I saw a similar poll on cnn.com and was just wondering what y'alls opinion is...

Look, here's my two cents.

The shuttle program is great.  For all of you who may see it as pointless, it's not.  They do a lot of very importand research in space.  We need to send human beings up to carry out this research, so the program is important.

However, I believe it should be scrapped. The shuttle is old.  Grant it, it's not that old years wise, but If you look at the progress made in aerospace technology, it is far behind.  Yes, the columbia disaster was a horrible tragedy, but people are making way too big a deal.  Columbia was the first shuttle, the oldest shuttle, and a problem was bound to happen.  It is just very unfortunate that the problem led to what it was.  The shuttle has a very good safety record, only two have had a fatal error in it's 30 years of service.  Some of the things that were changed for the return to flight had been happening throughout the shuttles history.  Tiles fall off all the time, foam comes of the tank, etc...  I do believe that the shuttle was grounded for too long.

In discovery's flight, problems came up again. Foam fell off, and now the shuttle is grounded...again.  It is clearly too old, and like all old things, it needs to be retired.

However, the whole manned space flight should not be stopped.  I think that once discovery returns, it should not be grounded but it should be retired.  Now that technology has improved, I believe that nasa should forget the shuttle, and begin designing a new craft.  They should figure out a way to do without that huge fuel tank,  design a new heat resistant covering, as well as put in new, more advanced computers.

This won't be quick and easy.  The ISS might have to be scrapped because it is gonna take a long time to build a new shuttle.  I plan on being an aerospace engineer, possibly work for nasa.  Im going to be a junior in high school this year, and when I am ready to start my career in at least 6 years, thy still might be working on the shuttle.  In fact, if all goes well for me, I could actually see myself designing the new shuttle as part of a team working on it.

Two years of repairs and changes, and now the shuttle is grounded again?  It is clearly time to start anew.

Here's my two pence for what it's worth. I've mentioned before that I have little interest in space exploration & it doesn't worry me whether they continue or not. This means I can look at this impartially.

I've read that the Shuttle is the most complex aircraft ever built. I use 'aircraft' for want of a better word but age doesn't doesn't affect it any more than a conventional aircraft, providing it's maintained properly. Many airliners & military aircraft remain in service for decades although they might be outdated as far as technology is concerned. Take Concorde as an example. In regular service for something like 30 years & since it was retired there's nothing to replace it. The similarity with Concorde goes a little further. It had one fatal accident during the time it was in service & this was not directly caused by a fault with the aircraft. A terrible chain of events exposed a weakness in the basic design that had existed since it first entered service. A foreign object on the runway was thrown up into the wing, puncturing the main fuel tank. You should know the rest. In hindsight it was an accident waiting to happen but that foreign object should never have been there in the first place.

From what I've read (& remember I'm no expert) the main difference between the Shuttle & a conventional aircraft seems to be the maintenance schedules & the way NASA itself operates. Some parts on other Shuttles were found corroded after inspection following the Columbia tragedy. These had never been inspected since first being fitted & on investigation some had even been fitted the wrong way round. That smacks of carelessness, if not downright incompetence. If this had been Concorde or any other airliner heads would have rolled. I get the impression they allowed themselves to become complacent with the inevitable results. Ozzy mentioned in another thread that they need "some negative attitude engineers to dream up worst case scenarios and then solve any possible problems". I tend to agree with that & the whole attitude needs to change. Space exploration is dangerous enough without safety being ignored.

Another thing occurred to me. Academics & scientists aren't usually the most practical of people. They exist on a plane above ordinary folk but most of them couldn't put up a shelf or change a wheel on their cars. NASA seems to be full of these types but do they have any ordinary practical employees? It's quite possible there's a simple solution to this problem that a good "old-fashioned" practical engineer could solve quickly & with little expense or inconvenience. Maybe it's time for a rethink, not on the Shuttle itself but the whole organisation from top to bottom.

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...they finally woke up, and realised that "Star Trek" is really a fictional Movie, and USS Enterprise NCC 1701 doesn't actually exist....and Alpha Centauri is a really, REALLY! long way away...
...(except in George's mind)... ...!
LOL......!
Paul...feet firmly planted on Mother Earth, where "we" were designed to be... ...!

My idea of a shuttle program:

Start using varying composites and stuff like that to reduce weight and save fuel.

Use four-people crew instead of like 6. A pilot, an Engineer, a Navigator, and a researcher. The first three must all be trained for everything [what if the pilot gets injured?]. The reseacher is there as a passenger so that he-she can switch places with another. Over time, the ISS crew is switched completely instead of bringing the whole gang all at once.

Everything must be digital [computers are getting small and lighter].

Just to let you all know, I'm not that knowledgable about space flight.

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I wouldn't say the Shuttle program is any more dangerous than when it started, if fact its bound to be a lot safer. However, what has changed is the public perception of events such as Challenger/Columbia, and the 24/7 global coverage of these things. The same applies in the case of Concorde. If the 2000 crash had happen 25 years earlier I think it would have had similar effects in the short term, but the aircraft may well still be flying today (depending on the full extent of 9/11 - if Concorde had been in full service in 2001 it may have survived...)

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Imagine, a pilot saying that... tsk, tsk.

I'm afraid my question still stands

There we go.

Yeah I'm satisfied and agree with the you idea of keeping it whilst developing a new design.

Sorry chaps. I was never convinced of the value of manned space exploration. The current problems with the Shuttle show just how primitive & dangerous it still is. To a casual observer like me, NASA seems to be run by a bunch of enthusiastic & highly talented amateur boffins* trying to justify their existence. I'm still inclined to be as sceptical as Fozzer.

* bof·fin also Bof·fin    )
n. Chiefly British Slang
A scientist, especially one engaged in research.

I think you hit the nail on the head Richie. The Sixties was a very exciting time & all sorts of new things were happening, not only in space. Technology was advancing more rapidly than at any time before or since. I can remember when Sputnik, the first artificial satellite, was successfully launched (in 1957 when I was 14 years old) & listening to the beeps on the radio as it passed within range. Top of the charts on both sides of the Atlantic in 1962 was an instrumental named Telstar, by British group the Tornados, released soon after the first-ever live transatlantic TV transmission via satellite. It would have been difficult for any young person brought up on the exploits of Flash Gordon & Dan Dare not to be caught up in all this. It was like science fiction coming true & something I'd never dreamed of seeing in my lifetime. However, the military implications were obvious to anyone with the slightest imagination. If the USSR could put a man into orbit what else might they be capable of?

When the Space Race was in full flow circumstances were very different to what they are now. It was vitally important to the Western world's very survival that we (mainly represented by the US) kept abreast, if not ahead, of the USSR in military technology. That included ballistic missiles & space itself. At least, that's what we were were told & we believed it. Peace negotiations had broken down again & the Berlin Wall was built in August 1961. A physical symbol of the Cold War & how bad East/West relations had become. Intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads were permanently aimed at strategic locations all over the world, some obviously being aimed at London - not far from where I'm sitting now. (It's quite possible that some still are.) We were told we would get a maximum 4 minutes warning of a nuclear attack for whatever use that might be. Not only did nuclear war appear to be a very real possibility but the USSR seemed to have the advantage.

After narrowly winning the 1960 Presidential election JFK had (somewhat rashly I thought) publicly promised the American people that they could & would put a man on the Moon before the end of the decade. The 'New Frontier' as he put it, was like something straight out of Star Trek although the first episodes of that series would not appear until 1966. Quote:

The man was so charming & charismatic that people wanted to believe him. I admired him myself & thought he must have been pretty certain of his facts, although I'm not so convinced of that now. It was more than likely a huge gamble but I was never under any doubt that this was a military project & it was natural that the pioneer astronauts would be military test pilots. It was also generally accepted that this was likely to be highly dangerous & some of those astronauts would quite possibly lose their lives in the attempt.

I recently discovered that the JFK Library released a tape recording of a White House meeting in 1962 in which the space programme was discussed. This extract seems to confirm what I have always thought. That, however it might have been presented to the public, this was politically motivated right from the beginning with mainly military objectives. I'm cynical enough to believe that this is still the case & that no government in the world would be prepared to spend that amount of effort & resources on purely scientific research.
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PS. http://www.space.com/news/kennedy_tapes_010822.html