THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, September 15, 1995 TAG: 9509150506
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JAMES SCHULTZ, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: HAMPTON LENGTH: Medium: 97 lines
Airplane pioneers Orville and Wilbur Wright used one. And they were at the heart of virtually every other American aeronautical advance of this century, including breakthroughs produced by NASA Langley Research Center.
They are wind tunnels, and the days are numbered for some of the most illustrious in the nation: Up to one-third of Langley's 40-plus will be closed within the next five years, according to center director Paul F. Holloway, speaking Thursday.
Holloway said the decision is part of a plan to trim millions in operating expenses from the center's $639 million budget to meet upcoming NASA-wide funding cuts. Operational costs excluded, the modern Langley complex is worth roughly $2 billion.
For now, the livelihoods of Langley's 4,750 civil servants and independent contractors appear secure. There will be no layoffs or firings as a result of the shutdowns, Holloway said.
``There's a plan for closing facilities at every NASA center. We can't do everything any longer,'' he said. ``No one loses a job in any of this. They'll come to our other facilities.''
There are no plans to tear down, renovate or mothball any of the targeted tunnels. That would be too expensive, Holloway said. So power will be turned off, doors padlocked and the buildings housing the affected facilities left as is.
Langley's first tunnel to be closed, on Sept. 29, is NASA's oldest in continual operation, known as the 30-by-60-Foot Tunnel. Opened in 1931 and declared a National Historic Landmark in
1985, the facility was used extensively in World War II to test full-scale models of fighter aircraft.
Investigations of submarine designs, spacecraft configurations and mockups of supersonic transports also were conducted there.
Another facility, Langley's 8-Foot Pressure Tunnel, will close in December. More will follow next year, and every year through 2000, Holloway said.
``We will be developing a plan for continued cutbacks in facilities,'' he said. ``We have to give up things. We're going to keep the best.''
The wind tunnel closures bring home to Hampton Roads the reality of federal budget-balancing and government downsizing. More severe NASA cuts may be on the way. Congressional budget proposals for the upcoming 1996 fiscal year, beginning Oct. 1, would carve several hundred million more dollars from the $14.2 billion NASA appropriation favored by the White House.
``In the field, we've done nothing to assess how we'll react to that kind of cut,'' Holloway said. ``It's going to be tough. I wouldn't be surprised if we hear in the next couple of months about closing some NASA center - and probably more than one.''
This past summer, and with intense lobbying from the Virginia congressional delegation, Langley sidestepped an effort by California Republican Rep. Jerry Lewis to close Langley and two other NASA centers, the Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland and the Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama.
This past year has been perhaps the most difficult in NASA's 37-year history. Rumors of budget cuts gave way to talk of budget cuts, and then to specifics of how the space agency would tighten its belt by $5 billion over five years.
In May, NASA administrator Daniel S. Goldin announced sweeping organizational change, including privatization of some of the agency's research, consolidation of management, and outright abolition of some programs. Lost, by the early years of the next century, would be the jobs of thousands of NASA civil servants and independent contractors.
But in the absence of a 1996 federal budget, even those savvy to the ways of Washington, like 35-year NASA veteran Holloway, are befuddled by what's coming next in the downsizing parade.
``Where do we go from here? I don't know,'' Holloway said. ``We're definitely still in a crisis. How this will play out is still wide open.''
The tunnel shutdowns trouble observers like historian James R. Hansen, author of ``Spaceflight Revolution: NASA Langley Research Center from Sputnik to Apollo,'' and chairman of the Auburn University history department. Hansen is concerned that, however well-managed the Langley closures are, they nonetheless speak to an American reluctance to pay the price for long-range technological advance.
``I'm afraid we're doing some damage to government research and development in aeronautics,'' he said. ``For the first time, you're having a significant reduction in capabilities. At some point we'll regret it.''
In Hansen's view, wind tunnels have enabled researchers to ``work smarter'': to observe directly the workings of aerodynamic phenomena and to practically apply those observations to airplane, rocket and spacecraft design. Eroding that capability erodes the nation's capability to remain in the forefront of aerospace, he said.
In the aftermath of NASA's current funding woes, Hansen believes the agency ``is going to be something else.'' What exactly that is, he added, the country hasn't yet decided.
And even if the current budget impasse is resolved, there are the 1996 presidential and congressional elections to consider. No one, Hansen said, can predict what a new congress or president may do.
``Anything's possible,'' Hansen said. ``I'm not sure Virginia's political power will be such to ensure that Langley wouldn't be closed. I wouldn't rule that out.'' by CNB