More than seven in 10 Americans say the space shuttle program is worth the risk in human life and should be continued, new polls say.

A CNN-Time poll out this weekend found that 71 percent said the shuttle program is worth the risk to the astronauts; a CBS News poll found that three-fourths of Americans said the shuttle should be continued; and in a poll by The Orlando Sentinel, three-fourths said the shuttle program was somewhat or very important to the nation’s future.

A majority of people also say the shuttle program contributes to the nation’s sense of pride and patriotism, and about a third think it contributes a lot to science, the CBS poll found.

Americans seemed relatively satisfied with the level now being spent by the government and were evenly split on whether the government should spend the billions of dollars needed to build a replacement shuttle, the polls suggested.

The CBS poll of 831 adults was taken Wednesday and Thursday. The CNN-Time poll of 1,003 adults was taken Thursday. The Sentinel poll of 1,000 adults was taken Tuesday through Thursday. The polls had error margins of plus or minus 3 percentage points.