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The first casualty of Mr Bush's moon-mars dream has become apparent. NASA canceled all remaining service missions to Hubble and will let it splash down by 2010. All in order to focus on the space station.
Explain this to me. We're about to take the most succesful mission (in terms of knowledge learned) since the last moon mission and give it up? As the artical mentions, Hubble has discovered so much it's forced the rewritting of textbooks to keep up with what it showed us.

This just to go back to the moon? Hubble provided 1000 times the data daily that all the moon missions combined taught us.

But wait, we have to go back to the moon, quick before the chinese do it next Dec!

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numist

Another thread link here: http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...t=hubble+scrap

(me huggles the search function)

The Hubble is outdated as it is... It would be far better to scrap it either way, whether theres a replacement enroute or not. At the time it was ahead of its time, but now our digital cameras could almost get similar resolution if they were in space (exageration, but still...).

The Hubble did its job, and now it dies.

bermuDa

there needs to be a replacement on the way before I could support scrapping the hubble. The mission to mars I'd be cool with just to prove that we can make it that far, but another trip to the moon? can anyone say "election year"?

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Gortexfogg

If the only reason for scrapping the Hubble is to have more money for the trip to the moon, then it's an absurd idea. But if NASA has other reasons, then I guess it's ok. Though, one interesting substitution for the Hubble would be an observatory on the moon...

Harshaw

"Bush broke the hubble... Bush broke the hubble"

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gnort

YES! MST3K reference! I love it!

but anyway, I agree that if the reasoning is to just raise money for a mars/moon mission then it's a horrible idea. Lets hope that NASA has some kind of replacement that can far surpass Hubble's findings

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tritium

Whoa whoa whoa. Time to set some facts straight.

There already is a replacement with significantly greater camera capabilities. The Spitzer Space telescope is superior in about 1,000 different categories over the Hubble platform. I like redundancy, but why when the old stuff has become antiquated?

http://www.spitzer.caltech.edu/

In any case, there already is a replacement in orbit and has been for some time now. Take a look at the photographs coming back -- spectacular!

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tritium

Just 1 of Spitzer's pictures. NASA is still living. Its OK. See? Proof.

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brandon11983

So the old "don't fuck with us cuz we can go to Mars" battle tactic? I do like astronomy and space and all, but I guess I don't see much need to go to Mars when there are so many other things we could spend billions of dollars on. Do I hear "national defecit," or "homeless," or "unemployment??"

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tritium

or the "feed tritium for the next 75-years fund".... run by the same agency that operates the "buy tritium a 2002 Porsche Boxter fund."

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tehblaed

Don't forgot the James Webb Space Telescope program, http://ngst.gsfc.nasa.gov/ , aka "Hubble 2".

GakFace

If its going to crash, why not just jetteson it into the moon? Then we could use those parts to create something on the moon.

If its outdated, fine.. but that means they should have something new for replacement.

--- I meant to post this a while ago, but forgot to press send.. heh

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grumpyolddude

Actually, the original plan was to keep them both operational:

"Spitzer will be the final mission in NASA's Great Observatories Program - a family of four orbiting observatories, each observing the Universe in a different kind of light (visible, gamma rays, X-rays, and infrared). Other missions in this program include the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), Compton Gamma-Ray Observatory (CGRO), and the Chandra X-Ray Observatory(CXO). Spitzer is also a part of NASA's Astronomical Search for Origins Program, designed to provide information which will help us understand our cosmic roots, and how galaxies, stars and planets develop and form. "http://www.spitzer.caltech.edu/about/index.shtml

Scrapping the Hubble is a large loss and a step backward for astronomy.

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tritium

Nowhere in your quote or the Spitzer websites does it say ANYTHING about keeping all four telescopes operational concurrently. Moreover, the cryogenically cooled instruments on the Hubble would have run out of gas long before those of Spitzer. Ergo, it would be impossible to operate both the Hubble *and* the Spitzer -- to say nothing of the other 2 -- without further intervention to replenish the cryogen gas. When the coolant is depleted, the telescope is finished. That's all there is to it.

Coming back to my original point. Nowhere in your quote or subsequent link does it *say* that both projects were going to continue operating side-by-side.

In any case, MY original point was that there already was a more capable replacement in orbit and that the folks whining about NOT having a space telescope were completely unfounded.

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Dilbert1234567

today is a sad day for science.

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World's King

We have to beat the Saddam to the Moon.

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Dilbert1234567

to drill for oil on the moon and mars, cause where there is ground ther is oil...

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bonehed1

The hubble only covers like 3% of the entire galaxy or something like that so I say bust out more of those and see what else is there that were missing....dont end it

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cetacean

This is not good. I hope that they do not cut funding to earth imaging satellites...

bermuDa

I'm glad to see other observatories in orbit, and the hubble is old enough to let go of. I didn't mean that the money for a mars mission couldn't be better spent on domestic issues, but it does seem like big step for our generation. I'm hesitant to say human exploration, cause we can learn a lot more from unmanned missions.

it would also give us a good thing to complain about... "we can put a man/woman on mars, but we can't...."

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Nazggul

I just saw a special on this topic on the Science Channel. I believe what they were saying is that the planned lifecycle of the Hubble was only until 2010. Basically they are scrapping like 2 or 3 service missions. Without the service missions it should come down sometime around 2007. It is however big enough that they need at least one more service mission to set it up so it doesn't land in a populated area. Interestingly enough, the technology for that be be done doesn't exist yet. I found that to be funny.

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Prince

Maybe they'll save the dough and let it drop. If it hits a populated area, they can just say the terrorists dropped it on us. *rme*

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grumpyolddude

And nowhere at the site that you linked to was the Spitzer declared to be a replacement for the Hubble. Spitzer does not provide visible light imagery.
My quote, pulled from the site that you linked to (and thank you for that... it's a fascinating site!), is the concluding paragraph on the "About Spitzer" page and, I believe, demonstrates that NASA's intent was to maintain four platforms gathering significantly unique data.
If there is evidence that Spitzer was intended as a replacement, other than the inferences that can be drawn from NASA's decision to stop maintaining Hubble, I haven't seen it, but I would like to.

Meanwhile, in the initial link at the beginning of the thread:
I have been a fan of the Hubble and it's photographic exploration of the universe since its deployment, and I will be sad to see its mission abandoned.

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jwells777

Actually...there was an interesting article in recent edition of the IEEE Spectrum which discussed a potential land based replacement for the Hubble. The problem with land based telescopes is that the atmosphere bends light as it passes through which reduces the ability to resolve distant objects. IIRC, they have found a way to perform DSP on the image to account for this dispersion/bending which restores the image to essentially identical quality as what would be seen by Hubble.

The obvious advantage is that it is much cheaper to build and maintain a ground based telescope.

tritium

You are, of course, absolutely correct. However, since the Hubble program has already been beheaded, we have no recourse or alternative but to call the Spitzer telelscope *a replacement* as a means for framing the current situation in as positive a light as possible -- even if that was *not* NASA's original intent. It was my only goal to point out that another, similar, program existed for all of the star-gazers like myself.

Naturally, it would have been ideal to keep the Hubble in orbit for as long as possible, even if the images it generated were of a lesser quality than those of Spitzer -- better some images than none, no? I concur with you in that the Hubble has had its contribution to science cut short as a result of (debateably poor) decisions to pursue other objectives -- like a child leaving toys strewn about the house. Its a shame to lose such a productive project to nothing more than budget cuts and it leaves me wishing for a private entity to purchase the satellite and takeover operation and maintenance. Nonetheless, Hubble is dying as all good things do.

I, for one, am hopeful for Spitzer's capabilities and eventual fame. When all of this Mars rover bit is over and out of the news, hopefully, the images generated from the Spitzer program will begin to come to public light. This, I hope, will begin to generate the same positive public enthusiasm that Hubble created (after the corrective maintenance).

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tritium

What about atmospheric interference from pollution?

I was out on a boat on the Atlantic one evening and I looked up at the stars. Being a city-boy most of my life, I almost wet myself when I realized that you could actually *see* some of the clouds from the Hubble pictures!

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jwells777

Unfortunately, I can't post the article as it requires a subscription. I will paraphrase the concept though. The basic idea is to use shape changing mirrors and adaptive optics to correct for the atmospheric distortion. Incident light hits an adaptive mirror which then passes the light through a beam splitter. Part of the beam is focused to produce the high resolution image while the other part is passed to image sensor which perform the DSP to adjust the shape changing mirrors resulting in the optimal deformation removing the atmoshperic distortion.

If you are particularly interested in the subject, drop me a pm and I will see if I can turn up some more info. You may also enjoy poking around this site; although I haven't actually looked at it myself.

Adaptive Optics Lectures

jwells777

Upon further review, I think that link is to the set of lectures given by the guy that wrote the article in IEEE. They contain an awful lot of information as well as a few comparisons of images using AO and those not using AO. Happy reading to all the geeks out there who appreciate this stuff like me.