The space shuttle Discovery landed safely at Edwards Air Force Base in California on Tuesday. The eagerly awaited return to flight of the orbiter, more than two years in the making, was meant to signal the start of several more years of operation by the ageing shuttle fleet. But even before Discovery landed, NASA began pushing plans to replace it with a new class of spacecraft and launchers. Clearly the shuttle's days are numbered, and its end may come far sooner than many expect.
This urgency stems in part from the problems Discovery encountered during its flight. Seconds after its launch on 26 July, several large chunks of insulating foam broke off from the giant external fuel tank. For NASA, it was a chilling moment of déjà vu: precisely the same problem fatally damaged Columbia's wing during launch in January 2003. As it re-entered Earth's atmosphere, superheated air flowed into ...
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