NASA employees and contractors crowd together to get a glimpse of space shuttle Atlantis (STS-135) as it rolls toward the Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF) at a wheels stop event, Thursday, July 21, 2011, at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla. Atlantis returned to Kennedy early Thursday following a 13-day mission to the International Space Station (ISS) and marking the end of the 30-year Space Shuttle Program. Overall, Atlantis spent 307 days in space and traveled nearly 126 million miles during its 33 flights. Atlantis, the fourth orbiter built, launched on its first mission on Oct. 3, 1985. Photo Credit: (NASA/Paul E. Alers)
A new CNN/ORC International Poll has found that 50 percent of Americans say curtailing the NASA space shuttle program is bad for country.
The findings from the new national survey were released shortly after the space agency’s last shuttle mission came to a wheel’s stopped position in Florida.
The poll also shows that most of the public wants the U.S. to develop a new spacecraft that will send astronauts into space…but a majority polled indicated they would prefer that private enterprise rather than a government program achieve that goal.
“Men are more likely than women to think that the U.S. should develop a new spacecraft,” says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland in a press statement.
“Eight in ten men favor replacing the shuttle, compared to roughly two-thirds of women. But there is little partisan divide on this topic – more than seven out of ten Democrats, Independents and Republicans want to see the U.S. develop a new spacecraft,” Holland explained.
Polling questions
Selected questions and the polling results are:
— As you may know, the current space shuttle mission will be the final time that the U.S. will send astronauts into space using the shuttle. Until the U.S. develops a replacement for the shuttle, all manned U.S. space flights will take place in spacecraft that are owned by other countries. Overall, do you think the end of the space shuttle program will be good for the U.S., bad for the U.S., or not have any effect on the U.S. at all?
Results: Good 16%; Bad 50%; No effect 33%; No opinion 1%
— Just your best guess — do you think the U.S. will or will not eventually develop a replacement spacecraft that will be capable of sending U.S. astronauts into space and returning them to Earth?
Results: Will 87%; Will not 11%; No opinion 2%
— And do you think the U.S. should or should not develop a replacement spacecraft that will be capable of sending U.S. astronauts into space and returning them to Earth?
Results: Should 75%; Should not 23%; No opinion 2%
— In general, do you think the U.S. should rely more on the government or more on private companies to run the country’s manned space missions in the future?
Results: Government 38%; Private companies 54%; Both equal (vol.) 4%; Neither (vol.) 2%; No opinion 2%
— How important do you think it is for the United States to be ahead of Russia and other countries in space exploration — very important, fairly important, or not too important?
Results: Very important 38%; Fairly important 26%; Not too important 36%; No opinion 1%
This poll was conducted for CNN by ORC International on July 18-20, with 1,009 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The survey’s overall sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.
The sample includes 856 interviews among landline respondents and 153 interviews among cell phone respondents.
The poll data can be found here:
http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2011/images/07/21/poll.july21.pdf
By Leonard David