NASA NEAR TURNING POINT FOR SHUTTLE.

Byline: Jim Skeen Staff Writer

PALMDALE - The space shuttle is at a seminal moment in its history.

As the National Aeronautics and Space Administration works to recover from the Feb. 1 Columbia disaster, the Bush administration is preparing a space policy that, in part, will spell out how much longer and in what fashion the shuttles will fly.

An announcement is expected within a few weeks.

Three people intimately involved with the shuttle program - a man who has spent his entire NASA career supporting shuttle landings, a Boeing worker who helped build and modify orbiters, and a former test pilot who is living a childhood dream of being an astronaut - offered some of their shuttle memories and thoughts about what the future might bring.

``The program is going to continue,'' said Al Hoffman, director of Boeing's assembly and test operations in Palmdale. ``We will return to flying soon.''

And he expects to see the shuttle continue to fly for some time.

``I would like to see us fly it until we have another vehicle or system better than the present system,'' Hoffman said. ``We need to continue to fly humans into space.''

Hoffman joined the space shuttle program after the 1986 Challenger disaster and has worked on every space shuttle, starting with the construction of Challenger's replacement, Endeavour.

He started out as a floor supervisor for the installation of thermal protection blankets on Endeavour's crew module in 1989 and later because the second shift supervisor.

Among Hoffman's memories was watching the first flight of Endeavour in May 1992 on a big-screen TV at Boeing's Palmdale facilities.

``I got choked up as it launched from Kennedy. There was all this pride. Here is the excellent job we did. It was elation,'' Hoffman said. ``It was another flying miracle turned out by the company.''

The counterpoint to the elation of Endeavour's first mission was the Columbia tragedy. The tragedy had occurred just days after Hoffman sent out a memo to his staffers encouraging them to reflect on the Challenger disaster and to strive for the highest standards of workmanship and professionalism.

Hoffman said he believes Americans do not fully appreciate the value of the shuttle. Hoffman said he has a collection of photos taken by the Hubble space telescope - launched, repaired and enhanced by shuttle missions - that he shows people as an example of its value.

``The images provided so much knowledge of what is taking place in the solar system and the universe,'' Hoffman said. ``It's all possible because of the shuttle.''

Astronaut Scott ``Doc'' Horowitz, a veteran of four shuttle missions, is living a childhood dream of being an astronaut. As a boy, he was inspired to become an astronaut by two events - the Apollo 11 moon landing and a note from a teacher telling him that he could become ``one of the astronauts of tomorrow.''

``A shuttle is more than a shuttle. It's thousands of people's efforts,'' said Horowitz. ``When I look at a shuttle I look at the blood, sweat and tears of the people who worked on it.''

NASA needs to focus that human energy on a new project, Horowitz said.

``We need to take all of the lessons learned from shuttle and decide what we are going to,'' Horowitz said. ``We need another vision to get these people to create the next miracle.''

While studying engineering at California State University, Northridge, in the late 1970s, Horowitz made a trip to Edwards Air Force Base to see the nation's first shuttle, Enterprise.

``I thought immediately I wanted to fly it,'' Horowitz said.

Horowitz returned to Edwards in 1990 as a test-pilot school student. In 1992, while serving as a test pilot at Edwards, he was selected for astronaut training.

Horowitz made his first space flight in 1996.

Horowitz has logged more than 1,100 hours in space, including flying on missions to modify the Hubble space telescope and two missions to help build the International Space Station.

Joe D'Agostino, head of the space shuttle office at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards, has spent his entire NASA career supporting space shuttle operations.

D'Agostino came to Dryden in 1976 to head up security for the approach and landing tests that would be Enterprise's contribution to the program. Those tests were conducted over a nine-month period in 1977 and brought out hundreds of NASA workers to Dryden and thousands of spectators during the flights.

``It looked like the whole world descended on Dryden,'' D'Agostino recalled.

One of D'Agostino's memories of the program is the concern NASA had about the separation of Enterprise from the Boeing 747 that carried it aloft for the approach and landing tests. There were concerns that the two aircraft could hit each other during separation.

``My first concern was would it clear the tail section. I went whew when it cleared,'' D'Agostino said. ``Everyone oohed and aahed when it separated.''

Another of D'Agostino's memories comes from March 1982, when he headed up an effort to ship out shuttle support equipment to White Sands, N.M., after Columbia had to land there because the lake bed at Edwards was too wet. D'Agostino worked 40 hours straight overseeing the loading of 44 rail cars carrying the gear to White Sands.

D'Agostino was working at Dryden the day Columbia broke apart. He knew instantly something terrible had happened by the way the phones at Dryden were ringing.

``You go into a state of mind where you don't believe what has happened,'' D'Agostino said. ``At the same time you realize we are working on the edge of technology. Risk is one of the consequences of working with an airplane or space program.''

In the short term, the shuttles will return to flight in a safe manner, he predicted. In the long term, new technologies will lead to new spacecraft, D'Agostino said.

``The shuttle was the pinnacle of the effort of the '60s, '70s and '80s,'' D'Agostino said. ``There are new technologies, new vehicles coming out. We're moving on.''

Jim Skeen, [phone]

james.skeen(at)dailynews.com