With thoughts of salvaging the Hubble Telescope being of major concern, Michael Griffin has been confirmed by the US Senate to take over as NASA’s chief.
Griffin received a unanimous voting margin from the Senate yesterday, which was actually earlier than they had initially intended. However, by urging of the Senate Commerce Committee co-chairmen, Griffin was confirmed and is now ready to take over the leadership responsibilities.
The Senate’s rationale was they would like Griffin to have as much time on the job has possible before the launch of the Discovery Space Shuttle, which has a launch window of May 15 through June 3. This will be the first shuttle mission since the Columbia disaster in 2003.
According to Reuters,
Shuttle Discovery is set to lift off from Cape Canaveral between May 15 and June 3, but an independent panel monitoring NASA’s compliance with investigators’ safety recommendations has not yet given its final approval for the flight.
“Dr. Griffin’s first task will be to ensure that the shuttle program gets back on its feet safely and effectively, NASA needs its next administrator immediately,” Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Stevens, an Alaska Republican, said in a statement after the vote.
At his confirmation hearing on Tuesday, Griffin said that his top priority was getting the shuttle program flying as safely as possible until its retirement, not later than 2010.
Another one of Griffin’s priorities is deciding the future of the Hubble Telescope, which was bleak based on the previous Chief’s choice to cut funding and deny repairs. Griffin would like to keep the Hubble project active by performing a repair mission, which would be done by astronauts using one of NASA’s space shuttles.
Chris Richardson is a search engine writer and editor for Murdok. Visit Murdok for the latest search news.
