Today is perhaps the biggest day for the Vision for Space Exploration since its unveiling last January: NASA is set to release its Exploration Systems Architecture Study (ESAS) with new details about how the agency plans to return humans to the Moon. Even without the details released, there are signs some members of Congress are skeptical about the prospects of the new plan: Reuters quotes Rep. Bart Gordon, ranking member of the House Science Committee, who said that winning approval for the plan “is going to be heavy lifting in the current environment, and it’s clear that strong presidential leadership will be needed.”
So even if that presidential leadership is there today, what happens in 2009 under a new administration? In an article in The Space Review, Daniel Hardin addresses the issue of the sustainability of the VSE. He calls for accelerating the plan, including a “phased retirement” of the shuttle fleet, such that by 2009 the shuttle is too close to retirement to extend the program, and the CEV nearly complete.
All right, Griffin’s plan does specify a separate Lunar Surface Access Module. Because of the large mass of the new vehicles, two launches will have to rendezvous in LEO to accomplish one lunar mission:
This is from AviationWeek/AviationNow:
Griffin’s Moon Plan Looks Like Apollo
09/18/2005 09:22:29 PM
Edited by David Bond
BACK TO THE PAST
… Griffin will unveil a tightly-focused program that aims to return humans to the Moon as early as summer 2018, basically using a replay of the Apollo approach of the 1960s, with updated electronics.
A 4-6 person Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) that looks like a bigger version of the ballistic Apollo Command Module capsule would dock with a Lunar Surface Access Module (LSAM) and an upper stage in Earth orbit for transit to the Moon. A larger version of the Apollo Lunar Module, the LSAM would sustain a crew of four during surface stays of less than 90 days and, in unpiloted mode, could pre-position about 20 tons of cargo at the lunar South Pole for an eventual base.
In one of the Griffin plan’s few new-technology elements transferable to Mars exploration, the liquid-propellant LSAM ascent rocket would be fueled with methane that could be extracted from Mars’ atmosphere. As early as the first lunar return mission, the crew would experiment with in-situ resource utilization by extracting oxygen from the lunar regolith.
Launch would come on the shuttle-derived Crew Launch Vehicles Griffin has previously described, with the heavy-lift version carrying 125 metric tons. Rewriting the exploration-hardware development plans drafted under his predecessor, Griffin will exert tighter control over hardware design, leaving much less to the imagination of the contractors and perhaps building the new vehicles in NASA facilities. ….
…
From space.com:
An Earth-returning CEV would toss off its reentry shield after its fiery plunge. A parachute system would deploy, followed by a set of airbags to cushion the craft’s touchdown on land, somewhere in the American West, Geveden said
…
///
They’ll land at Edwards. There will be landing gear under the jettisonable heat shield. Not that I expect this plan to acutally happen — DD
Predictably, the public has little appetite for this at the moment according to a CNN poll.
At the time writing it’s 37% for, 63% against.
It’d be interesting to see how Katrina changed the Shuttle poll numbers…
Given that the Griffin VSE is already a complete overhaul of the O’Keefe VSE, people are right to wonder what will happen in 2009. Unless Griffin keeps his job, it will very likely be the same picture frame and the same title, but with yet another unfinished painting inside.
In light on that CNN poll and in terms of US public support, Sputnik and Gargarin were the two best things that ever happened to the American space program. But today, China is going way too slow to be an immediate challenge (even if the tortoise / hare metaphor is unsettling) and Russia is dead flat broke.
No one to race against. Maybe some Yanks need to invent (fund) a foreign competitor for the American people to race against.
In light on that CNN poll and in terms of US public support, Sputnik and Gargarin were the two best things that ever happened to the American space program.
Only if you don’t believe that Apollo was a disaster for the space program, in terms of long-term progress.
>.Only if you don’t believe that Apollo was a disaster for the space program, in terms of long-term progress.
I don’t accept that, and I won’t until a realistic alternative produces results. I.e., until someone actually makes money by putting and sustaining people in LEO and by operating exploratory missions to the Moon and Mars. Talking and Powerpoint slides are all we’ve got so far. (Besides, what would have happened in the absence of Apollo? Not “could’ve” but “would’ve”.)
Someone will figure out how to make money putting people in LEO (probably crewing ISS as long as the poor thing is there); I’m skeptical that money will be made sustaining paying passengers in LEO; and don’t think there’s money to be made running missions to the Moon and Mars.
Get the costs down so we can move something as big as a 747 from LEO to the lunar surface and back, over and over, for the same money it takes to fly a 747 from JFK to Heathrow and the rules will change.
Greg, I agree with you. We’ve already entered the design and re-design cycle that ruined the Space Station project. The current design will last exactly as long as Griffin does, then it will be somebody elses turn to play with the PowerPoints.
In spite of my concern with many of his designs, I hope Mr. Griffin last a long time. The timing is awful and I suspect that there is a hard political road ahead of Mr. Griffin.
As for the plan itself, I’ll wait until I’ve read it for detailed comment. One thing I like is that it appears to try to get people and hardware on the moon fast, which I think is critical to political and technical sustainability.
I found it interesting that Griffin focused on the fact that the CEV/CLV program will be done within the existing NASA manned-space budget line (with increases from inflation) so as mute the criticism that the VSE won’t impact the rest of NASA’s programs. What we really get is a transportation architecture to get to the moon with no budget identified or specific program vision (at least publicly) to actually create the destination infrastructure. Griffin’s response was that he hoped the science/international/somebody-else community will come up with that part of the plan. This is just pure politics to sell the program without revealing the true overall costs of the vision to go to the moon and do something there.
GuessWho, I don’t necessarily see that as a fault. To survive politically, especially post-Katrina, the plan has to stay within current budgets. That is because budget increases are politically improbably in the extreme, and it reduces the number and passion of its enemies.
What we need first in transportation to the moon and a few initial trips to test it out and to learn more about living off the land. Once all that is developed and in place, you can worry about the base.
The VSE is different from Apollo: it is not a single project that you can budget out all at once. Exploring and settling Earth’s moon is a project that will last a very long time, probably thousands of years. There is nothing wrong with doing it increment by increment as you can afford it.
What I’ve read about Mr. Griffin’s plan, while it costs more per unit achievement than I think it needs to, suggests that it does get early results (people on the moon, science, resource experiments) while setting the stage for the next step. In today’s political environment, that is exactly what we need and the best we can hope for.
I wish him luck.
— Donald
Just for everyones information, the CNN poll was an internet poll and has no scientific basis. Polls done properly show widespread support for the VSE.
Also, I agree that Rand is wrong the Apollo was a “disaster.” That it ended and was replaced by the shuttle program was a disaster.
One thing I like is that it appears to try to get people and hardware on the moon fast
Thirteen years? What do you call slow?
Well, given that nobody appears willing to make hard choices regarding the Shuttle, that does appear to be “fast.” It’s only three years after the Shuttle project frees up the money [grin!].
And, since we’ve inserted new launchers and other development that I consider unnecessary first, what do you expect?
— Donald
Donald, why do you consider new launchers “unnecessary”? The Shuttle isn’t up to it, and neither is anyhing else we’re flying now. Don’t tell me the prvate sector will save the day, ’cause they haven’t flown squat yet.
Choices, “hard” or otherwise, about Shuttle’s lifespan are political decisions, not cost decisons or engineering decisions. If you want to whine at someone about avoiding hard choices, forget Griffin and look to his boss.
Billg, I, of all people on this list, do look to the boss!
If I’d been managing this, I would have packed the same way I do for a backpacking expedition. If it doesn’t fit, it doesn’t go.
NASA’s marching orders would have been: I don’t care what it takes, make the lunar spacecraft fit onto two EELVs, with a third for the crew and supplies and a fourth for the fuel. If that means you take a crew of two, so be it. If that means you put your solar pannels and habitat on the surface before you send a crew, that’s the way it’s got to be. If that means one meal a day, get used to it. Just like backpacking, you’ve got to live within what you can lift, no matter what that means about your standard of living.
These new launch vehicles are nice to have luxuries. Especially after Katrina, the VSE, in the beginning, cannot afford them. Once we’ve placed something to go to with the vehicles we’ve got, we can optimize the transportation to get there.
— Donald
I have to agree with Donald on this one. NASA has been trying for years, under various titles, to develop a next-generation launch vehicle and MSFC has been horrendously inept at doing so. And yet Griffin insists on giving them yet another chance to waste several billions of dollars. Make the prgram fit on existing EELVs, do what it takes to man-rate them to a reasonable level and focus the rest of the program on developing the destination infrastructure that can sustain an initial long-term presence on the moon.
Having looked at the plan in more detail, except for the launch vehicle selection, I like this plan’s extreme conseratism. It doesn’t try to take too big a step. It uses incremental improvements in existing hardware (not just technology!). It allows slow and steady improvement based on lessons learned through actual experience. (I suspect we’ll make a lot faster progress that way than we will attempting all-new quantum leaps in capabilities . . . and never getting them off the ground.)
A couple of detailed comments:
I like the use of methane and the “why” of it.
Even given the launch vehicle decision that was made, I’m a little uncomfortable with the use of SSMEs. These are terribly expensive engines. Once you’ve run through the stockpile after the Shuttle is retired, we’re really going to build these for single flights?
— Donald
Mr. Daniel Handlin’s article is interesting, but I have a little more faith in the durability of the human space program than he does. I think one important lesson of the Space Station fiasco and of two Shuttle losses is that American support of human spaceflight is very persistant. To paraphrase David Stockman (talking about Amtrak), if they couldn’t kill the Space Station, they can’t kill anything. The American frontier mythology, and a generation of leaders who grew up reading (or at least culturally exposed to) science fiction will ensure that human spaceflight survives in one form or another.
Mr. Handlin’s comment at the beginning of his article that the VSE has stayed below the political and public radar is probably an entirely good thing. You can keep your head down and get the job done, or you can stick your head up and get it shot off. (I’m afraid that the timing of this anouncement, right after Katrina, falls into the latter class.) Until they’re actually ready to fly something, the VSE will probably do best to keep its head down and survive.
— Donald
These are terribly expensive engines. Once you’ve run through the stockpile after the Shuttle is retired, we’re really going to build these for single flights?
In the context of the total program costs, SSMEs are the least of the problem. They can probably be built for thirty or forty million each (assuming that Rocketdyne stays in business). That’s probably less than ten percent of a total per-flight cost, even ignoring the amortization of development.
Thanks, Randy, that makes me feel a little better.
— Donald
However, Randy, your link quantifies what is probably my biggist concern:
“and the Crew Launch Vehicle another $4.5 billion. The heavy-lift launcher, which would be capable of lofting 125 metric tons of payload, is expected to cost more than $5 billion but less than $10 billion to develop,”
There you have it, a minimum of $9.5 billion on launch vehicles.
— Donald
I don’t understand why they didn’t just go to a clean sheet design. I would have gone to a shuttle-c as an interim and followed up with a clean sheet. I generally focus on the function of my designs. I’m not really into monuments. At least their current cargo launcher design doesn’t have any serious aerodynamic problems.
Thanks, Randy, that makes me feel a little better.
Glad to hear it, but I’m not Randy (though I’m occasionally horny…).
Oops, Rand, my apologies.
— Donald
>> make the lunar spacecraft fit onto two EELVs…
Why? I assume you mean the EELV’s that have flown to date, not the EELV’s that are promises for later.
Basing a minimal lunar program on existing EELV’s seems fated to be a more literal duplication of Apollo than VSE is miscontrued to be. People, including some who ought to know better, keep harping on VSE architecture as a throwback to Apollo because it uses a capsule that sits on top of a stack. Well, my car has the engine in front, two seats, 4 tires and an internal combustion engine, just like the Ford my father drove across country in the early 1930’s. But my car is no more a throwback to a 1930 Ford than VSE is to Apollo. Both incorporate technological progress into a vehicle framework that will remain standard as long as we drive wheeled vehicles or put people into space using rockets and have to return them to Earth at orbital speeds or greater.
Unless the numbers of lanches multiplied, a minimal EELV program would put two people on the Moon for a short time. The VSE heavy lifter can put 21 tons on the lunar surface when used for cargo. We’ll need to do that if we actally do intend to base people there for long duration missions. (If I read NASA’s site correctly, the LSAM by itself can carry enough to support a crew of 4 for 90 days.) Sure, we could use existing EELV’s to put 21 tons there, too, but at the cost and increased risk of more launchs.
Griffin’s VSE seems to me to be a rather conservative approach to the problems Bush handed him: Put people back on the Moon, use the Moon as a learning tool to figure out how to put people on Mars (meaning long-duration missions), keep me from reneging on our ISS deal, and do it all while keeping NASA’s budget stable.
Dfens, that is one of the reasons I advocated an EELV solution. It buys you time to develop a clean-sheet HLV, possibly with commercial money. The current plan costs more up front, takes longer, and ties the VSE to the expensive Shuttle infrastructure for the foreseeable future.
I just watched NaSA’s promotional video on this. Donald’s not wrong about extreme technological conservatism!
It was nearly pointless re-animating most of that sequence when they could have used the actual Apollo footage. Most of the scenes and hardware in there I recognized from old documentaries.
If NaSA is to become a legacy technology agency (and perhaps this is just as well) then more than ever we must depend on the military to support a cutting edge in space technology. Certainly, I don’t want to spend my career reinventing the wheel in ever more incremental ways.
It is, indeed, a conservative plan, but that is exactly what it should be. Getting to the moon and surviving there is risk enough, without adding new technology to the mix.
New technology should be developed by a separate division of NASA (or elsewhere) and slowly incorporated into the VSE architecture over time.
All the new technology in the world cannot get you experience in what the military calls operations, and that is what we need now. We’ve spent the last thirty years demonstrating that new technology in isolation is useless, at best, and by consuming money it can be actively harmful. Operations and new technology for the moon and Mars should evolve hand-in-hand, with one feeding information to the other — but to do that you have to fly to the moon and Mars.
— Donald
…my apologies.
No problem, Donald, it’s a common (albeit annoying) mistake.
>>It is, indeed, a conservative plan, but that is exactly what it should be.
Couldn’t agree more. There is no reason to pay to develop new technology when existing tech can get the job done.
Most of the Monday morning quarterbacking surrounding VSE smacks of the kibitizing and grumbling that happens almost every time the Pentagon decides it needs a new weapon system. People seize it as an opportunity to rant about previous slights, real or imagined, push their favorite wonder tools, and just generally pontificate.
If there’s better way to get to the Moon and Mars, and someone can make money at it, then sooner or later, the private sector will do it.
And, for those who assert that Griffin’s plan doesn’t encompass going to Mars, consider this: One primary mission of the heavy-lifter is to put the pieces of a 500-ton Mars mission in LEO. Since it seems apparent that NASA won’t be going to Mars for at least 25-30 years, isn’t it a bit premature to be designing the actual vehicles that will make the trip? Having the booster that can lift the pieces and a CEV that could form the basis of an eventual Mars mission spacecraft seems like a reasonable start to me. (Frankly, I’d be very surprised if the CEV used in a Mars mission bears more than a physical resemblance to today’s CEV.)
billg: “Most of the Monday morning quarterbacking surrounding VSE smacks of the kibitizing and grumbling that happens almost every time the Pentagon decides it needs a new weapon system. People seize it as an opportunity to rant about previous slights, real or imagined, push their favorite wonder tools, and just generally pontificate.”
I do agree. I fear that the launch vehicle choice was wrong, but this is the plan we have, I do think it will work technically and it may work politically, and therefore it has my full support.
I think the use of methane fuel, and the early HLV (although I opposed that decision) are the interesting aspects of this plan. Mr. Griffin seems to be trying to ride Mars development onto the lunar plan, possibly so that the step from lunar base to Mars missions is small at the time that step is taken, maybe sooner in Mr. Griffin’s mind than ours.
— Donald
There is no reason to pay to develop new technology when existing tech can get the job done.
It doesn’t “get the job done” for a price that any sane person (or even general American taxpayer, if they knew what it cost), other than a NASA fanboy, would accept.
And “new technology” is not needed. What’s needed is existing technology made into new, low-cost launch systems.
Rand, this is no low-cost plan, either. It spends a lot of money developing launch vehicles that are not really new — the plan’s weakest point, I think. Again, with my hiking analogy above, I’d prefer that they attacked the problem from the mass end of things, rather than the launch vehicle end. If we can reduce the mass needed to go to the moon, then any future HLV would be that much more effective.
— Donald
This “Apollo on steroids,” as Mike Griffen put it, is a debacle in the waiting. I felt this vision was doomed from the start, when the president announced his intention to focus NASA assets on sending humans to the Moon with absolutely no elequence or inspiration whatsoever.
The budget for this massive Cold War-era boondoggle will not be met, and we see this already as we struggle to deal with disaster relief and the fool war in Iraq.
The president should have done the following regarding thse matters, and both would ultimately have cost Americans a lot less:
1. Not invade Iraq with paltry intelligence.
2. Announce a space economic development plan that has at its core a strategy of investment – a prescriptive policy designed to initiate, encourage, and sustain a unified approach to utilizing space. Enough of these government-funded, badly managed, visionless initiatives!
People seem to be quite willing to accept a half-trillion dollar Pentagon and $1 billion airplanes. Why would they look askance at a NASA budget of under $20 billion?
Meanwhile, I’d rather be called a NASA fanboy than a vaporware fanboy. I don’t doubt that the way NASA does business is more expensive than it might otherwise be; the same can be said of every other part of the government. (And, it isn’t all government’s fault. People boost the price when the taxpayers foot the bill.)
But, frankly, I’m a lot more interested in seeing people in space — however funded and whatever the cost — than I am in reforming government procurement and contracting. If the private sector can do it cheaper and still make money, it will. So far, it hasn’t. Where’s the private sector VSE? Who in the private sector is going to put people on the Moon anytime soon? Or, ever?
Maybe if the alt.space crowd took all those PowerPoint slides, all the aviation fuel spent flying to conferences and combined it with the hot air generated there and in their little corner of the blogosphere, they’d get a head start on propellant reserves.
Proof is in the pudding.
… It allows slow and steady improvement based on lessons learned through actual experience. …
The actual experience of the successful Apollo program showed that payload weight growth had to be strictly constrained. Lightness was emphasized in designing the Apollo crew module, service module, and Lunar exploration vehicle set.
The Apollo designers did NOT want two Saturn V launches to have to rendezvous in LEO in order to accomplish one manned lunar landing.
Mickey Mouse Griffin’s design proposals disregard these Apollo precepts, which were proved by lunar flight experience.
Never mind, in spring 2009 there’ll be a new President and a new NASA boss — even if a Republican is elected — and a new Vision and
new Power Point shows.
What we need first in transportation to the moon and a few initial trips to test it out and to learn more about living off the land.
Live off the lunar land? Show me where Griffin’s NASA has set that as a goal. Don’t confuse your sci-fi fantasies with reality.
Once all that is developed and in place, you can worry about the base.
Once lunar agriculture is sufficiently developed to support a number of humans, we can “worry” about a base on the Moon? Contradictory.
The VSE is different from Apollo: it is not a single project that you can budget out all at once.
In other words, you want to make legitimate NASA cost accounting impossible.
Exploring and settling Earth’s moon is a project that will last a very long time, probably thousands of years.
I’m excited.
People seem to be quite willing to accept a half-trillion dollar Pentagon and $1 billion airplanes.
What “billion-dollar airplanes”? Do you have an example of one?
And what deluded people are willing to accept that? Particularly when the national defense isn’t at stake?
People seem to be quite willing to accept a half-trillion dollar Pentagon and $1 billion airplanes. Why would they look askance at a NASA budget of under $20 billion?
Why not give the DoD $20B/year to do the Moon project?
The DoD is more competent than NASA.
>>1. Not invade Iraq…
I’ve no reason to disagree.
Bush’s lapdogs want us to believe that the cost of Katrina recovery is the threat to NASA’s VSE budget. That’s simply chutzpah and hoodwinkery. Bush had spent more wasted money than any other President long before Katrina happened.
>>2. Announce a space economic development plan that has at its core a strategy of investment…
That only works if the private sector can profitably do what you want done. If it isn’t inherently profitable, the only alternative is to fake it with government transfers subsidizing a handful of huge corporations. If it is inherently profitable, the private sector will do it anyway, with or without government prodding or incentives.
I don’t think exploration will ever be profitable. Supporting exploration is, and will be, profitable. I very much doubt the private sector will ever do much exploring.
What “billion-dollar airplanes”? Do you have an example of one?
I should add, do you have an example of one that people are willing (let alone happy) to throw away after a single mission?
When it comes to objections related to NASA budgets, the reason is simple. A defense budget, even when massively wasted, is easy to defend (pardon the pun) because it is essential to national security.
Whatever space advocates may think, populating space with humans and machines is not a matter of national security – we can defend our country using alternative means from services provided by space assets, and NASA’s mission could be abandoned entirely without much adverse effect on the nation’s prosperity. Thus, pitching $20 billion per year to send people to the Moon, without really explaining to the American people why it’s important to do so, well, that’s a tough one to defend.
I believe Americans would support such funding, and probably more, if they knew their tax money was going into an investment. The vision pitched for the past two years has little in the way of investment strategy; most folks feel this is yet another Apollo program staffed by the nation’s elite, and the vast majority of us anxious Americans will watch from the sidelines.
That, by the way, was not how the country grew in the 19th and 20th centuries. Government played an important supporting role in our country’s growth, nothing more. Private enterprise, religious zeal, and generally seeking a better way of life were the primary sustaining forces required to prop up the fledgling republic.
Understand that an “economic development plan for space” is merely a broadly-termed title for what would likely be a very complex process involving the public, private, and communal sectors.
Obviously, if money can’t be made and jobs are not at stake, space won’t be attractive. But there are very proven ways to make nasty things look very attractive.
An obvious one is this: hundreds of years ago, nomads travelled by the tens of thousands across the Arabian deserts not knowing that in the 20th century the “black gold” buried deep in the sands would fuel the greatest powers on Earth. We frankly have no concept yet of the things innovative people can do with the undoubtedly bewildering array of resources hidden among the worlds of our solar system.
Rand,
To this day, most exploration in space has been a government-funded effort. On this, we agree. But this does not mean exploration will not be conducted by private enterprise.
Indeed, oil companies have done this for a century. Exploration is worth the price if it is assumed that the money spent on such endeavors will eventually produce results. This cost-benefit analysis, however, sometimes bankrupts a business, and that, I’m sorry to say, is part of the deal.
I suspect that in the future comapnies interested in characterizing, extracting, processing, and selling resources will do a bunch of exploring. This benefits the company, of course, but it also benefits science. A whole lot of geological knowledge, and more, has resulted from the exploratory work of companies interested in utilizing the Earth’s resources.
Phil: I fundamentally disagree with you here. Yes, the government helped with the settlement of the West, but that could not happen until there were bases first. In my favorite example, the railroads were not built by government and private organization until a hundred years after San Francisco was formed at great expense as a military base (by a different country, yet). It is too early the “investment,” as you describe it. You need something to invest in first. In the same way that the existance of the Space Station is forcing development of better transportation (after all, the forerunner of the CTV got started as a way to get crews from the Space Station in an emergency, and the project itself got started after Collumbia as a way to support two-way crew transport absent the Shuttle; likewise, the Station is keeping the Soyuz in business today). The existance of a lunar base, requiring supply, will lead to your investment. But the lesson of history is that the reason must be there before the investment. No one will fund a railway to nowhere; but build the Presidio, find silver, and all of a sudden everyone is coming out of the woodwork to fund that railroad. To paraphrase you, we won’t find that “hidden silver” in the Solar System until we get out there, so we’d better do that ASAP. That is why the VSE, broadly defined, is the correct strategy.
Rand, I believe the B2 cost well over a billion dollars a copy, though I could be wrong.
Regarding “living off the land,” I believe the first lunar mission in Mr. Griffin’s plan is to practice separating oxygen from lunar soil. Presumably, this is to breathe, mixed with imported hydrogen to drink and wash in, and mixed with imported methane to burn on the in-bound trip. It’s a start. Ultimately, it could even be exported for use in Earth-orbiting applications and trans-Mars missions, et cetera. Then, there’s the water possibly at the south pole; there’s titanium and certainly glass (silicon) in them thar hills; not to speak of the makings of cement (finely ground sand, of which I don’t think there’s a shortage on the moon). Living off the land doesn’t mean making everything you need. It means making your supply line as small as possible, and ultimately exporting enough to pay for what you need to import.
If we’re not going to dream “sci-fi fantasies,” why are we doing this at all?
David: I too am worried that they’re proposing to spend some $10 billion on new launch vehicles and _still_ require assembly in orbit. If we’re going to spend that much on launchers, it seems to me that we should be able to avoid any assembly. Conversely, if we are going to do assembly, what’s wrong with foregoing, say, $8 billion in development costs and using the EELVs?
— Donald
OK, I think we need some perspective here:
The deltaV for the Moon is 13.4 km/s, as opposed to about 9.6 km/s for LEO. The rocket equation says that this decreases the payload fraction exponentially (more or less). So, you are expending 99.something% of the mass you launch before you get to the useful stuff, putting the cost per kg to the Moon at around $80,000/kg.
i.e. three cans of Pepsi on the Moon will cost you $80,000. Private development of spacecraft will undoubtedly lower this number as Rand suggests, but to pretend new technology will not ultimately be needed is a distortion of the wider picture for near-term ends.
Billg thinks that cars have come a long way since 1930, and similarly that VSE will bear little relation ‘under the hood’ to Apollo. Yes, many years of private development have given us comfortable, reliable computer-controlled cars. BUT, the core physics (internal combustion engine propulsion) that drives these things is still the same as it was nearly a century ago, and correspondingly the economics and logistics of car travel has changed little.
Consider this: The Ford Model T achieved 25-30 miles per gallon – better than the mileage most people reading this post get. Production on a massive scale reduced the cost by thirty times, from ~$90,000 to ~$3,000 in inflation-adjusted 2005 dollars. If we were to produce several million chemical rockets per year, might we expect a similar cost reduction, from $80,000/kg to $3,000/kg?
Great, I might be able to afford a few more cans of Pepsi that way. If most people reading this post ever want to visit the Moon, they must do so on a mass-produced vehicle for which a great deal more than 1% payload pays for the rest of the launch mass. Perhaps then I can bring three cans of Pepsi to the Moon for about $100, and the one-way ticket price will be ~$15,000 — that is within the realm of possibility.
What “billion-dollar airplanes”? Do you have an example of one?
Stealth Bombers cost a billion dollars apiece.
Indeed, oil companies have done this for a century. Exploration is worth the price if it is assumed that the money spent on such endeavors will eventually produce results. This cost-benefit analysis, however, sometimes bankrupts a business, and that, I’m sorry to say, is part of the deal.
This is the drill for oil in the asteroid belt pitch?
… That, by the way, was not how the country grew in the 19th and 20th centuries. Government played an important supporting role in our country’s growth, nothing more. ,,,.
The settlers advancing westward and the railroad companies depended heavily on the US Army to clear the aborginal inhabitants out of the way.
Before the entire US could be modernized, industrialized and “grown,” there was also this little matter of slavery and the Civil War to be, uh, managed. The US military played more than a supporting role in that obscure central government versus states’ rights controversy.
An Earth-returning CEV would toss off its reentry shield after its fiery plunge.
I infer all sorts of expensive development from that “toss off its reentry shield” sentence.
Doesn’t seem very conservative. Doesn’t seem like Apollo.
“Government played an important supporting role in our country’s growth, nothing more.”
And this gets to my issues with how the VSE is implemented. As noted in the VSE under Goals and Objectives, “The fundamental goal of this vision is to advance U.S. scientific, security, and economic interests. through a robust space exploration program”.
NASA could be playing a supporting role in creating another Erie Canal that would enable all kinds of business opportunities that just weren’t available beforehand, which in the case of the Erie Canal were often due to travel limitations from western upstate NY. To this day the Erie canal is an enabler for commerce along its banks, often nowadays as support for cyclists. (Yes, I know, it was a mix of public & private ventures, but that’s also kind of the point)
The HLLV (whatever its final form) will not enable commerce, in part (but not solely) due to the fact that there is no cabal of insurers who can raise a risk pool big enough for 100 mt of commercial payloads. We are, however, getting comfortable with launching two commercial sats at the same time. There are a variety of existing launchers in the 20 mt to ISS class, such as Ariane and Proton, two that are effectively online but need a couple shakedown cruises, and one that is a scaled up Falcon.
There are a number of innovative applications in the 20 mt ton payload range right around the corner: ATV, Bigelow’s balloons, CXV, Klipper, and others. –In theory– the ISS modules could be lofted by some other means, probably through the use of some kind of internal/external cradle that emulates the shuttle’s cargo bay and is wrapped in a nice fairing. Don’t tell me there aren’t engineers who would drool over the opportunity to work on a project like that. Mass produce a Universal Docking Node and you’re in the space transport business.
There are about 100 satellites in current commercial service which will be reaching the ends of their service lives in the next 5-10 years. These types of satellite are tending to be larger in scale (though in some particular niches there is some downsizing), and guess who has a 5-meter fairing payload processing facility set up? Well that would be SpaceHab. Boeing’s proclaimed that the Delta-IV can handle 5m payloads. We’ve invested in the architecture. There is going to be some demand for the EELVs, NASA’s use of them as well would sure help bring down the cost for everyone. NASA would also be able to preposition 100s of tonnes of materiel in space by the time and cost of getting this HLLV thing going.
And what exactly is it we’re buying? Where is the Moonbase facility? Is anything going to be left behind but descent stages and garbage? We’re spending $104Bn for what exactly now?
Ah yes, some reusable capsules, Moon rocks, as yet to be determined science, and the real crux of the matter, the key elements for a Mars trip.
I am so not sold on this project. If Mr. O’Keefe were giving me these numbers I might put some credence in them, but I don’t think he whipped the agency into good enough shape for me to really have confidence in these numbers. Given how covert all of the preparations have been I think the folks over at the unscientific CNN poll had good reason to be skeptical.
Don’t get me wrong, I know that preparing numbers is a painful exercise in futility (I do work in a bank, after all), and I’m sure that every effort was made to try to make them accurate. Doesn’t mean I have to believe them, though.
NASA is pursuing NASA’s goals, whether or not that is to the benefit of the commonweal. This plan does not meet the goals of the VSE, and as a taxpayer I’m concerned, and as a space advocate I bewail the incredible lost opportunity that now faces us in the form of a chance to build a permanent (i.e. sustained and all the transit pieces aren’t thrown away) infrastructure that let’s us not just go to the Moon, or Mars, but also NEOs, GEO, L-4 & 5, L-1, HEO, MEO, LEO, SEL-1 & 2 and all the other great destinations in space so that American business can venture forth and unlock the value of the heavens for us poor land-bound souls.
Stealth Bombers cost a billion dollars apiece.
Without doing any research to verify that number, did they cost a billion dollars per mission? That would be a third or a quarter what NASA is planning.
David – “Doesn’t seem very conservative. Doesn’t seem like Apollo.”
It also doesn’t seem very smart. It amazes me how much money we will spend to keep those poor astronauts from getting their feet wet. Of course, if they want to stay dry, they could do a slow crash into the prairies of middle America like the Russians do with their reentry vehicles. Energy absorbers in the seat mountings keep the g loads tolerable. No glory in a crash landing too, I suppose.
By the way, when is NASA supposed to start all of this? Are they proposing to wait until they retire the shuttle in 2010 and then start? If that’s the case, this is a pipe dream. It will be gone with Bush.
If they would have gone with shuttle-c, they could have been done in 3 to 5 years, not much more time than it will take to get shuttle flying again. Then they’d have a success to point to for a change (or not). Now we are supposed to buy this pipe dream and wait at least a decade and a half to see any result. We are going to do that because we just love to spend money on NASA?
Kevin is right, this is going nowhere. It’s not going to make any significant improvement in the way we go to space. Rockets have inherently small payload fractions. They aren’t as bad as that dumb ass single stage to orbit junk, but bad enough to where we recognized in the Apollo days these throw away boosters were no long term answer.
That’s what kills me with this turkey. It will likely take 20 years to build and then we’ll be stuck with it for another 40. It would have been better to do a shuttle-c and then start developing an air breathing, fly-back first stage vehicle. But noooo. This way we have a monument to Bush and Griffin that will last exactly as long as the US space program.
Donald,
Your example is a good one, and I think we actually agree. Exploration or space will be largely funded by the government because the commercial sector hasn’t the inclination nor the cache for such a thing. My point was that exploration is not solely a government venture; it can also be a commercial one. These blog entries, like email, often lose the nuances and detail of face-to-face conversation, which I find irritating. Oh well.
We also don’t necessarily need a base funded by the government, but that scenario is probably the best one. Indeed, I would say that my space economic development plan would involve an exploration base on the Moon, probably the far side of the Moon. Staff the base with 20 or so people, then find a way to enable commercial support of this endeavor. For example, these folks will need food – hire a company. They will need doctors – hire them. They will need plants and recreation and lodging – buy them.
Think McMurdo or Amundson-Scott and you get the picture. These scientific bases are funded by the government and non-profits, but also partially serviced through commercial ventures. I actually applied to a company that provides a host of services to the South Pole (back when I was trying anything to get out of Minot AFB).
Whatever we say here or anywhere else, we probably all agree that this business of exploring, pioneering, and settling space will not be easy to figure out, and the nature of how this will unfold is impossible to predict. That it will occur at all I think is becoming a foregone conclusion for growing numbers of average citizens. And that is more critical than a handfull of space geeks and visionless politicians…
“…because the commercial sector hasn’t the inclination…”
Oh, they have the inclination. They just aren’t allowed to play.
It would be wonderful if someone could ascertain why viable, alternate, ideas for VSE launch vehicles are not allowed to see the light of day. Boeing and LM were forced to pull their papers at the recent Space 2005 conference. Sounds reminiscent of the first Exploration Conference in Orlando: EELV papers need not submit, USG employees associated with the EELVs will not ask questions of the SDV presenters, etc.
“…If Mr. O’Keefe were giving me these numbers I might put some credence in them…”
I agree. Does anyone really expect this development to stay within the $104B? The thing that impressed me most about the O’Keefe/ Steidle team was that it appeared to be generating a believable, sustainable, business plan. Griffin & Co. seem hellbent on the same activities that made Apollo, shuttle, and ISS unsustainable and that has kept us in LEO for thirty years.
My bet is $200B. If it survives. And I pray it doesn’t.
> It also doesn’t seem very smart. It amazes me how much money we will
> spend to keep those poor astronauts from getting their feet wet.
What makes you think that’s the reason? A more likely explantion is that the Navy doesn’t want to pull one of their carrier battle groups out of the Arabian Gulf whenever NASA wants to launch a Constellation capsule.
> Of course, if they want to stay dry, they could do a slow crash
> into the prairies of middle America like the Russians do with their
> reentry vehicles.
The Russians don’t come down in middle America. They come down in the steppes, which are virtually uninhabited. Americans would likely object to a capsule coming down in Omaha or Kansas City.
> Energy absorbers in the seat mountings keep the g loads tolerable. No
> glory in a crash landing too, I suppose.
I’m not sure what you’re going on about, but that’s exactly what NASA is planning.
> If they would have gone with shuttle-c, they could have been done in 3 to
> 5 years, not much more time than it will take to get shuttle flying again.
They are going with a variant of Shuttle-C. However, they don’t have a spare $10 billion in the next 3-5 years. So, they’re taking the money they have and building the CEV capsule first.
> Then they’d have a success to point to for a change (or not).
What success? They would have a big expensive rocket and nothing launch on it. Why would anyone consider that a success?
> The deltaV for the Moon is 13.4 km/s, as opposed to about 9.6 km/s for
> LEO. The rocket equation says that this decreases the payload fraction
> exponentially (more or less). So, you are expending 99.something% of the
> mass you launch before you get to the useful stuff, putting the cost per kg
> to the Moon at around $80,000/kg.
The rocket equation doesn’t require expending anything but propellant, which doesn’t cost anything close to $80,000/kg. Not even $8/kg.
> If we were to produce several million chemical rockets per year, might we
> expect a similar cost reduction, from $80,000/kg to $3,000/kg?
> Great, I might be able to afford a few more cans of Pepsi that way. If
> most people reading this post ever want to visit the Moon, they must
> do so on a mass-produced vehicle for which a great deal more than 1%
> payload pays for the rest of the launch mass.
Most reasonable rocket propellant combinations cost less than 50 cents a pound. If you weigh 200 pounds, then 100 times your weight in rocket propellant will cost less than $10,000. I’m sure most people reading this post could afford much more than that, especially if it was a once-in-a-lifetime expenditure.
As for mass production, you’re optimizing for the wrong variable. The desired end product is not rockets but trips; that is what you want to maximize. If a Model-T were thrown away after one trip, it would have been prohibitively expensive, no matter how many were produced.
> Perhaps then I can bring three cans of Pepsi to the Moon for about $100,
> and the one-way ticket price will be ~$15,000 — that is within the realm
> of possibility.
It’s also within the realm of possibility for a vehicle where 1% of the launch mass is payload –all mature transportation systems operate at about 3x fuel cost and 3 x $10,000 = $30,000.
We have a long ways to go before we get to $30,000 tickets, but we won’t get there by obsessing over the horrible $10,000 fuel cost and trying to reduce it by developing some new (and no doubt very expensive) technology. Worrying about fuel costs only pays when they are more than 1/3 of your total cost.
Ed is true to his usual form, choosing to focus on fuel cost as today’s diversionary straw man.
I leave it as an exercise to the reader to figure out why since anyone who has previously debated Ed knows that if you try to explain something he just keeps throwing out strawmen till the thread dies.
David – “Doesn’t seem very conservative. Doesn’t seem like Apollo.”
It also doesn’t seem very smart.
You’re right. It seems exactly like Soyuz, actually.
It amazes me how much money we will spend to keep those poor astronauts from getting their feet wet. Of course, if they want to stay dry, they could do a slow crash into the prairies of middle America like the Russians do with their reentry vehicles.
Make up your mind. Earlier you didn’t think jettisoning the heat shield like Soyuz was smart, and now you’re suggesting we do like Soyuz? I hope you’re being sarcastic…
I suppose you’ll see things differently when you re-read these comments in the daylight. I know that, given some time to reflect on it, I have changed my opinion on a few things. I would imagine the justification for landing the astronauts on firm ground instead of the ocean is to practice for Mars landings where there is no water. So I can live with that part. I have become way too reactionary in my old age.
Kevin, you still read Edward’s posts?
. . .the justification for landing the astronauts on firm ground instead of the ocean is to practice for Mars landings where there is no water. . .
Good point. The ESAS architecture appears to have the objective of “Moon first, Mars capable”
No, I cannot accept the argument that ground landings in a capsule with parachutes and airbags is a fore-runner of future Mars landings. That would require the presence of a pre-positioned launch base architecture and launch vehicle to allow those unfortunate astronauts a means of leaving the planet and returning home plus; a standing army of ground support personnel to retrieve the astronauts (since they will be incable of walking after 6 months in space) and manage the subsequent launch; weather forecasters to let us know when the winds are favorable; and downrange safety gurus to ensure that our one and only Mars base doesn’t get flattened when the launcher fails. I suspect the approach was chosen since it is relatively inexpensive (doesn’t require the shuttle landing and refurb infrastructure) and doesn’t require a carrier or battleship group to fish them out of the ocean and is essentially idiot proof (if the Russians can completely lose flight control and still land safely, seems like a good example of how to avoid killing the crew). Whether or not the capsule is really reusable remains to be seen. I will have to agree on the whole capsule approach though. It always struck me as just a little insane to design a highly complex reusable lifeboat (CRV) when a simple capsule (that you hope to never use and can throw away afterward if you had to use it) would do the job.
> Ed is true to his usual form, choosing to focus on fuel cost as today’s diversionary straw man.
“If you can’t say it with math, it isn’t science, it’s opinion.” You are true to form in responding with insults rather than logic, Kevin.
The idea that we can’t reduce launch costs because of the rocket equation and the mass fraction is the oldest of strawmen.
Anyone who has done basic math knows that rockets are expensive not because of the mass fraction or because we need new technology, but because we throw the expensive hardware away after each flight.
It’s sad that someone who says he’s studying to be a rocket scientist doesn’t know that. It’s sadder stil that you don’t want to learn.
After looking over NASA’s plan for returning to the moon for me there is a lot to like and there is some disappointment. I like the development of the HLV from shuttle components as I believe that should have the shortest, least expensive development track. I’m still not convinced that the CEV on a stick (5 segment SRB) is the right way to go. For one thing the boosters are a notoriously bumpy ride.
I like the idea that we’re not trying to re-invent the wheel. At this phase discoveries should be coming from the exploration not the technology. Development problems and rising costs have killed to many other manned vehicles in the past.
Limited reusability is a good thing. A CEV should be good for UP TO 10 missions. This should keep acquisition costs relatively low. NASA will have to keep an eye on refurbishment costs.
I would have liked to see some sort of infrastructure built in space like a reusable lunar transfer stage, lunar lander or lunar base. I hope these will come very soon after the initial missions to keep the momentum going.
The biggest mistake made during the presentation was the price quote of $100 billon dollars. That seems to be the issue that the news media has focused on. It would have been much better to mention that NASA was going to do this with their present budget. It’s easer to sell the Ronco rotisserie at 5 easy payments of $39.95 then at $200 bucks.
Same with space missions which have now been lumped into the $200B for Katrina rebuilding and $250B for Iraq.
The timetable is worrisome also. The target date for first launch of the CEV should have been early to mid 2009 with a phased shutdown of the shuttle beginning in 2008. That would have made it harder for the next congress and administration to kill it.
Nemo: “It seems exactly like Soyuz, actually.”
And what’s wrong with that? The Soyuz has proved a reliable way of getting people to and from orbit. It has survived Apollo, and is likely to survive the Shuttle. To quote Greg, maybe we should reward success.
— Donald
GuessWho, they’d better come up with some decent explaination for why they’re going to carry those air bags to the Moon and back. You don’t need a carrier to fish a capsule out of the water. Any ship with a decent size loading crane will do that job.
I like the simple capsule idea myself. I don’t see why they need this CEV turkey. They could use the extra weight to start building a permanent facility on the Moon instead of shuttling its very expensive mass (many $80,000 Pepsis) to and from the Moon. I’m telling you, the CEV is large because even as proposed it will be hard to shoe horn those massive astro-egos in there and still get the door closed.
Donald:
I read your comments on the article I wrote. The ISS has survived largely because of its international character introduced by Mr. Goldin in the 1990s to tide it over from Bush. I don’t think that the American public would stand a third Shuttle accident- certainly at the very least it would be the last flight of the Space Shuttle program, as talk is already being heard of standing the STS down as soon as possible. Even if there was a highly accelerated CEV program supported by the 2009 administration, I don’t think it’s realistic to see a launch date before 2011 or 2012 for such a vehicle, so another Shuttle disaster could well lead to a several year standdown of manned US spaceflight even in the ‘best’ case (i.e. fast-track CEV development). Although it should be kept in perspective to the six-year hiatus from 1975-1981.
Secondly, I tend to agree to some extent that it’s good that the VSE has remained below the radar – so far. What we saw yesterday was AP stories with titles like “NASA to spend $100 billion on moon rocket”. That sounds silly to members of the public – “$100 billion? Ridiculous”. Few people, if anyone, seem to understand that it’s already been funded and that the $100 billion is only half of NASA’s budget over the next 13 years or so anyhow. So for the time being it might be good, but as we get closer to an actual lunar landing with such a system- if the next adminstration don’t shut down the heavy-lift SDLV development – I think it will be good to have a base of public support to sustain the program in the long-term. Once real missions start flying I think people will get excited about it. The regular media seem to have no recollection of this plan being introduced by Bush last year, or of how low the price tag is compared to the garbage numbers in the hundreds of billions or trillions they threw out then.
Daniel, I agree with you re. the Space Station’s international character. While it is popular to be “against” internationalism, today, I think Mr. Gore did nothing but good, both to the world and to the Space Station project, by bringing in the Russians, and clearly Russian logistics capabilities are why the Station project is alive now. It’s a lesson we might also learn re. the VSE.
“Once real missions start flying I think people will get excited about it.”
I think that is key, and part of why flying soon is so important. If I am right about the strength of latent political support for human spaceflight, actually having someone flying to the moon will give us something to glom onto and be excited about. It’s part of why I’ve argued so strongly for results first and new launch vehicles second.
— Donald
Why the land landing? Four plausible reasons:
(1) They also want to use the new crew capsule as an ISS lifeboat, and NASA has the attitude that a water landing would be inappropriate for the ISS lifeboat. One reason why is a water landing would delay getting sick or injured ISS crewpersons to hospital. Another reason is that it is felt that an ISS lifeboat should not require Navy or Coast Guard support, if possible.
(2) Water landings are not always safe. Gus Grissom nearly drowned exiting his Mercury capsule, which sank. Just a few years ago, a Soyuz
landed nearly 500 km off target. NASA wants more safety and accuracy than that.
(3) NASA dislikes the comparison of smooth, dignified Shuttle landings and airliner-style crew exits from the Shuttle to old-fashioned, monkeys-in-a-tub capsule landings. I share that subjective bias against capsule landings.
So, NASA wants to make the new capsule land within the property lines at Edwards, in as similar a manner to the Shuttle as possible.
(4) As Bill White said, Dr. Griffin also intends the new crew vehicle to ultimately become the Mars
descent and landing vehicle.
By the way, I suspect that the Russians fear that Muslim terrorists may try to harm Soyuz operations in Kazakhstan, which is only tenuously under control of the Moscow central government. A similar thought might apply to American capsules landing who knows where in mid-America.
Oh, and the Russians also want to build the Klipper lifting body spacecraft and launch from Kourou. If they do that, it will make the Apollo on steroids stuff seem even more old-fashioned.
“You don’t need a carrier to fish a capsule out of the water. Any ship with a decent size loading crane will do that job.”
Which is exactly why a carrier group is needed if you have a water landing. You have to be able to defend your expensive space hardware and its associated advanced technology. Or would you rather than any ship with a decent size loading crane – a North Korean ship for instance – that happened to be in the vicinity would pluck your capsule from the water?
Unfortunately, I think the chances of the Klipper ever actually flying are near zero. Hopefully, this is somewhat lower than the political chances of any of Mr. Griffin’s proposed vehicles.
— Donald
> You don’t need a carrier to fish a capsule out of the water. Any ship with
> a decent size loading crane will do that job.
Watch the tapes of the Apollo splashdowns, or talk to someone who has actually done search and rescue operations at sea. It’s not as easy as you think.
> I like the simple capsule idea myself. I don’t see why they need this CEV
> turkey. They could use the extra weight to start building a permanent
> facility on the Moon
This is the “simple capsule” back-to-Apollo has been asking for: a virtual clone of Apollo CSM. If it isn’t as simple, light, and cheap as fans have been claiming, then fans have only themselves to blame. The weight is pretty much what NASA expected all along. You guys just weren’t paying attention until now.
> I’m telling you, the CEV is large because even as proposed it will be hard
> to shoe horn those massive astro-egos in there and still get the door closed.
Er, yeah. Right. Whatever.
I think that is key, and part of why flying soon is so important.
But 2 zero one 8 is too long to wait.
Dr. Griffin should have announced an earlier date, maybe 2010, even if thought it was unrealistic deep down inside.
2018? Who knows what the technological,economic, and political sitruation will be then? It’s too far ahead to know much.
Nemo: “It seems exactly like Soyuz, actually.”
And what’s wrong with that? The Soyuz has proved a reliable way of getting people to and from orbit.
Its record is no more reliable than the shuttle. 2% accidents, 2% fatalities for both vehicles.
It has survived Apollo, and is likely to survive the Shuttle.
If it does survive the shuttle, it will only be because the Russians fail to develop Kliper. They have widely advertised their desire to retire Soyuz and replace it with Kliper in 2010, the same year the shuttle is to be retired.
Regarding 2018, I fully agree that this is too late. It’s one of the reasons I’ve argued so hard for the EELVs as the only realistic way to do it sooner and stay withing the budget.
— Donald
Think late model Soyuz is a proven proven proven system that is safe safe safe? Read this.
That 2003 Soyuz mission did more than land off course.
Computer Glitch Eyed in Soyuz’s Wild Ride Home
By Marcia Dunn
AP Aerospace Writer
posted: 03:00 pm ET
06 May 2003
STAR CITY, Russia (AP) — A computer error is suspected of sending three spacemen on a wild ride home that was so steep and forceful their tongues rolled back in their mouths and they could hardly breathe.
Then antenna problems blocked their ability to announce a safe arrival, albeit one that was far short of the targeted touchdown site. Even so, the two astronauts and one cosmonaut who returned to Earth Sunday from the international space station were in good spirits Tuesday as they talked about their adventure.
American Donald Pettit, the sickest and weakest upon return, didn’t mind having a few more hours alone with his crewmates after 161 days together in orbit. He had been warned about the “mob scene” and “hustle and bustle” awaiting him in Kazakhstan, what with all the recovery helicopters.
“I was actually relieved to ooze out of the spacecraft and lay on Mother Earth and have a solitude moment in which to get reacquainted,” Pettit said, reflecting on his historic yet harrowing ride. They had landed nearly 300 miles off-course.
All three were crawling on their hands and knees the first hour and a half, said cosmonaut Nikolai Budarin, who popped open the hatch and was the first one out.
The transition from weightlessness to gravity was made all the more difficult by the steeper descent that subjected them to eight times the force of gravity. That’s twice the usual amount for a Soyuz and three times the load experienced aboard a shuttle.
“It was easier than I thought it was going to be, but there’s a lot of pressure on your chest,” space station commander Kenneth Bowersox said at a news conference. “It’s hard to breathe and your tongue sort of slips back in your head and toward the back of your throat.”
Pettit said, “For me, for a moment, it felt like I was Atlas and I had the weight of the whole world on my shoulders.”
A cosmonaut whose own Soyuz landing two years ago was steep but not ballistic, Talgat Musabayev, said Russian space experts believe the problem was caused by software in the guidance computer installed in the new model Soyuz. It was the first time the modified spaceship had been used in re-entry.
If software is the problem, it should be an easy repair and the two new residents of the space station should have nothing to fear when they ride a Soyuz capsule back to Earth this fall. Flight controllers would develop a software patch and simply beam it up.
NASA is relying on the Soyuz for as long as the shuttle fleet remains grounded in the wake of the Columbia disaster. A severe Soyuz problem could easily shut down the orbiting complex.
…
Budarin explained why no one heard from the crew during the final minutes of the descent and for two full hours afterward. Several parachute cords, including one with an antenna, ripped off during descent. Two other antennas did not open at touchdown, and one opened toward the ground.
The men tried to use the NASA radio station, but it was too weak, Budarin said. Then they pulled out another antenna and used it to communicate with the rescue airplane that finally found them. Between their frail condition and the need to keep crawling back into the capsule, “it all took time,” he said.
Bowersox and Pettit will spend another two weeks recuperating at the cosmonaut base in Star City, outside Moscow. Then they will fly home to Houston with their wives, who beamed with pride at the news conference.
…
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/exp6_home_030506.html
So what, David? Spaceflight is never going to be “safe,” certainly not in our lifetimes. Do we want to go or not? If you do, than you pays your money and takes your risk, as some tourists have already done. The point is, Soyuz is affordable. So, even if it is no safer than the Shuttle, being just as safe as the Shuttle makes it a far better buy.
— Donald
Columbia: Point of departure.
by
Thomas D. Jones
Early on May 4, the Expedition Six crew returned from a five-and-a-half-month stay aboard the International Space Station (ISS). Ken Bowersox, Nikolai Budarin, and Don Pettit parachuted safely to Earth in the Soyuz TMA-1 capsule after an unexpectedly exciting reentry. The upgraded TMA-1 flew a steep, short ballistic trajectory, subjecting the crew to 8 or 9 gs, and landed some 460 km short of its target in Kazakhstan. The cause of the malfunction is being sought, but crewmembers—except for a few aches and bruises—appear in good shape. They were replaced at the ISS by the two-man team of Yuri Malenchenko (commander) and Ed Lu (flight engineer and science officer), who expect to stay aboard for six months and return on their own Soyuz, launched April 26.
Expedition Six spent 161 days in space, two months longer than originally planned. They were due to return to Earth in March, but the February 1 loss of the shuttle Columbia grounded the space shuttle fleet and forced their return via Soyuz. Just as Russia’s Sergei Krikalev returned home from Mir in 1992 to a country that had not existed when he left Earth, the returning astronauts must adjust to a human spaceflight landscape that has shifted beneath them. Radical change is in the works, and we should encourage it.
This post-landing scene shows the ground damage caused by the soft-landing thrusters of the Soyuz following its touchdown in Kazakhstan.
( small photo does not in fact show evidence of a soft landing )
Photo by Marty Linde.
While the steep, high-g descent surprised the crew (“That was scarier than landing on an aircraft carrier,” said Bower-sox), the Soyuz did, in fact, fulfill its intended role on the ISS as a backup return vehicle. Americans had not returned home under parachute in a reentry capsule since the 1975 détente-driven Apollo-Soyuz mission. This latest landing on the Kazakhstan steppes is further testament to the legacy of that ground-breaking mission 28 years ago.
…
http://www.aiaa.org/aerospace/Article.cfm?issuetocid=375&ArchiveIssueID=40