Hubble left hanging

The 14-year-old Hubble Space Telescope has been orbiting the Earth and capturing historic images, aiding us in the understanding of our universe, and allowing us to boldly see where no one has seen before. Link. It’s our only space telescope… the only telescope that has the advantage of having a view of the universe that isn’t affected by the Earth’s atmosphere. But now, the old space telescope needs a billion-dollar tune up. NASA scientists and others like them have been debating whether it's better to send astronauts or a robot to do the Hubble repairs, but it looks like they might as well save their breath. The latest word is that the Bush administration plans to cut the funds for a Hubble repair and scrap plans for a repair mission. Plans to bring the telescope back to Earth unharmed aren’t looking good either. The soon-to-be retired instrument could end up in pieces on the floor of the Pacific Ocean, instead of displayed in a museum in one piece. There is hope that the White House is just bluffing; they do this to NASA routinely as a bargaining game. In 2011, NASA plans to send up the new Webb Telescope, more than twice as large as the Hubble. Although more powerful, the Webb isn’t exactly the same as the Hubble, it detects different wavelengths of light. Link.