What's Your Opinion ?

Question

Do you think the US Space Program will be greatly affected without the Orbiter Fleet Of Shuttles?
My Opinion- I think it will considering for almost 30 years Nasa has been having Shuttle Based missions. Plus the current space station is occasionally re-supplied by a MPLM hauled by shuttle. Lastly most Nasa Astronauts are trained to fly shuttle and Space station, so crew training will change drastically.
Whats Your Opinion

Answer 1

In my opinion, the lack of a shuttle fleet will be a good thing. This will allow commercial space to really take off, pardon the pun, and be the main providers of space access. I do not believe the Ares will be done in time, so we will have to rely on the Russians for space access. This will be politically unacceptable, so congress will push to subsidize companies like space x, virgin galactic, and sea launch.

Answer 2

I think to return to the moon and later a possible manned mission to mars at some time in the future ,nasa needed a vehicle that could do these things which the space shuttle can't .
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orion_%28spacecraft%29

Answer 3

I think that NASA is just undefunded. The shuttle works great. and If it isn't broken, then don't fix it unless it's a heat-shield tile.

Answer 4

I think that, under our present social, political and military mind sets, that as long as there is some "benefit" to certain individuals and nations, there will always be someone that will try to exploit space and its resources.

As soon as there is no military or economic benefits to exploring space, space exploration will cease.