IEEE Spectrum June, 2011 - 13

$600 per metric ton

Cost of capturing carbon directly from air, according to a report by the American
Physical Society. The report politely gives "direct air capture" a failing grade.

12 Space Shuttle Missions That Weren't
A look at some of the gutsier (and goofier) proposed space shuttle missions
the u.s. space shuttle fleet is set for retirement following the launch of Atlantis, scheduled for midJuly. In all, the fleet will have flown 135 missions, the first in 1981, but there were many more on the drawing board. With scrubbed missions that included daring rescues, in-orbit satellite snatches, and dangerous
explosives, you can see why some of these didn't make the cut. But just imagine if they had. -James Oberg

1979

REBOOST
SKYLAB
As America's first
space station (1973-4)
slipped steadily from
orbit, NASA built a
small booster rocket

to be attached to it
by a two-man crew
(Fred Haise and Jack
Lousma) on an urgent
early flight. But launch
schedules slipped, and
Skylab fell on Australia.

1986

CALIFORNIA
(SPACE)
DREAMING
The U.S. military had
planned polar-orbit spysatellite launches from
California. A launchpad
at Vandenberg Air
Force Base was ready,
spy satellite payloads
had been picked, an
emergency landing
site on Easter Island
built, and a crew
trained. But the needed
upgrades to engines
were deemed too risky
after Challenger was
lost, so the mission
was canceled and the
pad mothballed.

1980

1981

SATELLITE
SNATCH
A key scenario among
the planned missions
that drove the shuttle's
design was the
Pentagon's need for a
superfast, single-orbit
mission that would
deploy or retrieve
a military satellite.
Strictly speaking, the
retrieved satellite need
not have been the
property of the United
States. The -shuttle
was built to enable
this, but the idea was
soon abandoned.

RETURN TO
LAUNCH SITE
In the event of
engine problems
during launch, one
emergency procedure
involved flipping over
in midascent and
thrusting back to
Florida for a runway
landing. It worked in
the simulator, but it
was so dangerous that
astronauts considered
it barely preferable to
crashing into the ocean.

LATE 1980s

1990s

DARTH VADER,
ASTRONAUT

COLIN HAYES (6)

During research for a
space-based ballisticmissile shield (the
Strategic Defense
Initiative, popularly
known as "Star Wars"),
the Pentagon wanted to
test astronauts' ability
to track objects and aim
weapons in space, and
Moscow accused NASA
of doing so. But in truth,
the test was canceled.

HANDS-OFF
LANDING
The shuttle's digital
autopilot has an
"autoland" option,
although it does require
one throw of a manual
switch to lower the
landing gear. NASA
actually scheduled
a mission to test the
system all the way to
"wheels stop," but the
agency lost its nerve
before launch and left
the astronaut in control
for the landing.

1983

SALYUT
RESCUE

Following a series of
breakdowns on the
Soviet Salyut 7 space
station, NASA wondered
if its upcoming mission,
carrying the Spacelab
module, could be
diverted to perform an
emergency rendezvous
so that the cosmonauts
could be evacuated via
space walks. The answer
was yes, but Moscow
never asked for help.

1998

ALL-WOMAN
CREW
A combination of
astronaut selection,
mission training, and
flight assignments
offered the option
to juggle the crew
manifest and put seven
experienced female
astronauts onto an
otherwise routine
shuttle mission. The
selection was meant
to demonstrate the
level of responsibility
women had earned in
space, but concerns
about exploitation for
electoral politicking
scuttled the suggestion.

1986

HYDROGEN
BOMB
For fast planetary
probes, a Centaur
rocket stage was
modified to be carried
on the shuttle, and two
launches were planned
in one week in May
1986. The explosion
hazard from leaking
gas later led to their
cancellation, but only
after Challenger was
lost in January.

CRUISING
HOME
NASA discovered that
if there had been an
emergency landing at
an overseas airfield,
the shuttle would have
been too heavy for the
747 carrier aircraft to
transport it across an
ocean. So the agency
developed a kludge plan
to lift the shuttle onto
the deck of an aircraft
carrier, thereby limiting
emergency landings to
coastal airfields.

2003

2000s

RESCUE
COLUMBIA
Although Columbia
had been mortally
wounded by launch
damage and was too
crippled to safely
return, controllers
failed to realize it in
time to mount a rescue
flight by the nextin-line shuttle. After
the disaster, analysts
examined whether that
flight might have been
launched in time. The
answer: maybe.

1980s

SUICIDE
SPACE DIVE
NASA figured that
if a shuttle was too
damaged to safely land,
the crew could hang
out at the International
Space Station until
the next shuttle could
retrieve them. The
agency also developed
a system to remotely
pilot a crippled shuttle
into the South Pacific.

SPACEFLIGHT WITHOUT THE SHUTTLE: In an online commentary, IEEE Spectrum examines the capabilities that NASA is giving
up by retiring the shuttle fleet. See http://spectrum.ieee.org/oberg0611.
SPECTRUM.IEEE.ORG

JUNE 2011 * IEEE SPECTRUM * NA

http://spectrum.ieee.org/oberg0611 http://SPECTRUM.IEEE.ORG

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Spectrum June, 2011