Criticism of the Space Shuttle program
Criticism of the Space Shuttle program stemmed from claims that NASA's Space Shuttle program failed to achieve its promised cost and utility goals, as well as design, cost, management, and safety issues. Fundamentally, it failed in the goal of reducing the cost of space access. Space Shuttle incremental per-pound launch costs ultimately turned out to be considerably higher than those of expendable launchers. In 2010, the incremental cost per flight of the Space Shuttle was $409 million, or $14,186 per kilogram ($6,435 per pound) to low Earth orbit (LEO). In contrast, the comparable Proton launch vehicle cost was $141 million, or $6,721 per kilogram ($3,049 per pound) to LEO and the Soyuz 2.1 was $55 million, or $6,665 per kilogram ($3,023 per pound), despite these launch vehicles not being reusable.
When all design and maintenance costs are taken into account, the final cost of the Space Shuttle program, averaged over all missions and adjusted for inflation (2008), was estimated to come out to $1.5 billion per launch, or $60,000 per kilogram ($27,000 per pound) to LEO. This should be contrasted with the originally envisioned costs of $260 per kilogram ($118 per pound) of payload in 1972 dollars (approximately $555 per pound adjusting for inflation to 2019).
While the shuttle did serve a purpose servicing satellites and space stations in orbit, it failed at its original goal of achieving routine, reliable access to space, partly due to multi-year interruptions in launches following Shuttle failures. It was never as economical as expendable rockets for the task of launching satellites. NASA budget pressures partly caused by the chronically high NASA Space Shuttle program costs have eliminated NASA crewed space flight beyond low earth orbit since Apollo, and severely curtailed use of uncrewed probes. NASA's promotion of and reliance on the Shuttle slowed domestic commercial expendable launch vehicle (ELV) programs until after the 1986 Challenger disaster.
Two out of the five spacecraft were destroyed in accidents, killing 14 astronauts, the largest loss of life in space flight.