Fic: Might Have Been
Cape Canaveral, FL, July 21th, 1999
Speaking yesterday at a NASA event celebrating the 30th anniversary of Apollo 11's successful moon landing, President Bob Dole announced the long anticipated cancellation of the Apollo Program. In his speech, the President praised the many scientific accomplishments of Apollo, which landed at twenty-one different sites over the course of over thirty lunar missions, twelve missions to the Skylab One and Skylab Two space stations, the 1975 Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, and the landing of Apollo-Ares 3 on Mars' moon of Phobos.
Critics of the Apollo Program have long complained of cost overruns and of NASA "Digging trenches on the moon", in particularly the final eight lunar missions, which established Goddard Base on the Moon's Mare Cognitum, and also included the 1996 tragedy of Apollo 37, when astronauts Commander Rick D. Husband, Lunar Module Pilot William McCool, and Mission Specialists Kalpana Chawla and Laurel Clark were killed when the engine of their Advanced Lunar Module failed upon takeoff, resulting in it crashing into the lunar surface ten minutes after launch. A subsequent investigation discovered that debris struck the ALM's engine bell during its initial landing, which was not discovered during post-landing inspection. The investigation's final report eviscerated NASA for a "culture of complacency" resulting in large changes in NASA's safety programs.
Upon hearing the announcement, former NASA chief Michael Griffin stated "In retrospect, the Apollo Program was a mistake. The American public and scientific community would have been better served if we had moved forward with the Space Transportation System, and created a true, reusable Space Shuttle, and perhaps a permanent manned space station."
The Space Shuttle was a mid-70's attempt to build a partly reusable spacecraft, which would have carried a maximum seven astronauts, compared to the Advanced Apollo Command Module's five crew, and over 22,000 lbs. of cargo. A prototype craft, the Enterprise, was built for testing the Shuttle's landing characteristics, and flew on five captive carry flights atop a modified Boeing 747, and five test flights, where it was released to land on its own. However the program was cancelled by President Ford in 1980, citing cost overruns and NASA's commitment to the Skylab 2 program.
Currently there are no plans in place for a replacement for the Apollo program, leaving NASA's manned space program in limbo
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