NASA Shuttle Cutbacks May Protect, Not Harm, Space Science Research

Engineers may be quaking over the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's announcement last month that it may cut 5,000 space shuttle-related jobs over the next five years. But space science researchers are viewing the move as nonthreatening, or even as a boon. In a January 6 speech broadcast to NASA employees, Robert Crippen, the new director of the Kennedy Space Center and a former shuttle astronaut, said that if Congress cuts the agency's budget it will be the space shuttle program that feels most of the pain. Forward-looking programs such as the space station and Mars mission, which traditionally have borne the brunt of the budget ax, will be conserved. NASA officials say engineers and contractors, primarily those not currently at Kennedy Space Center, would be the ones most likely to lose their jobs. "It is NASA's ambition, and rightfully so, to be doing other exciting things and exploring new horizons," Crippen said. "All of these things cost money, and there aren't going to be many new bucks for NASA to work with. . . . Consequently, we need to be able to reduce programs like the shuttle, but do it safely so that we can do these other exciting things." NASA is preparing for a scenario in which a sluggish economy forces congressional budget cuts of 3 percent per year over the next five years, says NASA spokesman Carl Kristofferson. Exactly which programs and positions would be eliminated is still unclear, he says, but the focus will be on contractor positions and attrition. In the past, NASA has preserved the $2.7 billion annually allocated to shuttle operations at the expense of other operations. Such shuttle coddling would change if the budget cuts materialize, with most of the layoffs occurring at operations outside Kennedy Space Center, Kristofferson says. NASA also may be forced to eliminate two of the eight annual shuttle missions, at a savings of $600 million, he says. "Right now we're talking about a nebulous thing," he says. "And it may all go away if the economy springs back to life this year." But there may be more smoke and mirrors to the NASA announcement than fire, according to Roger Crawford, a 30-year veteran of aerospace research who is studying shuttle engine leak detection at the University of Tennessee. With the presidential election looming, he says, "there's going to be an awful lot of rhetoric in the next six months that won't translate into money changes." Crawford says Crippen's announcement smacks of posturing, that is, announcing ahead of time that should the congressional budget ax fall, it will fall hardest on one of the most politically popular program areas--the shuttle. The announcement has an additional impact. All those potentially unemployed technicians and engineers, who are also voters, will be writing their representatives in Congress in support of NASA in general and the space shuttle program in particular, he says. Space Sciences Growing Crawford says that in the aerospace research realm, it is the funding plunge at the Department of Defense--which provides 10 times more research money for universities than does NASA--that is creating the greatest concern. "These are difficult times in aerospace research," he says. "Space science [at NASA] has actually fared quite well," according to Katy Schmoll, assistant associate administrator for space science at NASA. The budget for space science research, which makes up 20 percent of the current NASA budget, has doubled in real-dollar terms, from $1.5 billion in 1981 to $2.7 billion for this year. Schmoll says that such growth has probably topped off, but paring back the shuttle program will provide some breathing room and stave off a decline. "I really do believe that we're going to hold our own," she says. Despite a forecast for a flat space sciences budget, Schmoll predicts there will be opportunities for new scientists entering the field as the old guard of senior scientists leave the profession. NASA scientist Allen Wilkinson, who is involved in fundamental research on critical point fluids, says he does not fear any trickle-down effect in terms of job security or reduced funding from the announced shuttle cutbacks. "I think there's a healthy thrift consciousness coming into play," he says. Although his experiment was part of the International Microgravity Laboratory flying aboard the January 22 shuttle, Wilkinson thinks keeping the space station on track would improve the quality of his work and that of others whose research requires longer periods than the seven days of a shuttle mission. In his on-board experiments with critical point fluids, for instance, minute changes in temperature--as little as one milli-Kelvin--are required, which take several days to stabilize. As a result of earlier congressional budget trimming, the launch date for the first components of the space station was pushed back from 1992 to 1995. Originally envisioned as both a permanent microgravity laboratory and a way station for trips to the moon and Mars, the same cuts forced NASA to scrap the way station and make the laboratory the primary focus of the project. Protecting the space station from further delays is critical to its scientific viability, says Schmoll. Because researchers are tying up major portions of their careers in order to prepare for space-based experiments, she says, it is a tremendous blow when the "vehicle is not there." "When you have a program that's waiting for another component of the NASA program to show up, the impact on the quality of work is severe," Schmoll says.

NASA Shuttle Cutbacks May Protect, Not Harm, Space Science Research

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