al@ames.UUCP (Al Globus) (08/07/84)
>One thing I've never understood is why the US never >tried to save Skylab. From what I've read, NASA had >planned to fly one of the early shuttle missions to Skylab >to attach a new engine to it to boost it to a higher orbit >in order to save it. This plan was based on the assumption >by NASA that the shuttle was going to be ready in about >1978, which it obviously wasn't. However, my question is: >if NASA knew that it couldn't get to Skylab with the shuttle >in time, why didn't they launch an unmanned vehicle to >rendezvous with Skylab to boost it into a higher orbit? > >Would there be technical difficulties with such a plan, >or did NASA not do it so they could obtain a *new* space >station; instead of having to refurbish Skylab? It seemed >to me to be such a waste to let such a huge station be >destroyed. It sure would have been nice to have to work >in concert with the shuttle, until the new space station >is launched in the 1990's. There would have been severe technical difficulaties. Not unsolvable, but expensive and time consuming. Building ANY space vehicle takes years, usually five or more. Building something that does something new (unmanned rendezvous and reboost would be new for the U.S.) is that much harder. Combine that with tight NASA budgets of the time and it's fairly obvious why nothing was done. Also, a note, Skylab wasn't supposed to come down so soon. The problem was that the Sun was hotter than expected so the atmosphere expanded increasing drag. When Skylab was put up, NASA did three studies to determin drag up to the shuttle era. Two studies said little atmospheric expansion, one study turned out to be accurate. NASA managers did the logical thing at the time and believed the two studies. They just turned out to be wrong. At least that's the story I heard.