Hmmmm...... Since the shuttle seems to be a problem on landing or takeoff we could...............leave them in space. Add a shuttle mothball dock on a spar of the ISS. On each shuttles last mission, have one man pilot it up for docking, and leave it there as a service vehicle. You would only have to have it refueled and supplied for the missions it could be reconfigured to do.
Scrape off those pesky tiles. Add some solar cells and extra fuel tanks. Strap on that ion engine. The shuttle could still be usefull even though it could never touch Earth again. Re-make it into a true *space*ship. Send what Hubble needs by other means, but use the shuttles to do the space transportation and support. The shuttle could be a crew life support system and pickup truck for several different kinds of Earth and Lunar orbital missions. You just need Apollo to get there. <G>
Wow, that's a great idea. Really. I wonder what the drawbacks are.
-- Doug _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
