The International Space Station (ISS) has come under fire again, this time from the US government's Office of Management and Budget (OMB). The ISS is one of the government's "most inefficient and wasteful programmes", says Mitch Daniels, director of the OMB.
Despite its promise as a research platform, the ISS will be highlighted in the Bush Administration's 2003 budget programme as an example of one of the "biggest overruns ever in the federal government", says Daniels, calling for the introduction of "firm accountability". Daniels' former deputy is Sean O'Keefe, recently appointed NASA administrator.
Meanwhile, former NASA manned spaceflight chief Chris Kraft has expressed concern that O'Keefe lacks the knowledge of "what NASA is", and is critical of the new chief's statement that the agency ignores costs and worries only about technical and safety matters.
In an Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers publication, Kraft questions whether O'Keefe would be willing to sign off more risk-taking changes to the ISS that would save money. He suggests, for example, that the risk of needing to evacuate the ISS quickly is small enough to negate the need for a Crew Return Vehicle. He also suggests that instead of spending $4 billion on the Space Launch Initiative, NASA should put the money into upgrading the Space Shuttle.
The second ISS Expedition Crew 4 spacewalk was made on 25 January. The 6h spacewalk involved the installation of protective covers around thrusters on the Russian Zvezda module, additional amateur radio antennas, new tether connections for future EVAs and some science experiments. A third and final EVA will be made this month to pre-position equipment that will be used by the crew of Shuttle mission STS 110, which will be launched in April to install the S Zero truss.Source: Flight International
