Congress, NASA, White House

Additional notes about the revised plan and other developments

The White House released late yesterday a fact sheet about the new space exploration plan, an amalgam of details from the budget proposal released in February as well as the changes announced yesterday. “Our goal is to take advantage of the best work undertaken in the Constellation program,” it states in the section about Orion, which will be restructured to a “simpler and more efficient design” to serve as an ISS lifeboat. “We will be able to launch this vehicle within the next few years, creating an American crew escape capability that will increase the safety of our crews on the Space Station, reduce our dependence on foreign providers, and simplify requirements for other commercial crew providers,” it adds.

On heavy lift, the fact sheet states that the President “will commit to making a specific decision in 2015 on the development of a new heavy-lift rocket architecture” based on the technology funding in the original budget proposal. “The new rocket also will benefit from the budget’s proposed R&D on other breakthrough technologies in our new strategy for human exploration (such as in- space refueling), which should make possible a more cost-effective and optimized heavy lift capability as part of future exploration architectures.”

Speaking with Space News immediately after the announcement came out late yesterday, NASA deputy administrator Lori Garver said the Orion decision “allows you to keep the ability to go beyond low Earth orbit with humans”, but that for now work on Orion would be focused on the lifeboat mission only. Lockheed Martin, the prime contractor for Orion, would have the option to use Orion or a derivative design in any future commercial crew procurements.

The decision to retain Constellation was hailed by Sen. Mark Udall (D-CO), who just this week wrote to the president about his concerns over canceling Orion and the rest of Constellation. Udall, according to the AP report, says that decision shows that NASA and the White House “understand Colorado officials’ concerns.”

The announcement largely overshadowed another development late yesterday: a letter by legendary astronauts Neil Armstrong, Jim Lovell, and Gene Cernan critical of the new plan. While some of the elements of the new plan have merit, they wrote, “the accompanying decision to cancel the Constellation program… is devastating.” Lacking the ability to launch humans into orbit, they write, “destines our nation to become one of second or even third rate stature.” And in the final paragraph: “Without the skill and experience that actual spacecraft operation provides, the USA is far too likely to be on a long downhill slide to mediocrity.”

63 comments to Additional notes about the revised plan and other developments

  • amightywind

    Neither Obama nor his advisors have a clear vision for the manned space program. That is obvious. Just like with health care we will now go through a period of corrupt bargaining and absurd compromise. Nobody will be happy with the result. Obama, Holdren, Garver, and Bolden have abdicated their decision making roles. They have no credibility. They should leave NASA strategy to someone who does, like Armstrong, Lovell, and Cernan.

  • Will

    Right, amightywind,

    With Constellation we will have a gap of at least 7 years before we can put anyone in LEO again and we wil not be going anywhere beyond LEO until after 2030, in a small tin can.
    Hey, let’s raise taxes and put another 100 billion dollars into the Constellation pit! That will surely help.

  • amightywind

    Will

    Ares I has already flown. Lockmart has suggested the project could be accelerated. I suggest gutting NASA climate research and transferring the funds to Ares development.

  • Major Tom

    “Just like with health care we will now go through a period of corrupt bargaining and absurd compromise.”

    It’s hard to see a decision to pursue an Orion-lite CRV and to set a date for an HLV decision as “bargaining” or “compromise”, “corrupt”, “absurd”, or otherwise. Orion-lite (CRV or otherwise) was not an element of Constellation; the Augustine Committee’s final report warned about the costs of the full-scale Orion; and both Orion-lite and a 2015 HLV decision strengthen the use of EELVs and commercial crew over Shuttle-derived vehicles or Shuttle extension. We’re still going to hear complaints from Ares, SDLV, Shuttle extension, and probably even full-up Orion advocates, on top of the whining about the lack of a singular, Apollo-like exploration target and date. None of these factions are going to say that there’s been a compromise — they didn’t get anything they wanted.

    “Obama, Holdren, Garver, and Bolden have abdicated their decision making roles.”

    How have these people “abdicated their decision making roles” by making a decision to pursue an Orion-lite CRV and setting a date for an HLV design decision?

    Goofy…

    “They should leave NASA strategy to someone who does, like Armstrong, Lovell, and Cernan.”

    With all due respect to these Apollo astronauts, they have not put forward a strategy.

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “Ares I has already flown.”

    No it hasn’t. A 4-segment SRB with a dummy upper stage has flown (with problems). No 5-segment SRB with a working J-2X upper-stage resembling the actual Ares I configuration has flown, successfully or otherwise.

    “Lockmart has suggested the project could be accelerated.”

    LockMart is the contractor for Orion, not Ares I.

    “I suggest gutting NASA climate research and transferring the funds to Ares development.”

    It wouldn’t be enough, probably by a factor of two or so.

    FWIW…

  • amightywind

    Major Tom

    I am aware of the components of Ares I and who is building them. A year ago folks like you and your ilk were spreading hysteria about Ares pogo vibration, Ares colliding with the launch tower in high winds, Ares roll instability. Pitch instability due to length… All of these concerns were retired with the successful test flight this fall. This is my point. To suggest that the J2-X upper stage is beyond Boeing’s capability, or Orion beyond Lockmart’s is absurd, when you consider how much faith you put in charlatans such as SpaceX and Bigelow.

  • Will

    amightywind,

    You can read all the pros and cons of Constellation in the report by the Augustine Committee. For Constellation to succeed we need a significant budget increase. Even then, it won’t be ready any time soon according to the Committee. Now, suddenly, Lockmart comes with suggestions to speed up things. I’m eager to hear all about it.

  • Mark R. Whittington

    This decision is largely meaningless in regards to deep space exploration. I know that some people are already making vague promises that the Orion derived CRV will somehow become a deep space vehicle again, in the fullness of time, some where in the distant future. Don’t hold your breath.

  • taka

    amightywind wrote:

    “I suggest gutting NASA climate research and transferring the funds to Ares development.”

    I’m not sure how that would be good use of taxpayers funds. Regardless of your position on global warming, studying the climate is very important. (You could argue that perhaps NOAA should be doing this vice NASA, but that would just be a transfer of funds from NASA to NOAA)

    On the flip side, there are a lot of parallels in technology between climate research on Earth and deep space planetary probes, so perhaps we should keep the funding with NASA.

  • Major Tom

    “I am aware of the components of Ares I and who is building them.”

    Are you sure? In your earlier post, you wrote: “Ares I has already flown. Lockmart has suggested the project could be accelerated.” This is not true, because Ares I is not LockMart’s project.

    If you don’t know, don’t make stuff up.

    “A year ago folks like you and your ilk were spreading hysteria about Ares pogo vibration, Ares colliding with the launch tower in high winds, Ares roll instability. Pitch instability due to length… All of these concerns were retired with the successful test flight this fall.”

    Not true, on multiple fronts. First, the SRBs don’t suffer from pogo. The SRBs suffer from thrust oscillation. They’re different phenomena. Second, a four-segment SRB test doesn’t have the same acoustics, resonances, or even CG as a five-segment SRB. On issues like thrust oscillation and pitch instability, the former doesn’t provide an accurate test for the latter. Third, even if the Ares I first-stage was still a four-segment SRB, the Ares I-X test flight was not a success. It suffered from several shortcomings, the most glaring of which was two parachute failures that opened new questions about Ares I recoverability and the safety and cost claims associated with that.

    And whether Ares I would have ever worked is a side issue. As GAO, CBO, and the Augustine Committee have all shown, Ares I/Orion was a budget and schedule buster. $30-50 billion for one crew transport provider by 2019 vice $6 billion for two crew transport providers by 2016 is a no-brainer.

    “To suggest that the J2-X upper stage is beyond Boeing’s capability, or Orion beyond Lockmart’s is absurd,”

    Who said that?

    I wrote that “No 5-segment SRB with a working J-2X upper-stage resembling the actual Ares I configuration has flown, successfully or otherwise.” It’s an issue of accurate system testing, not whether Boeing can build the upper stage or LockMart the crew capsule.

    Don’t make stuff up.

    “when you consider how much faith you put in charlatans such as SpaceX and Bigelow.”

    Where have I said that I put a lot of “faith” in SpaceX or Bigelow?

    I do think that between Atlas, Delta, Falcon 9, and Taurus II on the launch side and Dragon, Orion-lite, the Blue Origin biconic, and Sierra Nevada’s HL-20 derivative on the capsule side, there’s little doubt that multiple providers can deliver a crew transport capability . But I’ve never backed one solution over another.

    Don’t make stuff up.

    FWIW…

  • Doug Lassiter

    “They should leave NASA strategy to someone who does, like Armstrong, Lovell, and Cernan.”

    “With all due respect to these Apollo astronauts, they have not put forward a strategy.”

    With all due respect to these Apollo astronauts, they have essentially zero expertise in national space policy or strategic planning, and wouldn’t know one end of a funding bill from the other. Their voice is valuable here, and I appreciate their petitioned arguments, but the idea that it just takes a “hero” figure to make policy for the space agency, and to organize consensus on a national scale is just loony.

  • Major Tom

    “This decision is largely meaningless in regards to deep space exploration.”

    Yeah, setting an HLV decision date has nothing to do with deep space exploration.

    Oy vey…

    “I know that some people are already making vague promises that the Orion derived CRV will somehow become a deep space vehicle again”

    Before termination, Orion had lost most of its lunar mission capabilities to Ares I underperformance and budget overruns. Orion became a very expensive LEO vehicle, not a deep space vehicle.

    Regardless of outer mold line, or even whether an Earth reentry vehicle accompanies future human space exploration missions, a CRV has capabilities in common with crewed deep space systems, especially automation, long-duration stays in space, and highly reliable restart. The subsystems will likely be reapplied. It’s a bigger step to a deep space crew vehicle than a LEO Orion.

    FWIW…

  • CharlesTheSpaceGuy

    While this could be welcome news, again we see the direction from the top with no coordination from the working level troops that must implement the decision. Exactly what sort of “Orion” might emerge and what it might cost have not been determined. The decision makers (who ever they are!) are not polling the engineers to see what could be done. The Plan B team did propose various options but which was was taken? Or is there a separate option to try to make work??
    Mark W says that the “Orion-lite” will not be capable of going to deep space (of course we know that the return and deceleration are the challenging parts!!) but we don’t know what the new configuration will be! It could have great potential upgradeability…
    And where is this new money coming from? Do we think that the Flagship Technology has just been traded away? It is hard to plan, with new programs popping up and then being dropped…

  • Joe

    How much of this is about technological leadership and how much of this is about pork/congressional support?

  • Major Tom

    “How much of this is about technological leadership and how much of this is about pork/congressional support?”

    It’s about simplifying commercial crew as much as possible and meeting existing commitments to the ISS partnership using domestic systems.

    Capsules have been around for 40-odd years. There’s not much technological leadership involved.

    Congressmen with Ares or Shuttle workers in their districts/states are still not going to be happy. Little or no support will be gained outside Colorado.

    FWIW…

  • Smitty

    Is it me, or does the administration have trouble with simple math?

    According to the bold new document 2015 is when the decision will be made on the Heavy lift architecture which will give NASA a 2 year jump on current Cx (according to the document)

    Current Ares V schedule is flying 2019 for first test flight –

    So this means NASA will design and build a new heavy lift in a year? They will be darn busy 2015 through 2017

  • Will

    Smitty wrote @ April 14th, 2010 at 10:50 am

    “Current Ares V schedule is flying 2019 for first test flight – ”

    No, Smitty. That’s Ares I.

  • Major Tom

    “Current Ares V schedule is flying 2019 for first test flight”

    No, per the Augustine Committee’s final report, Ares V wouldn’t have flown until 2028 at the earliest (if ever).

    FWIW…

  • Mark R. Whittington

    “Major Tom”, the problem with decisions put off “until tomorrow” is that “tomorrow” hardly ever comes. I would be more impressed if Orion deep space ship and some kind of HLV were started today, not five years from now. I would be even more impressed if a lunar lander were to be restarted.

    By the way, it is my impression that Jeff’s opinion that the Orion CRV announcement has “overshadowed” Neil Armstrong’s descent from Mount Olympus to condemn Obamaspace is wide of the mark. Quite the opposite, actually.

  • I know that some people are already making vague promises that the Orion derived CRV will somehow become a deep space vehicle again

    It never was a deep-space vehicle, despite the hype about it. At best it would have gone to lunar orbit.

  • I would be more impressed if Orion deep space ship and some kind of HLV were started today, not five years from now. I would be even more impressed if a lunar lander were to be restarted.

    We don’t need an HLV, and the lunar lander was never started in the first place, so it would be hard to “restart” it.

  • Major Tom

    “‘Major Tom’, the problem with decisions put off “until tomorrow” is that “tomorrow” hardly ever comes. I would be more impressed if Orion deep space ship and some kind of HLV were started today, not five years from now.”

    You do realize that lunar Orion and Ares V would still have been under study in that timeframe under the old Constellation program, right? That Ares I/ISS Orion ate the lunar Orion and Ares V development budgets, right?

    “I would be even more impressed if a lunar lander were to be restarted.”

    You do realize that Ares I/Orion budget growth ate Altair, right?

    FWIW…

  • Will

    Mark R. Whittington wrote @ April 14th, 2010 at 10:59 am

    “I would be more impressed if Orion deep space ship and some kind of HLV were started today, not five years from now.”

    My guess is that a true deep space ship probably won’t be like Orion at all. It will be composed of several parts (propulsion, habitat, moon/marslander,…) to which a CRV or other Earth-LEO vehicle can be docked. That would impress me.

  • “Ares I has already flown.”

    No it hasn’t. A 4-segment SRB with a dummy upper stage has flown (with problems). No 5-segment SRB with a working J-2X upper-stage resembling the actual Ares I configuration has flown, successfully or otherwise.

    “Lockmart has suggested the project could be accelerated.”

    LockMart is the contractor for Orion, not Ares I.

    “amightywind” would appear to be “amightybrokenwind.” What an ignoramus.

  • eh

    Well, orion-super-lite and a hard date on HLV choice are good politics at least. This saves some jobs, reassures the cape, gives us a backup plan for commercial and commits to HLV before CxP.

    It’s smart. I just wonder what will be lost to pay for the orion-lite.

  • amightywind

    Tom

    “Not true, on multiple fronts. First, the SRBs don’t suffer from pogo. The SRBs suffer from thrust oscillation.”

    The lengthwise vibration caused by thrust oscillation is precisely what pogo is. In your attempt to be pedantic you end up sounding silly.

    ” Second, a four-segment SRB test doesn’t have the same acoustics, resonances, or even CG as a five-segment SRB. On issues like thrust oscillation and pitch instability, the former doesn’t provide an accurate test for the latter.”

    NASA engineers will freely admit this which is why Ares I-X flew with a fifth insert segment with weight characteristics of the real thing. It is not a full test of the 5 segment booster, but if you won’t admit that the test doesn’t retire risk, you’re not being honest.

    “It suffered from several shortcomings, the most glaring of which was two parachute failures that opened new questions about Ares I recoverability and the safety and cost claims associated with that.”

    It was a test flight. NASA learned from the test. Read. Learn. http://www.space-travel.com/reports/What_Caused_The_Ares_IX_Parachute_To_Fail_999.html

    Shuttle SRBs have also been damaged on impact under fully functioning parachutes. One wonders how a Falcon 9 first stage would fare.

  • I think everyone needs to understand that any compromise this complicated and interactive is going to be tango that takes sometime to work out from political, technical and budget view points. What has happened is that the Whitehouse has now turned around, faced their Constitutional partner (ie Congress) and taken a small step towards a final compromise (ie shifted from canceling Orion to Orion-Lite and shifted from HLV sooner than the PoR 2025 to an HLV ‘decision’ by 2015 or first flight circa 2020). Baby steps to be sure but steps none the less and more importantly in the right direction. Hopefully Congress will show some willingness to take a step towards the President by agreeing to cancel the insult to American rocket engineers everywhere, better known as the Ares-1, in order to get on with building a HLV now using existing assets.

    Mr Augustine: “But one of the things that was recommended there was to get on with building a heavy-lift launch vehicle because that’s kind of the ground floor to everything. And I think one of the lessons that most of us have learned in our career is don’t skimp on the heavy-lift part of it, let’s have enough lift so we can have margins.”

    Mr Greason: “I came in absolutely convinced that 25 metric ton vehicles were big enough to launch all the pieces. I am by no means convinced of that today.”

    Concerning HLV, we can go back to future and recreate a modern day Saturn V for about $30 Billion dollars. Ironically we canceled the SaturnV because we thought it was too expensive to operate and didn’t have enough advanced technology. The physics governing Kero/LOX ISP have not changed since the SaturnV and we certainly don’t need to spend billions to re-uncover a fact that we already know in order to improve the ISP by at best 1%. I suggest we learn from this past history and just stop destroying the HLV we already own, in yet another vain attempt to find the end of the rainbow, and just re-task the existing SDHLV industrial base and workforce for new objectives.

    There is also an issue with timing which I think is actually more significant than the new Kero/LOX vs existing LOX/LH2 – SRB technical/ops cost debate. This proposed Kero/LOX HLV development will now commence five years from now under what will certainly be an even tighter discretionary budget environment. I think this will be an exceedingly bad timing to go and ask for $30 Billion dollars or try to carve it out of the 1,000 little iron rice bowls created under the Feb 1st plan. So in my mind any proposal to develop an HLV that doesn’t start now using existing paid for assets is magical thinking. Those who subscribed to it are either magical thinkers or know full well what I say above is true and are using this as a Trojan horse because they don’t want an HLV in any form. Either way this is false choice if we really want an HLV.

    The other alternative (with at best a one year shelf life under the current policy of shutting down the ISS along with the Shuttle) is that we can stay the execution of our existing paid for and well honed $40 Billion dollar SDHLV industrial base and workforce and have a modest inline crew capable SDHLV (75mT 10m diameter Payload) flying five years from now for about $8 Billion. Major Tom, if you have a problem with this number take it up with the CBO and GAO both of which have extensive documentation and published reports that backs this number up based on actual development cost. Perhaps you can convince them that a SDHLV should cost almost as much as the Shuttle cost from scratch (ie the Aerospace Corps estimate).

    The behind the scenes story of how that happened is an interesting tale of the sausage making process that produces policy. Long story short, NASA ended up shooting themselves in the foot in vain attempt to keep the 1.5 PoR from not looking so bad vs 2xSDHLV. Not that you would need to look very far, the facts (physics and budget) are for all to see in ESAS Appendix 6a, the section that despite multiple FOIA request over many years has not been ‘offically’ released but was leaked about two years ago and is widely available on the internet.

    An inline version of the directly SDHLV family will not only be fully man-rated at no extra-charge but will also have the lowest operational cost per kg to orbit, at just two flights per year, than any existing domestic launch systems. Oh and Orion can actually be sent on Beyond LEO missions in one launch using the Delta Upperstage as the EDS immediately. Missions like Apollo-8 or sending Orion+Crew directly to the SEL to dock with an internationally developed Deep Space hab for NEO missions come to mind.

    What a turn around from what we faced under the PoR thanks to the Whitehouse throwing cold water on the delusions associated with the PoR. All we need is for the reasonable people in this debate to help form a compromise between the extremes of either the PoR as is or shutting down American HSF for the foreseeable future (ie 5 years plus). Anything we plan/hope to achieve beyond five years is magical thinking in the political realm. Don’t believe me? All you need to do is look back five years and read the predictions made back then as compared to what we are experience right now.

    Less than five years ago Congress was told irrevocably by ‘real’ self-proclaimed PhD rocket scientists that the Jupiter defied the laws of physics and that their Ares-1 was the best rocket ever conceived by a mortal man. Congress was being told behind the scenes what do you expect from janitors working on their off hours? Let’s get serious here the PoR is just fine and dandy just send more money.

    Mark 12:10

  • eh

    As long as they don’t extend shuttle, there is still money to do R&D.

  • CharlesTheSpaceGuy

    Major Tom said: Capsules have been around for 40-odd years. There’s not much technological leadership involved.
    And that is not correct. There a LOTS of new things to be done inside the capsule, even if you leave the mold line alone. The big design decision is the shape – for re-entry aerodynamics. One new thing the original Orion design was gonna do was have fluid flow (cooling loops) between the Orion and the service module – which turned out to be quite a design challenge. Trying to get that to go thru the heat shield.

    If you design a capsule for high speed re-entry (from lunar trajectory) it has to be far beefier than one designed to re-enter from Earth orbit. Inside the capsule there are lots of things like design for update of displays, etc that need to be considered. Having two hatches alone is a big issue.

  • Major Tom

    “The lengthwise vibration caused by thrust oscillation is precisely what pogo is. In your attempt to be pedantic you end up sounding silly.”

    It’s not pendantic or silly. Pogo refers to a phenomenon on liquid fuel engines. SRBs are solid fuel rockets.

    “NASA engineers will freely admit this which is why Ares I-X flew with a fifth insert segment”

    Exactly, it’s inert. Ares I-X had a completely different internal volume, burn, fuel geometry, and even a different fuel from that planned for Ares I. The acoustics and resonances are very different. Ares I-X was not an accurate test for Ares I.

    “It is not a full test of the 5 segment booster, but if you won’t admit that the test doesn’t retire risk, you’re not being honest.”

    Ares I-X did not retire the critical risks on Ares I and introduced new questions on top of those key risks.

    “Shuttle SRBs have also been damaged on impact under fully functioning parachutes. One wonders how a Falcon 9 first stage would fare.”

    Doesn’t matter. First-stage recovery is not key to the costs or safety claims on Falcon 9. It was for Ares I.

    FWIW…

  • richardb

    Well I am surprised at the gumby like flexibility of President Obama. His “plan” was going down in defeat in Congress because it was politically stupid. Even after Bolden announced where the gravy was going to be ladled Congress still wasn’t appeased. So now we have Orion lite, alittle more pork thrown into Obama’s space policy stew. Will this taste better to Congress? How will it taste to the commercial companies, Boeing, Lockmart, SpaceX, Orbital?

    My guess is they still won’t like it. Congress might just say, well if the thing can return a crew, why not have it carry a crew? Then Congress might just say, well if it can carry a crew, we need to find a launcher for it.
    So the risk just went up for those commercial guys. If they were tempted to bet company money on Obama’s boondoggle they aren’t anymore. But we already knew none were tempted to bet company money. Now they just see another competitor in the offing for ISS crew transport.

    Of course this is just pork, plain and simple. We don’t need it. With Soyuz we have all the crew return we need. As of now we pay 56 million for each seat, far cheaper than the billions for Orion lite.

    This revision just provides more substance to the claims that Obama is making it up as he goes along.

    Lets look at that HLV decision by 2015. Of course he commits to nothing more than making a decision to proceed, not proceed, study it some more. What tickles me is he first said we need to wait till 2020 or 2030 to decide on a HLV so as to give the fullness of time for his massive R&D program to produce “game changing” technology. I guess American’s are a lot smarter than he thought because now we can “game change” in as little as 4 years. You rock America!

    Making it up as he goes and committed to nothing.

  • Major Tom

    “Mr Greason: ‘I came in absolutely convinced that 25 metric ton vehicles were big enough to launch all the pieces. I am by no means convinced of that today.'”

    You’re using Greason’s name in vain. He stated in several places that he doesn’t believe that an HLV as large as DIRECT proposes is needed and that EELV-derived will be more affordable.

    “inline crew capable SDHLV (75mT 10m diameter Payload) flying five years from now for about $8 Billion. Major Tom, if you have a problem with this number take it up with the CBO and GAO both of which have extensive documentation and published reports that backs this number up based on actual development cost. Perhaps you can convince them that a SDHLV should cost almost as much as the Shuttle cost from scratch (ie the Aerospace Corps estimate).”

    I don’t know why you’re calling me out on this, but I don’t have to take it up with anyone. As I’ve stated in other threads, even if we ignore the Aerospace Corp. and other independent cost assessments and accept the $8 billion for Jupiter 130 development, your (or DIRECT’s) spreadsheets don’t fully account for the costs of keeping the Shuttle infrastructure/workforce around (whether it’s flying under Shuttle extension or not) while Jupiter 130 is under development.

    “but will also have the lowest operational cost per kg to orbit”

    As you’ve been told in other threads, that’s probably not true when the costs of keeping the Shuttle infrastructure/workforce around during Jupiter 130 development are included.

    And even if it is true, cost per unit mass is not the critical cost metric. The critical cost metric is whether the HLV’s development and operations costs fit the budget profile, with substantial funding left for human deep space systems development and operations.

    “shutting down American HSF for the foreseeable future”

    Extending the life of ISS, developing a crew rescue capability, putting in place at least two providers of crew transport, and accelerating HLV development is not “shutting down American HSF”.

    If you (or DIRECT) want to be taken seriously, you have to cut out the idiotic hyperbole.

    “Mark 12:10″

    We’re quoting scripture now?

    Really?

  • Eh, an argument could be made that the money used to extend the Shuttle should legitimately come from the stimulus funds which were specifically intended by Congress to help soften the blow from the economic down turn. The fact that shutting down America’s space human space program and the abandonment of the ISS has strategic implications is a tipping point in favor these jobs vs other jobs.

    On a dollar for dollar practical level, if we are willing to pay all these workers unemployment benefits (now run for up to two years now) plus cover their underwater government back home loans when they are forced to walk away, why not pay nearly that same amount of money flying the Shuttle? This produces the side benefit of keep jobs in America vs. sending them to Russia, enables us to actually use the ISS vs. shutting it down, plug the COTS-CRS ISS logistics gap rather than ignore it, and extend the ISS life to 2020 using the Shuttle only delivery elements needed vs. ignoring this issue as well.

    This would be temporary budget boost for about 2-3 years until we can be up and running on the Jupiter/Orion test flights. Use attrition to get the STS full up cost to about to 2/3 of its current level (i.e. due to reduced statement of work between STS and Jupiter/Orion) and we should have as smooth as transition as one could have hoped for given the how far the Ares-1/PoR silliness set us back at this late hour.

  • Major Tom

    “And that is not correct. There a LOTS of new things to be done inside the capsule, even if you leave the mold line alone… Inside the capsule there are lots of things like design for update of displays, etc that need to be considered.”

    While true, they involve the use of avionics and control subsystems that have already been developed for other applications. Maybe you have a different definition of technological leadership, but if it involves invention and innovation, using new displays is not it.

    “The big design decision is the shape – for re-entry aerodynamics.”

    Certainly a big decision, but unless it’s biconic or some other new shape, it’s hard to see an advance that would define technological leadership.

    “One new thing the original Orion design was gonna do was have fluid flow (cooling loops) between the Orion and the service module – which turned out to be quite a design challenge. Trying to get that to go thru the heat shield.”

    This was a desperate mass-saving measure, driven by Ares underperformance. I wouldn’t call that technological leadership.

    “If you design a capsule for high speed re-entry (from lunar trajectory) it has to be far beefier than one designed to re-enter from Earth orbit. Having two hatches alone is a big issue.”

    Sure, but again, where’s the new technology or leadership?

    FWIW…

  • Major Tom

    “His ‘plan’ was going down in defeat in Congress because it was politically stupid.”

    If that’s true, then why do both draft authorization bills provide all of the funding in every NASA account requested by the White House and incorporate all the major human space flight elements of the President’s FY 2011 budget request for NASA?

    If that’s true, then why did the chair of the House Appopriations Committee open a NASA hearing with a statement supportive of the President’s FY 2011 budget request for NASA?

    If that’s true, then why can’t the opposition in Congress even get Shelby’s Constellation language from last year’s omnibus appropriations bill inserted into a bill this year?

    “So now we have Orion lite, alittle more pork thrown into Obama’s space policy stew.”

    Meeting U.S. commitments to the ISS partnership is not “pork”.

    “How will it taste to the commercial companies, Boeing, Lockmart, SpaceX, Orbital?”

    It’s more Orion development for LockMart and more launches for ULA, jointly owned by Boeing and LockMart. Of course the major firms are going to like it. Duh…

    SpaceX, OSC, and other potential commercial crew providers are relieved of burdensome crew rescue requirements. Of course they’re going to like it. Duh…

    “What tickles me is he first said we need to wait till 2020 or 2030 to decide on a HLV”

    The President never said that. Bolden said he wanted HLV operations (not decisions) in that timeframe.

    Don’t make stuff up.

    “Making it up as he goes”

    So unlike the writing in your post.

    Ugh…

  • Coastal Ron

    Stephen Metschan – regarding your SDHLV comments, I think there are some extenuating circumstances that you are glossing over:

    1. Any funds spent on HLV beyond the proposed engine research is going to impact NASA’s proposed budget, so where are you getting the funds? Cancel COTS or CCDev? Cancel robotic precursor missions? Where are the funds coming from?

    2. What are you going to launch with a SDHLV in 5 years? What cargo are you adding to the budget? How are you going to fund it?

    Our current family of launchers (Atlas/Delta Heavy) are capable of delivering about the same tonnage of cargo to space as the Shuttle. Until you have a need for HLV, it’s not the best use of our limited taxpayer money.

  • Ya’ know Major Tom- when Ares I-X was about to roll out they put the lettering “USA” on one side. I disagreed- I was pulling ofr the letters “U-P-Y-O-U-R-S” just for people like you. When the Congress finishes with this Obama mess and the next I-X vehicle rolls out, perhaps they’ll use my lettering- just for you. If anyone wants to distract people such as you, they don’t need a shiney object, they just need a the words “Ares I” and bam- you people are gone from reality.

    This Obama announcement means exactly nothing- it’ll be rejected and the Congress will fix this. Major Tom and those of his ilk will remain distracted.

    Please Major Tom- keep talkin’, it amuses those of us who can still reason.

  • John Malkin

    I don’t see how this is a big change from the original budget. When Bolden testified, he said that they would take technologies from Constellation if they fit into the plan. He also said that they were working on specifics to the budget request.

    Why wasn’t this done first? Because they wanted to wait for the Augustine report. The budget had a firm release date and Obama wasn’t going to hold the budget until NASA was ready. However they should have said this is a work in progress instead of just a lot of silence. Bolden took the blame which I don’t think is completely fair. Obama should have handled it better.

  • Vladislaw

    “”Pogo” is a rocket scientist’s slang for a longitudinal vibration or oscillation that sometimes occurs in rockets. As the propellant flows through the pipes and fittings on its way from the tanks to the engine, low-frequency disturbances can form. This disturbance is like the groaning of plumbing pipes in your house, only not as strong. Since this causes variations in the propellant flow rate, the thrust from the affected engines fluctuates several times a second.

    Periodic fluctuations in thrust occur in all rocket engines, but normally the mass of the rocket is sufficient to keep it from becoming noticeable or dangerous. But when the thrust fluctuation approaches the resonant frequency of the rocket structure, the forces “couple” and the result is the sense that the rocket is surging backward and forward along its length several times a second. This motion resembles that of a pogo stick, hence the name.[Sutton01, p. 350]” http://www.clavius.org/techsvpogo.html

  • Major Tom

    “Ya’ know Major Tom- when Ares I-X was about to roll out they put the lettering “USA” on one side. I disagreed- I was pulling ofr the letters “U-P-Y-O-U-R-S” just for people like you.”

    Well, what your argument lacks in facts and logic, it makes up for in spelling and imagination.

    Oy vey…

  • Pad Rat

    Hey Metschan what happen to all of those claims you made to people that Buzz Aldrin was going to headline a protest rally at the VAB parking lot? You were telling everyone that Buzz was your BFF and that he had agreed to do this. What happened to that?

  • Bennett

    Pad Rat wrote @ April 14th, 2010 at 2:21 pm

    “What happened to that?”

    http://buzzaldrin.com/statement-from-buzz-aldrin-a-new-direction-in-space/

  • amightywind

    Bennett

    Buzz Aldin was a fine astronaut. But he will go to his grave a second stringer to Neil Armstrong, who showed us all in July 1969 that his balls wouldn’t fit in a dump truck. Neil stands alone on Tom Wolff’s great pyramid of flying. With Neil on the record, Aldin is irrelevant.

  • John Malkin

    @amightywind

    So you are saying all the moon astronauts after Neil are irrelevant? I think Buzz took equally as much risk as Neil.

    BTW Tom Wolfe is a really nice guy.

  • Pad Rat: “Hey Metschan what happen to all of those claims you made to people that Buzz Aldrin was going to headline a protest rally at the VAB parking lot? You were telling everyone that Buzz was your BFF and that he had agreed to do this. What happened to that?”

    You should talk to Keith about that one since we made no such plans. The protest against the Feb 1st plan is going on well enough without any help from us anyway. What we are working towards is putting forth amenable compromise plans that will work politically, technically and fit the available budget. We accomplish this is by combining the best aspects of the President’s plan with the progress already made on the PoR all built upon the foundation of the existing paid for industrial base and experienced workforce of ULA, STS, and hopefully soon to be Orbital and SpaceX. Its basically the same plan that has been on the table now for almost five years. Actually 32 years if you count the 1978 inline SDHLV first proposed by NASA engineers even before the first Shuttle flew.

    You should talk to Keith about that one since we made no such plans. The protest side against the Feb 1st plan is going on well enough without any help from us. What we are working towards is putting forth amenable compromise plans that will work politically, technically and fit the available budget. We accomplish this is by combining the best aspects of the President’s plan with the progress already made on the PoR all built upon the foundation of the existing paid for industrial base and experienced workforce of ULA, STS, and hopefully soon to be Orbital and SpaceX.

    This may come as a shock to you, but you might want to take what ever Keith says/predicts with pinch of salt. The future is not an open book for anyone at any level in this debate nor is their some smoke filled room where this ‘actually’ gets decided and then and only then is it revealed to all the little people.

    I for one would have never predicted that a plan that fits the budget, works technically, and adheres to the law would be this difficult to explain or sell all things considered. Having been through this process once on a niche issue it makes me wonder about just how intractable the significantly larger problems our nation faces really are. From my viewpoint its amazing what a little common sense from the common man can accomplish if given half a chance to actually help set policy.

  • Bennett

    @amightywind

    A “second stringer” is someone who sits on the bench until needed. Someone who “isn’t in the game”. You miss your mark by miles.

    Dr. Aldrin has been an outspoken advocate for the Space Program for almost 50 years, and if any former astronaut has the ear of the President, it’s Dr Aldrin, not the venerable Neil Armstrong.

    With that comment, you really show the depth of your ignorance.

  • richardb

    Major Tom, as usual from you pedantry is the norm. Here is what Bolden said: “Ideally, I would like to be flying a heavy-lift launch capability between 2020 and 2030. Now whether or not we’ve matured to a point by then that … the next NASA administrator will feel comfortable that it’s okay to put humans on that heavy-lift launch vehicle, I can’t say right now.”

    That is no commitment to have a HLV in hand by 2020-2030, in fact it is no more than a wish. He even implies that we might not have the “game changing” technology matured for even that timeline. But now President Obama says that “game changing” technology will allow us to decide by 2015 whether to build it or not. You focus on the trivia regularly and miss what is plain. Bolden said the technology might not be mature for 2020-2030, but Obama now says we’ll have the R&D in place in 4 short years to make a decision. Which is it? One timeline implies serious and sustained R&D over many years. The other implies the R&D is nearly in place and at a high readiness level. Neither can be correct, yet the Administration uses them both to pitch their plan.

    These guys got themselves in a mess that they have spent weeks trying to clean up. The more they wipe the mop the more they spread the mess around.

    Now for some more informed speculation, how about this from yesterday’s AWST:

    “U.S. space-industry executives who will have to make the Obama space policy work say they are dismayed by the amateurish roll-out of the plan, which continues to dribble out from the White House in tiny increments that betray a lack of planning. And details of the ongoing planning that have emerged haven’t always been reassuring.

    Speaking on condition of anonymity because they don’t want to alienate NASA leadership, executives here worry that the open-ended technology-development plan envisioned in Obama’s Fiscal 2011 NASA budget request can quickly become a cash cow for other spending on Capitol Hill, absent a clearly defined architecture and set of goals in space.

    They also complain that so far the new plan doesn’t have any procedures in place for capturing benefits from the more than $9 billion spent on the Constellation Program of space shuttle follow-on vehicles. That includes work through the preliminary design review milestone on the Ares I crew launch vehicle and the Orion crew capsule.”

    Think about it. Obama and company half baked this plan; couldn’t sell it to the stakeholders; make incoherent statements in supporting it; and provide little to no political rational for it to last more than a year or two on Capitol Hill. This is the crew many of you want making space policy?

    Here is your link:
    http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/blogs/space/index.jsp?plckController=Blog&plckBlogPage=BlogViewPost&newspaperUserId=04ce340e-4b63-4d23-9695-d49ab661f385&plckPostId=Blog%3a04ce340e-4b63-4d23-9695-d49ab661f385Post%3a51a64d54-6149-4e49-92b7-ec9218cc84d3&plckScript=blogScript&plckElementId=blogDest

  • Costal Ron: “Stephen Metschan – regarding your SDHLV comments, I think there are some extenuating circumstances that you are glossing over:

    1. Any funds spent on HLV beyond the proposed engine research is going to impact NASA’s proposed budget, so where are you getting the funds? Cancel COTS or CCDev? Cancel robotic precursor missions? Where are the funds coming from?

    2. What are you going to launch with a SDHLV in 5 years? What cargo are you adding to the budget? How are you going to fund it?
    Our current family of launchers (Atlas/Delta Heavy) are capable of delivering about the same tonnage of cargo to space as the Shuttle. Until you have a need for HLV, it’s not the best use of our limited taxpayer money.”

    Question 1: Please review the link to the compromise budget and let me know what you think.

    http://www.directlauncher.com/documents/NASA-Compromise-Budget-Detailed.xls

    Question 2: Good question, we are figuring on a nominal Jupiter launch rate of 2 per year. Assuming full-up capability occurs in 2015 that gives us about 8 launches upto 2020. In the first years two years we are flying additional paid for ISS elements (left in warehouse due to the Mike’s desire the end the ISS ASAP) plus ISS logistics/crew rotations plus an Apollo-8 type mission to stretch Orion’s legs a bit and to show the world we are serious.

    In the 2017-2020 time frame the progress of the Advanced Technology/Mission demonstration program (at full steady state funding achieved in FY15 under our plan after an efficient S-Curve ramp up that starts in FY11) should be producing some exicting missions like, Propellant Depots, Mars Sample Return (Human EDL proto-type), Jupiter Ice Moon missions to search for life in our solar system, our first human NEO mission using the international deep space hab using SEL staging point, JWST replacements to search for life in our galaxy, game changing military missions, Space Based solar power, Lunar ISRU facilities, etc. Post 2020-Post ISS we should have more than enough foundational work via proto-type missions plus freed up ISS funds to begin a ten year roll-out of missions (akin to the how the Apollo program rolled out) that lead up to the first human landing on Mars in the 2030 time frame.

    Concerning the Adequacy of existing Launch Capabilities: For the first fifty years of the Space exploration and development we have been constrained to the launch system capacities world wide close what ULA has to offer right now. We are running out of truly new missions (both manned and unmanned) based on these systems, STS included.

    So we are in a bit of trap, what is the point of re-flying old missions. When we attempt to shoe-horn more mission capability into the same box we get exponential increases in overall mission cost that dwarf the launch cost. So even if the launch system was free it doesn’t pencil out.

    Fortunately we have been flying an HLV now for almost thirty years though it doesn’t seem like it because most of the mass delivered into orbit is in the form of the Shuttle orbiter. Correctly modified this same HLV industrial base can produce a Saturn V class lift capacity and volume with the addition of about $8 Billion dollars. It just seems to me that for a nation that spends more on space than all other nations combined that we can afford to have a launch system capacity slightly ahead of the curve needed in order to stay ahead of the curve in terms of mission capability.

  • taka

    Given all the rhetoric on how “badly” the President / NASA has handled this, I’d love to know how exactly Constellation was the end-all-be-all of launch systems for the foreseeable future.

    I’m not saying the “new” plan is perfect (by any means), it’s just that some people seem to think everything was copasetic with Constellation.

    I give the President credit for at least facing reality and trying to re-vector the program. Now if we could get some other over-budget / behind-schedule government programs cancelled…

    People need to separate their apparent disdain or support for the President (for whatever reason) and objectively evaluate Constellation and the new program.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Mark R. Whittington wrote @ April 14th, 2010 at 10:12 am

    This decision is largely meaningless in regards to deep space exploration. ..

    first thing you have gotten correct in a long time. there is no support for such efforts and our technology is to primitive for it

    Robert G. Oler

  • anon

    Does it occur to anyone that Obama just cancelled the Heavy Lifter
    and you don’t even recognize that?

    The Presidential decision on HLV go ahead is set for 2015.

    He leaves office in 2017, and it’s after his last mid term election.

    After the 2006 Election, GWB took a real FU attitude to the world.
    He just did what he wanted to.

    Clinton in 99 became a complete loose cannon.

    He hung out to dry lots of people.

    Reagan in 87? Same story.

    No, Obama has tossed a bone to NASA and the spaceflight mafia,
    and will trickle out money for HLV, but, the program is dead.

    Commercial may succeed, but Shuttle is dead, and
    all of NASA’s launchers with it.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Stephen Metschan wrote @ April 14th, 2010 at 3:53 pm

    great fiction.

    politically Jupiter/DIRECT has been dead for sometime. Engineering wise it was as viable as The Third Reich’s nuclear effort.

    Robert G. Oler

  • AnonyMouse

    the real issue here again is not if there will be a capsule to put people in, but what will launch it. Even if you use it as a CRV [if X-38 hadn’t been cancelled, we wouldn’t be having the conversation on CRV’s] how do you get it up there? There won’t be much change to -lite versions, because the designs have always been multi-mode. Kinda like the mini-van with 17 cup holders. When you pull them out, it’s a prettydcent little cargo van. It can likely go to first full scale test in 2013…

    But on top of what? We always worried that it’d be all dressed up, with no place to go at that point. we can hope we’ll be wrong. I wonder how fast you can man rate something else…

  • common sense

    This Orion-lite thing really is a “save-the-jobs” item: It will serve as a rescue vehicle therefore will not bring the astronauts up to the station and will not require a LAS on the way up. It may be put on “any” man-rated or not launcher then that can take it up as a “regular” payload. It’ll have to have some kind of automatic docking and thrusters to get there I assume. As such I suspect it may be fileded even earlier than 2013. Still have to rely on others to bring people up to ISS though.

    Oh well…

  • common sense

    BTW as a CRV it is sad that X-38 went down the drain. At least there would have been some (little) technological advances. Even if it was based on an existing and tested but never fielded design… I wonder how far X-38 was before cancellation and how far Orion-CRV is today.

    Ah if only Congress could only mind their own business. Oh wait! It is there business to put NASA in shambles and then cry wolf…

    Oh well…

  • AnonyMouse

    nah, not earlier than 2013, because of all the long-lead stuf and testing. It is still a fully man-rated vehicle, even empty, you can’t cut that. Dunno that I’d believe it was only a lifeboat… it makes no sense to do that, even if it is a much better unit than a soyuz over a much longer period of on-orbit. Maybe once a few are in operation… then “hey, y’know we have a man rated launcher now, so…”

    as for X-38… it was at 1:6 scale droptest.
    NASA Dryden

  • Doug Lassiter

    “Does it occur to anyone that Obama just cancelled the Heavy Lifter
    and you don’t even recognize that?

    The Presidential decision on HLV go ahead is set for 2015.”

    No, it doesn’t occur to anyone, because making a large investment in an HLV now is stupid. That was obvious enough to W, because even his plans didn’t have an HLV starting until very late in the decade. By that token, JFK canceled the lunar program because he put off the first lunar landing until after he would have been out of office. What a crafty guy, that JFK!

    An HLV right now, as built with decades-old technology is unaffordable and not even clearly necessary to do the things we want to do. Certainly not one on the scale of Ares V. To go long distances we’ll need a big vehicle, but not one launched in one piece from the Earth.

    One politically savvy provision of VSE was that a program be sustainable, over different administrations, and different congresses. OK, Constellation didn’t manage to be that, so let’s try again.

    Certainly, with regard to Orion-lite, Obama looks to be tossing a bone to KSC and JSC, but removing a jobs program from the equation is simply not feasible.

  • Major Tom

    “Major Tom, as usual from you pedantry is the norm.”

    Your statement confused Barack Obama with Charlie Bolden. You statement also confused development decisions with operations. I corrected your statement. That’s not being pendantic. Those were obvious errors.

    Don’t blame me if you can’t tell the President from the NASA Administrator or development from operations.

    “Here is what Bolden said: ‘Ideally, I would like to be flying a heavy-lift launch capability between 2020 and 2030.’”

    Good job. You found the quote that proved your earlier statement wrong.

    “That is no commitment to have a HLV in hand by 2020-2030″

    Where did I say that Bolden’s statement was a commitment?

    Don’t make stuff up.

    “Bolden said the technology might not be mature for 2020-2030″

    Bolden said no such thing. Per your own quote, Bolden said he wanted an operational HLV in that timeframe, but that he didn’t know whether the HLV would have matured to the point (i.e., had enough successful flights) to launch crew on it by that time.

    Don’t make stuff up, especially about your own references.

    “Now for some more informed speculation, how about this from yesterday’s AWST”

    It’s not “informed” and contains multiple false statements. For example, the complaint “that so far the new plan doesn’t have any procedures in place for capturing benefits from the more than $9 billion spent on the Constellation Program of space shuttle follow-on vehicles” is flat wrong. Any idiot (at AWST or elsewhere) could have done a simple online search and found multiple references (from the ESMD AA no less) to knowledge-capture exercise underway as Constellation winds down:

    msnbc.msn.com/id/35209628/ns/technology_and_science-space/

    Piss-poor journalism, even for an industry rag.

    Geez…

  • common sense

    @ AnonyMouse wrote @ April 14th, 2010 at 8:28 pm :

    “as for X-38… it was at 1:6 scale droptest.
    NASA Dryden”

    There is a lot more to the vehicle than the drop tests. A lot had been studied in terms of aero in the 60s/70s with the X-24A and X-23′. But none of this tells the actual story of where they were in terms of fielding it. Issues associated with launch vehicles, aerothermal (flaps) etc.

    Oh well…

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin-Marietta_X-24
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-23_PRIME
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-38

  • Major Tom

    Major Tom, lets clue you in here. Bolden rolled out Obama’s plan in Feb. He speaks for the Prez on all things Nasa. Just as Hillary does for State. Just as Holder does for Justice. Just as Gibbs does, daily. When they misspeak, corrections flow. None did. Bolden said what the Obama Administration wants, ie what the noun before Administration wants.

    As for the remainder of your trivia, if you can’t read, then don’t write.

  • Major Tom

    “Major Tom, lets clue you in here. Bolden rolled out Obama’s plan in Feb. He speaks for the Prez on all things Nasa.”

    No, he doesn’t. The President spoke today on dates and destinations for NASA human space exploration missions that Bolden hasn’t spoken on.

    Duh…

    “Bolden said what the Obama Administration wants, ie what the noun before Administration wants.”

    No, Bolden was speaking for himself — his target dates for HLV operations, not the Administration’s.

    And it’s beside the point, anyway. Regardless of the degree to which Bolden represents Obama, the other poster confused the two individuals, attributing a quote to one that belonged to the other. It was a misattribution and should be corrected.

    “As for the remainder of your trivia, if you can’t read, then don’t write.”

    What the heck are you talking about?

    Ugh…

  • NiteGlider

    This was a very interesting article and discussion. From the perspective of a layman who watched one of the moon launches on a b/w TV rolled into my first grade classroom, there is a lot of good information here from some very knowledgeable people.

    However, in spite of the vocabularies and obvious education, some of you sound very much like my bickering teenage daughters. This does not inspire confidence.

    If you are insiders, as you seem to be, then accept the decisions made and move forward. Do not be hindered by the political and bureaucratic structures from freeing your imaginations.

    The president needs guidance. He is a life-long politician placed in a role of leadership. Give him options; viable options. And give him honesty so that the decisions he makes will be able to endure successive administrations.

    But if I’m off the mark, and you are all just wannabes taking shots at each other for your ego’s sakes… cut it out.

    Nite

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