Posts: 836
From: Lafayette, CA
Registered: Oct 2001

posted 06-02-2005 01:38 AM            

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I was just watching some CNN 25th anniversary thing, and Miles O'Brien -- CNN's cheif space correspondent -- said that CNN and NASA were going to announce (in mid-Feb 2003) that they'd take O'Brien on the shuttle. But that Columbia's demise put that on ice, probably forever.

Anyone have anything more on this? I like O'Brien and would have been happy to see him get a lift, but this was news to me.

Posts: 1896
From: Cape Canaveral, FL
Registered: May 2000

Posts: 1217
From: Huntsville, AL, USA
Registered: Jun 2003

posted 06-02-2005 10:21 AM               

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So what does the cS community think about this?

In particular, there are two aspects, if the reports are true, that I find fascinating: that NASA would be coming awfully close to selling Shuttle seats, and that it could have laid the groundwork for a new expanded non-technical astronaut program.

Granted, it's likely all moot now, but what are your thoughts?

Posts: 836
From: Lafayette, CA
Registered: Oct 2001

Posts: 379
From: Yadkinville, NC
Registered: Jun 2000

posted 06-02-2005 01:26 PM               

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Absolutely, O'Brien should STILL be a candidate for a flight, if for no other reason than to be able to communicate the experience to a generation of people who do not know what human space exploration was, is or should be in the future. Send him.

Honestly, knowing his interest in the program and evidently how close he was to going, my heart breaks for the guy. Just imagine having something so magnificient snatched away like that ... let him go.

Posts: 1618
From: Gardner, KS, USA
Registered: Feb 2003

posted 06-02-2005 01:44 PM               

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Yes, I was surprised too when I saw the show last night. I think Miles is a great guy who really knows what he is reporting when it comes to spaceflight. I always wondered why he had not applied to be an astronaut or something and now I find out that he had been close to getting selected.

I really hope he gets to go. He deserves to go and I think it would be awesome to have Miles up there reporting live from space.

Posts: 816
From: Ridgecrest, CA
Registered: Sep 2000

posted 06-02-2005 07:36 PM               

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Seems like every time they talk about putting the public on the shuttle we have a problem. In 1985 they started the process of putting a member of the press on a shuttle flight for late 1986. Then Challenger happened.

I like Miles but I do not think it would have been too fair to give him a flight. I could have stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night why don't I get a flight then?

The guy who had the space desk at CNN before Miles was also good too, he died before STS-95 I think. I will admit CNN does have the best coverage of the shuttle. But if they had done his flight FOX, ABC, NBC, and CBS would all want one too.

I do not want to see the Today Show from the ISS with Willard Scott. Once I went to Dish Network which has NASA TV I got spoiled on my spaceflight coverage.

Posts: 104
From: Saginaw, MI USA
Registered: Feb 2004

posted 06-03-2005 06:18 AM               

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Whether Miles should get a flight or not, wow. Tough call. A good point was made about the other networks wanting equal treatment, but I believe only CNN and Fox News give live shuttle coverage the time of day.

At the same time, Miles would certainly be my choice for a non-astronaut going into space (on the shuttle). Not many could do as good of a job of conveying space travel to the public. If it were my call, I'd send him. I see the positives outweighing the negatives.

Posts: 1292
From: Rochester, NY, USA
Registered: Mar 2002

Posts: 1042
From: UK
Registered: Apr 2005

posted 06-05-2005 09:07 AM            

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I think there already was a journalist in space. He was a Japanese TV reporter who flew for a week onboard the old Mir space station in the early nineties.

But I agree that CNN's very good space correspondent ought to be given a chance to fly a Shuttle or Soyuz.

Posts: 551
From: Silver Spring, Maryland USA
Registered: Aug 2003