a mistake?

a mistake?

In an interview with USA Today at the end of September, NASA administrator Mike Griffin said that the Space Shuttle and International Space Station were mistakes:

Asked Tuesday whether the shuttle had been a mistake, Griffin said, "My opinion is that it was. ... It was a design which was extremely aggressive and just barely possible." Asked whether the space station had been a mistake, he said, "Had the decision been mine, we would not have built the space station we're building in the orbit we're building it in."

This was followed a few days later by a clarification email sent to agency employees. Griffin's USA Today interview had caused a firestorm within the agency, and he sought to put that fire out with the email:

"I was asked by an interviewer if shuttle had been "a mistake," and I provided my answer, which addressed the difficulty of the design challenge and the paucity of funds with which it was undertaken. This answer was given in the article, and was quoted correctly. But the use of words such as "mistake" and "blunder," as well as the overall pejorative tone of the article, was not reflective of my remarks nor of the general context of the discussion."

So basically, Griffin was quoted correctly as saying that the Space Shuttle and ISS were mistakes, but that what he said wasn't really what he meant. Following up on that today in The Space Review, Eric R. Hedman asks the following:

Regardless of whether or not Michael Griffin was correctly quoted still begs the question, "Were the shuttle and the ISS mistakes?"

His conclusion? Neither has been a resounding success, both driven more by politics than science or actual space exploration:

Decisions on both programs were made on factors that included many that had nothing to do with technical issues, scientific merit, or economic value. Jobs in key congressional districts, politics, and international relations have also been key factors.

Sounds like a mistake to me.

Technorati Tags: NASA, Space Shuttle, International Space Station