The Space Shuttle Atlantis is at the pad and ready to launch, carrying the Columbus, the next attachment to the International Space Station. But the entire launch and installation of Columbus is being overshadowed by a possible tragedy.
The furor is evolving around the decision not to send up the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometers (AMS). Costing $1.5 billion, the AMS was constructed over 12 years, by 500 physicists from 60 institutes in 16 nations. But despite all that, fears are that it will become one of the most expensive lawn ornaments in NASA’s collection.
The Columbus laboratory – which will dock with the ISS after being ferried aboard Atlantis – will be able to conduct long-term biological, fluid and materials science research in weightless conditions. It itself has cost $1 billion, but is not the favored son among many scientists.
"We are very excited about the launch of Columbus and believe this will be a major step forward for the international space station," said Martin Zell, who is involved with the European space laboratory as head of research operations for the ESA and is also a coordinator for development of the AMS project.
"But if the other device does not make it to the station, it will be a very great setback for the space community and the ISS," Zell added. "It would be the most visible, perhaps the most exciting, experiment on the station."
From a basic publicity standpoint, NASA may have miscalculated there as well. As wonderful as biological and fluid projects may be, the AMS had another thing in its favor (along with the 500 or so scientists); it would have looked for evidence of how the universe formed.
If you ask many people, in a toss-up between fluids and universal formation, the latter may just pull ahead.
"Given all that has happened with the shuttle program, there is no reason to throw harsh words at NASA about this," said Giovanni Bignami, president of the Italian Space Agency which has played a significant role in development of the AMS. "But that said it would be a true international disgrace if this instrument ends up as a museum piece that never is used."
The AMS was originally intended to be delivered to the ISS, but luck has just not been on its side. Funding problems which slowed construction of the space station, George W. Bush’s ‘manned exploration initiative’ which intends to see man on the Moon and Mars again devastated its chances. Add to that the tragic loss of the Space Shuttle Columbia on February 1st, 2003, which grounded, space shuttle missions for two and a half years.
And while the current research done aboard the ISS is not unworthy of attention, Bush’s lack of support for a NASA science program has devastated any chance for the AMS to make it up there. Many of the studies being done aboard the ISS currently are targeted towards helping humans in the future to better live in space.
One Nobel laureate, Steven Weinberg, who is a theoretical physicist at the University of Texas, is among many who are infinitely frustrated with NASA’s priorities. Weinberg has been vocal about his problems with NASA, and has used the AMS project as his prime example. He has gone so far as to say that if the AMS were to be delivered to the ISS, its study of cosmic rays "would be the only significant science ever done on the space station."
"This device could make discoveries that are Earth-shattering," he said. "We have an opportunity now to do some worthwhile fundamental science on the ISS, and they're resolutely turning their back on it."
So though we look forward to a future where man’s footprint is once again left upon the Moon, and maybe one day on the surface of Mars, what have we given up for that chance?
Joshua Hill, a Geek’s-Geek from Melbourne, Australia, Josh is an aspiring author with dreams of publishing his epic fantasy, currently in the works, sometime in the next 5 years. A techie, nerd, sci-fi nut and bookworm.
