Stuck in the 70s?

Above: View of the space shuttle from the TS-118: Endeavour Mission (click the image to see it at full size – trust me it’s worth it).

Not too long go a bridge fell apart here in the good old US of A, and after the disaster that claimed a few lives everyone has gone back to sleep (and they’re still finding bodies no less). It’s my thinking that the space shuttle is another disaster waiting to happen again, and like that bridge it’s because we’ve neglected NASA for the last thirty years ago. The space shuttle is 70s technology and while it’s cool that they can still still get into orbit giving the crew some glue to fix tiles isn’t the answer:

Shuttle Damage Looms Large During Endeavour Crew Spacewalk

“A detailed laser inspection on Sunday of the difficult-to-reach area on Endeavour’s belly could send astronauts out to repair the 3-inch wound later in the week, although NASA said that prospect appeared less likely than it did a day earlier. A penetration, if severe enough, could let in searing gases when the shuttle returns to Earth in a possible replay of the Columbia accident. As a pair of spacewalking astronauts installed a new beam to the international space station on Saturday, engineers back on Earth scrutinized images of the gouge, the result of a strike by fuel-tank foam insulation at launch.”

…I’d like to see every 2008 Presidential candidate tell us what they’re going to do to re-invent NASA.