If mission specialist Michael Massimino is worried about performing death-defying repairs on the world’s most famous (and expensive) telescope, he does a convincing job of hiding it. Snug in the electric-orange space suit that he will wear aboard the space shuttle Atlantis, he riffs genially about his Brooklyn upbringing, the search for a great slice of New York pizza, and the absurdities of NASA lingo. He discusses some technical issues about the suit with his crewmates. He reflects on the history around him in this corner of Houston’s Johnson Space Center, where Apollo communications equipment was tested four decades ago. In short, he exudes effortless competence and exactly zero fear.
Massimino will need that moxie and know-how when he and his crew blast off this month from Cape Canaveral and rendezvous with the Hubble Space Telescope 360 miles above Earth’s surface. Once the astronauts secure the orbiting 12-ton observatory to Atlantis, they will embark on five arduous space walks to install a new camera and spectrograph and fix two other malfunctioning instruments to upgrade Hubble’s vision. The crew will also swap in new batteries and gyroscopes, attach a protective blanket, and repair the guidance system.
photography by Michael Soluri
NASA has sent servicing missions to Hubble before, but this one is unique in complexity and finality. If the upgrades work, Hubble should keep scanning the cosmos until at least 2013. At that point, however, its gyros or batteries will fail and the heroic telescope will become so much orbiting junk. Three members of the Atlantis crew have visited Hubble previously. After this mission, no astronauts will ever return.
More significantly, this is the beginning of the end not just for Hubble but for space shuttles—indeed for the entire American manned space program as currently configured. NASA will fly the shuttle a few more times, mainly to complete construction of the all-but-forgotten International Space Station, but by the fall of 2010 the last shuttle will be retired. For the first time in 29 years, the United States will have no way to launch humans into space.
If all goes well, both the end of the Hubble and the end of the shuttle will create only temporary gaps. NASA’s next great space observatory, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), is well along in development, slated for launch in 2013. It might even overlap with Hubble, depending on how long its predecessor lasts. But JWST is not a true replacement. It is designed to study infrared rays—invisible radiation just beyond the red part of the spectrum. That makes it great for examining infant stars and distant galaxies, but it will not be able to take space portraits that capture what the human eye can see.
