Some thoughts from KSCer Jen Scheer on the end of the Shuttle program.
3 thoughts on “Dreading The End”
While I sympathize with those losing their jobs, KSC has been through this before. The last Apollo mission was the Apollo-Soyuz test mission in 1975. The first Shuttle mission didn’t happen until 1981. There were thousands of employees who lost their jobs following the end of Apollo. Thousands of their jobs – those working on the lunar module – ended with the launch of Apollo 17 in 1972. I’ll bet many of them could’ve said the same thing as the linked author did.
Admittedly, this time is different. There is no definite “next vehicle” to take the Shuttle’s place. If, as most of us hope, NASA uses commercial vehicles like the SpaceX Dragon to launch astronauts, there won’t be a need for so many thousands of people to service the vehicles unelss NASA decides to “help supervise” the program.
For a lot of KSC employees, it’s more than the end of the Shuttle era. It’s the end of government ran manned spaceflight for the foreseeable future, perhaps forever.
I know how he feels. Leaving the shuttle program, then station and finally NASA were painful times. Shuttle especially has been the bulk of all of human space flight. Its end is likely the end of NASA as a major farce in space.
> .. end of NASA as a major farce in space
Hum, I ment to type major force in space. Sadly it will stay a farce.
While I sympathize with those losing their jobs, KSC has been through this before. The last Apollo mission was the Apollo-Soyuz test mission in 1975. The first Shuttle mission didn’t happen until 1981. There were thousands of employees who lost their jobs following the end of Apollo. Thousands of their jobs – those working on the lunar module – ended with the launch of Apollo 17 in 1972. I’ll bet many of them could’ve said the same thing as the linked author did.
Admittedly, this time is different. There is no definite “next vehicle” to take the Shuttle’s place. If, as most of us hope, NASA uses commercial vehicles like the SpaceX Dragon to launch astronauts, there won’t be a need for so many thousands of people to service the vehicles unelss NASA decides to “help supervise” the program.
For a lot of KSC employees, it’s more than the end of the Shuttle era. It’s the end of government ran manned spaceflight for the foreseeable future, perhaps forever.
I know how he feels. Leaving the shuttle program, then station and finally NASA were painful times. Shuttle especially has been the bulk of all of human space flight. Its end is likely the end of NASA as a major farce in space.
> .. end of NASA as a major farce in space
Hum, I ment to type major force in space. Sadly it will stay a farce.