberg, president of the Universal Space Network in Horsham, Pa., one of the authors of the report.

“If it’s worth the risk to go to the International Space Station, it’s worth the risk to go to Hubble,” Rothenberg said.

At NASA, popular support is a factor in every mission decision. The Hubble has been one of the highest-profile and most successful NASA programs in the last 50 years. Not only have its stunning pictures beguiled the public, but physicists and cosmologists have relied on its discoveries to round out the understanding of the universe’s evolution.

Mirelson said NASA would continue its development of a robotic repair mission, and would probably make a decision on it next year.