NASA to permit independent review of Hubble decision
Posted: Fri, Mar 12, 2004, 9:58 AM ET (1458 GMT)
NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe said Thursday that he would ask the National Academy of Sciences to review the safety of a shuttle servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope, hours after members of a Senate committee asked him to perform such a review. During a hearing Thursday morning of the subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee that oversees NASA, Senators Christopher Bond (R-MO) and Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) asked O'Keefe to perform such a review. O'Keefe told reporters later in the day he would commission such a review, although he insisted that he felt it would not be possible to safely carry out a shuttle mission to Hubble before the telescope fell into disrepair later this decade. Also at the hearing Mikulski released a five-page letter sent to her from Admiral Harold Gehman, the former chairman of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board, with his opinion regarding the risk of a Hubble servicing mission. He concluded that a Hubble mission would be "slightly more risky" than a shuttle mission to the ISS, but that more study was required.
NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe said Thursday that he would ask the National Academy of Sciences to review the safety of a shuttle servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope, hours after members of a Senate committee asked him to perform such a review. During a hearing Thursday morning of the subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee that oversees NASA, Senators Christopher Bond (R-MO) and Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) asked O'Keefe to perform such a review. O'Keefe told reporters later in the day he would commission such a review, although he insisted that he felt it would not be possible to safely carry out a shuttle mission to Hubble before the telescope fell into disrepair later this decade. Also at the hearing Mikulski released a five-page letter sent to her from Admiral Harold Gehman, the former chairman of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board, with his opinion regarding the risk of a Hubble servicing mission. He concluded that a Hubble mission would be "slightly more risky" than a shuttle mission to the ISS, but that more study was required.
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