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Space travel is very dangerous, but probably worth it
The shuttle astronauts are, without exception, very smart people, and they know that they are taking great risk. They are engaging in a much more hazardous activity than even race car drivers. If you go on a shuttle flight, there is about one chance in 70 that you will die. For the odds to be that bad in NASCAR or IRL racing, there would have to be a fatality every other race. It is more like one fatality every 30 or 40 races.
Still, the people who go on these missions feel, rightly in my opinion, that they are doing something of benefit to the human existance. An example is that the Hubbell (sp?) telescope, the maintenance of which is possible only by use of the shuttle, has provided an abundance of knowledge of the universe that could not be obtained from earth-based telescopes.
I won't argue whether the astronauts are heros, but do feel that they are willing to knowingly put there lives at great risk, but with a purpose for which a good case can be made.
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Team 45, TechnoKats, 1996-2002
Team 1062, The Storm, 2003
Team 233, "The Pink Team," 2004-present
The views I express here are mine, and mine alone, not those of my team, FIRST, or my previous teams.
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