Hello Friends,
The Hubble Space Telescope is to be decommissioned later this year after 50 years of service. Will it be replaced or not?
Has anyone heard?
Love,
Patsy.
xxxxx
RE: Hubble Space Telescope
50 years? Surely they didn't put it up there in 1945? I thought it was in the 80's?
RE: Hubble Space Telescope
Found this if that helps
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/hubble_demise_030804.html
RE: Hubble Space Telescope
Thanks, Giles. I didn't think it had been up there for 50 years, I heard someone say that on telly on Monday.
????
Love,
Patsy.
xxxxxxx
RE: Hubble Space Telescope
I reckon that if there were immediate plans to replace it we would have heard. In my view space exploration - manned flights and scientific satellites - is very poorly planned. Apart from the American declaration to get a man on the moon within the 60s there is very little long-term planning. NASA and other agencies have to beg for funds, and everything is finance-led, finance-oriented. One view might be that the Hubble did its job, and no one is in a hurry to replace it, though I am sure they would if the finance was there.
Money was much more freely available for space flight during the Cold War, as it was the new frontier of battle (to lob missiles downward from space, or to protect against incoming). Now it's largely only science-led.
As for Hubble, whatever scientific discoveries it led to is one thing, but the sheer wonder and beauty of what it sent back is another thing. Also on the subject of Hubble, how amazingly short-sighted it was to have first sent it up in a state that it couldn't even truly work. I wonder who got the sack for that? 😉