This worst-case estimate for time needed to replace failed parts and inspect the craft has made NASA scientists question whether the station is feasible at all. A senior space engineer told NEWSWEEK that astronauts might spend so much time in space fixing modules, the first of which could be lofted in the mid-1990s, that they would never fully assemble the craft. “Many at NASA are concerned that the plans are unrealistic and, worse, that officials want to wish away all the problems,” he says. “Such wishful thinking killed the Challenger astronauts.” Congress has shown little inclination to torpedo the space station, but that may be changing. “There’s a growing sense that the U.S. is not getting from NASA the quality of performance it deserves,” says the space-program expert John Logsdon of George Washington University. Let alone the quality’s it’s paying for: the station will cost a projected $37 billion.
