NASA Agrees to New Study on Mission to Telescope
By WARREN E. LEARY

Published: March 12, 2004

[W]ASHINGTON, March 11   The Hubble Space Telescope may have won
a reprieve from an early death. Under Congressional pressure,
NASA agreed on Thursday to have the National Academy of Sciences
examine plans to cancel a space shuttle mission to repair and
upgrade it.

Astronomers who scan the telescope's spectacular images of the
universe for lessons on cosmic history were jubilant about the
decision, with one of them calling it a "grand slam." But the
NASA administrator, Sean O'Keefe, said that although he was
willing to have outside experts analyze his decision against a
shuttle repair mission, he saw little chance of any new evidence
that would change his mind.

Mr. O'Keefe told reporters at a news conference that even
Congressional critics of his decision to abandon the telescope
agreed that there should be no shuttle mission that did not fully
comply with safety recommendations from the board that
investigated the loss of the Columbia and its crew last year.

He said it was "not likely" that a service mission to the
telescope would ever meet those safety requirements before it
stopped operating around 2007.

"We probably would not be able to mount a mission in time to meet
those requirements," he added. "I'm still very much of the mind
that unless the facts change substantially, my decision will
stand." 

Earlier in the day, Mr. O'Keefe appeared before the Senate
Appropriations subcommittee that oversees National Aeronautics
and Space Administration and agreed to a bipartisan plan to have
a committee from the science academy examine the Hubble question.
That plan was put forward by Senator Barbara A. Mikulski of
Maryland, the panel's ranking Democrat, who has taken up the
cause of preserving the telescope, and the subcommittee chairman,
Christopher S. Bond, Republican of Missouri.

Ms. Mikulski called the NASA plan to cancel the telescope mission
major surgery and said: "Any prudent person would get a second
opinion. That kind of decision should not be made by one person
alone."

On Thursday evening, Ms. Mikulski sent a letter to Mr. O'Keefe
saying she was disturbed by his comments to reporters after the
hearing that appeared to undercut the reason for the study  
giving outside experts a voice on the telescope's future. 

"Yet, I understand that you later said that nothing would change
your decision to cancel the final servicing mission," she wrote.

Ms. Mikulski said if Mr. O'Keefe disregarded Congressional
concerns and did not continue planning for the service flight
while the study proceeded, she would work to have financing for
the mission included in the NASA budget.

Mr. O'Keefe announced on Jan. 16 that for safety reasons he would
not authorize a fourth shuttle mission to the telescope to
upgrade its instruments and replace gyroscopes and batteries that
would stretch its life past the end of the decade. The decision
drew immediate objections from astronomers, politicians like Ms.
Mikulski and a public that has grown enamored of the telescope.

In late January, under pressure to reconsider, Mr. O'Keefe asked
Harold W. Gehman Jr., the retired admiral who was chairman of the
Columbia Accident Investigation Board, for an opinion on the
mission. At the hearing on Thursday, Ms. Mikulski released a
five-page letter from Admiral Gehman saying that all shuttle
flights are risky and that a Hubble mission would be only
"slightly more risky" than one to the International Space
Station.

"I suggest only a deep and rich study of the entire gain/risk
equation can answer the question of whether an extension of the
life of the wonderful Hubble telescope is worth the risks
involved," he wrote.

Mr. O'Keefe insisted that any study by the Space Studies Board of
the academy look into ways to stretch the telescope's life, like
more efficient methods of using it and better management of its
power supply. Astronomers estimate that the telescope could
operate until 2007 or 2008, and Mr. O'Keefe said it should be
possible to buy it more time if people operated it more
creatively.

The agency will also look into suggestions for extending the
telescope's life, possibly by sending a robot spacecraft that
could make some repairs or attach an auxiliary power supply to
keep the telescope running longer.

Dennis Overbye contributed reporting from New York for this
article.

Copyright 2004, The New York Times Company