CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — The space shuttle Atlantis roared
into orbit at 2:28 p.m. EST Monday, arching through light clouds to begin an
11-day mission to the International Space Station and bringing the 28-year-old
shuttle program one step closer to retirement.
The successful liftoff — one of the most trouble-free in the
history of the program — reduces the number of remaining launches to five and
marks the first NASA mission completely devoted to stocking the station with
spare parts — such as pumps and gyroscopes — so that the floating observatory
can continue long past the orbiter’s 2010 retirement.
But the launch came amid major worries about NASA’s future,
as the agency has been told by the White House to consider cutting its 2011
budget by as much as 10 percent. Based on the agency’s proposed 2009-2010
budget of $18.7 billion, that would equal roughly $1.87 billion.
That kind of cut would end human spaceflight for at least
the next decade — and likely longer — according to a presidential space panel
that recommended last month a $3 billion-a-year spending increase so that NASA
could run a “meaningful” manned-space program.
“If that’s the case, we as a nation need to face the
fact that we’re not committed to exploration,” said former astronaut Leroy
Chiao, who served on the 10-member committee led by retired Lockheed Martin CEO
Norm Augustine.
But a senior administration official, who is not authorized
to speak on the record, cautioned not to read too much into the proposed
reductions. The official said agencies were given “global”
instructions to cut their budgets by 5 to 10 percent to help reduce the record
$1.4 trillion deficit.
“When the president makes a decision on human
spaceflight, he can ignore that,” said the official.
President Barack Obama convened the Augustine committee this
summer to evaluate NASA’s Constellation program, which aims to build new Ares
rockets and Orion capsules that could be ready to reach the station by 2015 and
return astronauts to the moon by 2020. The committee found that NASA needs up
to $3 billion more a year just to return astronauts to the space station by
2017, with a moon mission farther in the future.
With that bleak estimation, any talk of budget cuts sends
chills through NASA and Kennedy Space Center, which is set to lose as many as
7,000 jobs when the shuttle is retired. Any further delay in launching a
replacement could make the space center more of a ghost town than already
expected.
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On Monday, NASA associate administrator Bill Gerstenmaier
told reporters that he does not expect to know what the White House will do
until February. But he said the uncertainty has made it difficult for NASA as
it flies out the remaining missions.
“How do we keep our workforce and ourselves focused on
what we are doing and don’t get too distracted by all the ‘what if’
scenarios?” he said.
The reality of just five more flights also is starting to
resonate with the launch team. “It is starting to hit home, I have to
admit to you. It is starting to hit home,” said Mike Leinbach, launch
director at the space center.
But for one day, the worries were put on the back burner.
Minutes before liftoff, Atlantis commander Charlie Hobaugh
said: “We’re excited to take this incredible vehicle for a ride, and meet
up with another incredible vehicle, the International Space Station.”
Atlantis, loaded with crucial spare parts, is expected to
dock with the station Wednesday. The parts should enable the station to extend
its operating life by years,
Also on the mission is pilot Barry E. Wilmore, a Navy
captain; mission specialists Leland Melvin, a scientist and former NFL football
player; Mike Foreman, a U.S. Navy Captain and veteran spacewalker; Marine Lt.
Col. Randy Bresnick and Robert Satcher, an orthopedic surgeon. Wilmore,
Bresnick and Satcher were all first-time fliers.
The 11-day flight will keep the astronauts in orbit through
Thanksgiving. They will unload nearly 30,000 pounds of pumps, tanks and other
spare parts, as well as science experiments.
Atlantis will return to Earth with astronaut Nicole Stott,
who has been one of the station’s six crew members since late August.
Via McClatchy-Tribune News Service.
