Comments on: Additional notes about the revised plan and other developments

By: Library: A Round-up of Reading « Res Communis

Library: A Round-up of Reading « Res Communis — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 20:59:59 +0000

[…] Additional notes about the revised plan and other developments -Space Politics […]

By: NiteGlider

NiteGlider — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 21:41:58 +0000

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

By: Major Tom

Major Tom — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 05:27:57 +0000

“Major Tom, lets clue you in here. Bolden rolled out Obamaâ€™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 canâ€™t read, then donâ€™t write.”

What the heck are you talking about?

Ugh…

By: Major Tom

Major Tom — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 17:13:53 +0000

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.

By: common sense

common sense — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 16:42:27 +0000

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

“as for X-38â€¦ 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

By: Major Tom

Major Tom — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 02:26:35 +0000

“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.’â€

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 yesterdayâ€™s AWST”

It’s not “informed” and contains multiple false statements. For example, the complaint “that so far the new plan doesnâ€™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…

By: Doug Lassiter

Doug Lassiter — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 01:01:07 +0000

“Does it occur to anyone that Obama just cancelled the Heavy Lifter
and you donâ€™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.

By: AnonyMouse

AnonyMouse — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 00:28:03 +0000

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

By: common sense

common sense — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 22:54:00 +0000

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…

By: common sense

common sense — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 22:50:17 +0000

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…