Congress, NASA

Clash of the bailout quotes

So did NASA administrator Charles Bolden say that he would “bail out” commercial crew transportation providers on a scale similar to government bailouts of major automotive and financial companies? That was perhaps the most interesting item in a three-hour hearing yesterday by the Senate Commerce Committee on the future of human spaceflight. During the first panel, which featured Bolden as well as presidential science advisor John Holdren, Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) said, “It was reported to me that in the conference call with Mr. [Neil] Armstrong and Capt. [Eugene] Cernan last week that you had… you told them that you would, ‘do whatever it takes’ to make commercial work, including ‘bailing them out’, even if that would mean ‘a bigger bailout than Chrysler and GM’.”

“I’m not sure I said that,” Bolden responded. However, he went on, “I will do everything in my power to facilitate the success of the commercial entities in access to low Earth orbit. I have to have that.” He went on that as a “contingency planner” he had to look at the possibility the commercial sector would run into difficulties and plan accordingly. When pressed by Vitter about whether he used language like “bailout”, Bolden said, “I don’t remember using the sort of language you used. I don’t remember that.”

However, in the second panel, Cernan said he distinctly recalled hearing the term bailout. Calling Bolden “a dear friend who I ultimately have the ultimate respect for”, Cernan recounted that part of the discussion from last week’s conference call. “Charlie expressed some concern over the potential of the commercial sector to be successful in any reasonable length of time. He indicated we might have to subsidize them until they are successful. And, I can say with authority because I wrote this down and out the words ‘wow’ right next to it, because Charlie did say it may be a bailout like GM and Chrysler. As a matter of fact, it may be the largest bailout in history.”

So did Bolden use the term bailout? If so, it’s hardly the best choice of words for someone trying to advocate for commercial crew transportation, given the strong negative connotations of the term, particularly today. It’s highly unlikely, though, that the scale of any such support for commercial crew providers would approach that of GM or Chrysler (who combined have received $76 billion in loans and equity investments from the federal government since late 2008); those bailouts are also considerably smaller than what some financial firms received at the height of the crisis. Nonetheless, if he did use that language, he did the commercial space industry—and his own agency—no favors.

146 comments to Clash of the bailout quotes

  • Cernan repeats a statement made in confidence. Bolden given no opportunity to respond.

    “I can say with authority because I wrote this down and the words ‘wow’ right next to it”

    Awesome. I’m going to say everything with authority from now on.

    Wow.

  • Well, even if Charlie did say that bailing out the commercial companies would be necessary in order to get a couple of man-rated launchers w/capsules at $50B – $75B, it’s still cheaper than $40B for Ares1 and $50B for Ares5.

    The tax-payer will see a return on their investment sooner, especially if these companies have to pay the money back like the auto firms had to IMHO.

  • dad2059, not even ULA could spend more than Ares I. As for the cost for Ares 5, that estimate is definitely low.

  • NASA Fan

    Having listened to the hearings, I must say everyone looks like fools.

    Bolden is committed to a plan but has no contingencies in place, other than ‘bail out': “I’m a contingency planner” “I will do everything to facilitate their success” This guy would never make it to Project Manager of a small mission with such blind obedience to his boss; he’d be fired in an instance for such poor contingency planning.

    The astronauts looked a befuddled and puppets of Griffin

    KBH has past her prime. Egad. She had a hard time constructing a coherent sentence.

    The dysfunction of this little circus continues; the loser is humanity

  • NASA Fan

    Oh, and if I hear the phrase “Game Changing Technology” one more time, I’ll puke! Anyone who pays attention will know that for a looooong time now NASA does NOT spin out ‘technology’ consistent with this myth, and it’s not for lack of investments in R&D. NASA spins in technology from industry.

    Too bad the game that is being played by the WH/OMB/Congress/NASA/OSTP isn’t changing. That is where I’d invest in game changing technologies.

  • NASA Fan, that’s the whole point. NASA hasn’t developed new technology in decades and is now discovering that trying to do a meaningful space program old technology is impossible under the current budget. As there’s no more money available, the only sensible course of action is to admit their mistake and get back on the technology development path.

  • Cernan claims Bolden is a “dear friend” then throws him under a bus to score a cheap political point. Some friend.

    Even if Bolden did say it, obviously it was just a slang term used in jest.

    I have no respect for Cernan after yesterday’s performance. He came off like a Tea Partier, willing to say ridiculous and hysterical things to get his way.

  • As for the cost for Ares 5, that estimate is definitely low.

    I read one time at one of these sites that the total cost of Ares5 would be $140B, but I couldn’t remember where, so I didn’t post it or quote it.

    When folks start throwing numbers around, anything and any interpretation can happen.

    Point being though, even if Bolden mentioned “bailing” out a commercial company(ies), ‘even’ ULA, it would still be more cost effective than shoveling pork-pie into CxP for another two decades in order to pay people in a standing army making 4X more money than I am, claiming their contribution to the Nation is higher than mine and thus worth my tax money.

    Sorry. Ain’t gonna wash with me.

  • amightywind

    Crony capitalism, Obama style, at its best. Bolden cannot survive as NASA Administrator. He has no credibility with congress. Neil and Gene certainly came to play.

  • Bennett

    As NASA Fan noted, everyone (other than Augustine) looked like they were invited to the meeting by mistake. WHO exactly was this meeting supposed to sway? Do transcripts get sent around to the Senate? Do they read them?

    Cernan using whatever Bolden said off the record regarding commercial space didn’t lend any credence to his testimony, it made him look desparate to “score points”. Rockefeller’s parting speech about Johns Hopkins and Sir Issac Newton lost me completely, what the heck was he trying to say? His plodding questions about Why HSF? were likewise without a point. Was this hearing really the place to discuss WHY we have NASA?

    Christ, get a clue!

  • Ben Russell-Gough

    FWIW, I feel that the phrase ‘bail-out’ is inaccurate and poorly-chosen. ‘Bail-out’ implies recuing a failed company. That isn’t really what is being spoken of here. What is being discussed is a blank cheque subsidy. As this ‘plan’ envisages no alternative to the commercial providers (and why is ULA never mentioned in these discussions?), then they cannot fail. Ergo, even if NASA ends up providing every penny to the tune of tens of billions of dollars to get a commercial crewed spacecraft, it is something that Administrator Bolden considers a necessity.

    That’s how I see the state of the discussion anyway.

  • CharlesHouston

    This hearing reinforced to me that the NewSpace folks are just a new player with the same old rules.

    People complain that ULA makes too much money and should bring their money to the table – will SpaceX (for example) be any different? In fact, ULA moved production to cheaper states (such as Alabama) while SpaceX has their production in expensive California. Right now Elon Musk is spending his money in hopes of profitability, how long will it take to exhaust his 100 million or so? What happens when he hits the bottom of his pocket? Can SpaceX convince companies to fly into space or will they be dependent on the government?

    The true game changer is when companies will pay to fly to low orbit – of course they do now with geosynch comm sats. Lower launch prices would help but we need to define what people could do, and will any proposed tech development work towards that?

  • Stephen C. Smith wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 7:11 am

    Cernan claims Bolden is a “dear friend” then throws him under a bus to score a cheap political point. Some friend.

    Even if Bolden did say it, obviously it was just a slang term used in jest.

    I have no respect for Cernan after yesterday’s performance. He came off like a Tea Partier, willing to say ridiculous and hysterical things to get his way.

    Okay, let’s assume all of the above is true.

    What should (or will) happen going forward?

  • Mark R. Whittington

    So what? Bolden suggests that he would give the commercial space companies a bailout if that was what it would take to ensure space access. Then Cernan duly reports what was said to the Senate committee. Now Cernan is that bad guy?

    It seems to me that supporters of Obamaspace need to start asking themselves, is the commercial space initiative actually commercial? It increasingly looks like the answer is no.

  • Doug Lassiter

    I have no problem with Mike Griffin ghostwriting testimony for Neil Armstrong or Gene Cernan, but I find his presence anywhere near that hearing room (as reported elsewhere) as distasteful. Not because I don’t admire his abilities, or because I consider his term as NASA Administrator as one in which the agency sort of ran off the rail with regard to human space flight (and not necessarily because of him). But because he represents agency authority that he doesn’t officially have anymore. His presence was intended to be noted, and it comes across as a distraction. Mike’s role as Administrator was NOT to oversee the development of human space flight in general. Although he might see himself that way, he’s not the prodigal son of human space flight or even of Constellation. His role was to carry out the policy of the administration that hired him. He tried to do that, and in that capacity, he’s all done. That administration is gone. If he wants to hide under the blanket of private citizenship, and poke his nose out occasionally, that’s fine. But to have him on Capitol Hill holding hands with those who are being critical of the current administration, is just over the top.

    Sean O’Keefe kept his head down on NASA policy after leaving, as did Dan Goldin. In fact, it might have been nice to hear more from Dan Goldin in a constructive way. He too was a real visionary.

    As to “bailout”, it was a poor choice of words for Bolden if he did, in fact, say that. As would have been, say “aborting” Constellation, which is pretty much what he did. But the history of NASA, and certainly DoD, is full of what can be termed “bailouts”, as formalized in the cost-plus part of the FAR.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Mark R. Whittington wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 9:38 am

    It seems to me that supporters of Obamaspace need to start asking themselves, is the commercial space initiative actually commercial? It increasingly looks like the answer is no.

    LOL

    from someone who supports a big government program (Constellation) which is consuming Billions producing little but dole jobs and doing almost nothing…you are almost like Castro claiming everyone voted for him…a laugh

    even more so since you once supported in print exactly what is happening now…

    What people like you who support the POR cannot answer except in hyperbola is “why go back to the Moon”. Gene Cernan took a whack at it, and mercifully he was cut off before he got to far down the road of Ted Stryker in Airplane repeatedly telling everyone who was stuck listening to him about Macho Grande.

    Robert G Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    Bennett wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 8:35 am

    As NASA Fan noted, everyone (other than Augustine) looked like they were invited to the meeting by mistake. WHO exactly was this meeting supposed to sway? Do transcripts get sent around to the Senate? Do they read them?

    going from back to front…No, No and good question.

    My guess as to the answer is that I suspect Nelson is trying to figure out a way to drum up support for some massive government program after shuttle/Constellation. Nelson is smart enough to figure out that there is no money to keep Constellation on track per se ie as a set program but is trying to muse through the “B1″ solution which is to keep parts flying (well thats to much…lets say “building” a kind word) for at least this budget cycle so he can take something anything home to the home crowd (I am told he has lost the battle for the LON to become a real mission)

    Problem is that 1) there is not so much money anymore and 2) most of the folks who need to vote to go ahead with something dont have a clue why they should vote for it.

    The “we need a really heavy booster even if it is not affordable” crowd are desperate for a reason that they need one or at least one that sales in public…and so far nothing has really stuck. Mark Whittington might believe the Chinese are going to take over the Moon but few agree with him.

    When the space station was on the ropes NASA learned that star power could sway the semi stars in Washington…Jim Lovell aka Tom hanks was rolled around trying to save the station (and helped)…

    problem is that I dont think that game works all that well now…and while Armstrong and Cernan have some power they (or at least Cernan) squandered it badly with his gaff prone performance in the hearing.

    As I’ve noted before Obama will get his policy, some tinkering around the edges, but if Nelson tries more of this stuff, he loses.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler

    The problem that all the folks who want some other plan, one that has a specific goal and timetable (and budget of sorts) associated with it, have is that they cannot answer the basic question as to “why” that plan should be undertaken.

    So what happens is like buck coming out of a sawed off the effort scatters very quickly. Those who try answers come up with bizarre ones (as Gene Cernan illustrated)…”everything in technology today came from Apollo” or “The Reds are going to take over the Moon” or “Going back to the Moon makes us look like the toughest nation in the world” or…something equally disturbing in terms of a persons grasp on reality.

    To be fair, some like Spudis approach a reason, but it is one that has no real connect to where the American people are in terms of politics.

    The one sure thing about Constellation is that it will cost more, deliver less, and take more time then any of its cheerleaders are claiming. Partially that is a result of NASA being dysfunctional on a management and engineering level. But partially it is also a result of a complete disconnect with the politics of the rest of The Republic.

    Human space flight has since Apollo consumed probably a couple of hundred billion (in constant dollars) and has little to show for it. Instead of embarking on another 200 billion dollar “grind” perhaps it is time to try and accomplish smaller but specific task…and see where that leaves us.

    Gene Cernan looked like Ted STryker from Airplane during the last part of the committee hearing. He was stuck rambling about going back to the Moon much as the character STryker would always ramble about Macho Grande. That more then anything is why the era of big government space programs is over.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Robert G. Oler wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 10:28 am

    Human space flight has since Apollo consumed probably a couple of hundred billion (in constant dollars) and has little to show for it.

    Agreed

    Instead of embarking on another 200 billion dollar “grind” perhaps it is time to try and accomplish smaller but specific task…and see where that leaves us.

    Fair enough. Okay, let’s try to generate wealth from sending humans into space rather than consume wealth from sending humans in space.

    That said, from my perspective, wealth creation from humans in space shall require that we sell intangible goods and services such as tourism, media rights, marketing, advertising and entertainment. Nothing else has a prayer of closing a business case any time soon.

    Q: Space solar power?
    A: Nope.

    Q: He3?
    A: Heh! Nope.

    Q: PGMs & rare earths elements?
    A: Eh, maybe except platinum is a $10 billion per year market, a market that is too small and thin to support an asteroid mining program.

    Q: Zero gee ball bearings and pharma research?
    A: If that was a truly viable market European drug companies would already be flying a Russian made MirCorp II without NASA involvement.

    Other ideas?

  • …but it is one that has no real connect to where the American people are in terms of politics.

    Bingo.

    And that’s the crux of it.

    Most folks could give a good “dad-gum” about canned primates.

    Give them Google-Moon and Google-Mars, they’re happy.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Bill White wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 10:39 am

    Bill. this is why I like the Obama policy so much.

    I’ve thought (as have you and some other here) a lot about how to start human involvement in spaceflight and…what I see are a couple of possible models. What I have settled on as being the most likely to advance the cause of humans in space is the Geo Satellite model.

    ISS proved two things in my view.

    First that there was a role for humans in space assembling things. Second the role is useless unless the cost associated with it go down a lot.

    But I think that the second thing is possible (ie the cost can come down) and once that happens; with some suitable technology demonstrators that turn out to have long term value (much as the ATS/ACT satellites did) I think that human assembly of large complexes in space for uncrewed ops (of things that already have value in themselves) will become routine.

    I foresee a future where humans at an assembly complex spend sometime (weeks) putting together large complexes which then use a space tug (probably a Vasimer knock off) to put them in the final orbit. I see LARGE national defense platforms which are serviced by humans…

    but I see the evolution much like the GEO satellites…ie small and relatively simple building up to Ratslim (Milstar) sized efforts.

    To me a truly R&D effort to make a fuel depot work, to master the VASIMER and a few other things are far more important then a lunar goal.

    Robert G. Oler

  • CI

    Here’s a great question that no one has asked…

    According to Bolden, the commercial companies will be used to go to the station and that’s it, NASA will handle the “complicated” stuff beyond LEO.

    Ok, now you have testimony from Bolden yesterday saying that he hopes to have manned launches to the ISS from commercial companies by 2015. And you have the testimony from Norm Augustine yesterday where he said he thinks it will be more like 2017.

    So, that means that at most SpaceX (or any commercial company) will have somewhere between 3 and 5 years to fly to the station. (If their rockets are even ready by THOSE dates).

    So, if Charlie Bolden is comfortable with using the Soyuz to get to the ISS for at least the next 5 years why wouldn’t he be comfortable to use the Soyuz for 10 years?

    Why are we investing all this money into commercial companies for a mission that will only be done for AT BEST 3-5 years ?

    Why not let Soyuz just take us there for 10 years and shift the money from the commercial companies back to Constellation or some version of it that goes beyond LEO?

    Maybe Ares 1 will be ready before the 2020 close out of ISS and if so then that’s great, it’s just a bonus. At least the Ares 1 was meant to be used with Ares 5 to go beyond LEO whereas all the money spent on these commercial companies goes by by in 2020. What a waste of money that is!

  • Vladislaw

    “Why are we investing all this money into commercial companies for a mission that will only be done for AT BEST 3-5 years ?

    Why not let Soyuz just take us there for 10 years and shift the money from the commercial companies back to Constellation or some version of it that goes beyond LEO?”

    We are investing this money for a couple reasons. Regardless if ISS is there or not, NASA can use lower cost commercial launch firms for access to LEO. Your question presupposes that exploration starts on the ground instead of starting in LEO.

    There is already talk of extending the ISS to 2028 so we will have a potential need for longer then 3 years.

    It helps America capture the global market for commercial space access.

    The Nation has other firms working on destinations, this helps support that industry also.

    NASA is charged with helping to promote domestic space services first before supporting foreign suppliers.

  • Vladislaw

    Robert wrote:

    Our views: Stranded in space
    Obama’s NASA plan in limbo as Congress keeps fighting his proposals

    one more reason Obama will get his policy”

    Any plan that utilizes the external tank would also mean they could extend the shuttle because the tank keeps being mentioned as the sticking point to keeping it flying. Is that the reason supporters of the shuttle want the HLV to be shuttle derived to keep it flying?

  • Bolden was clearly willing to say anthing in hopes that he could get the endorsement of Armstrong/Cernan. Even promises that he is not in a position to keep.

    The response of Bolden to Senator Nelson’s question about NASA’s priorities was somewhat reassuring, compared to Holdren’s reply that Climate Research and Green Aviation are just as important to NASA as climate research.

    There are valid arguments on both sides. Armstrong and Cernan clearly provided strong arguments why Obama’s proposal would probably be very bad news for NASA, our nation, and the world.

  • Correction(!):

    The response of Bolden to Senator Nelson’s question about NASA’s priorities was somewhat reassuring, compared to Holdren’s reply that Climate Research and Green Aviation are just as important to NASA as manned space exploration.

  • richardb

    One damning statements that have yet to be rebutted:
    Armstrong said this: “I have yet to find a person in NASA, the Defense Department, the Air Force, the National Academies, industry, or academia that had any knowledge of the plan prior to its announcement,”

    This statement can easily be tested for truth. Armstrong, like the excellent engineer that he is, makes a simple statement without equivocation. “I have yet to find a person”.

    If Armstrong was lazy and didn’t reach out enough we should be hearing from those people in those organizations who did have a voice in crafting Obama’s plan. Very soon I expect.

    If we don’t hear from authoritative individuals in those organizations in the next day or so, we should all take Armstrong’s statement as truth that nobody in a position of line responsibility or in depth knowledge of America’s space industry was involved in crafting Obama’s plan. Who was involved? Congress will want to know. If the experienced managers and engineers weren’t involved that leaves the political types as the architects, in short the ideologues.

    As for Cernan’s remark, I’ve read elsewhere that the statement was common knowledge in and around higher ups at Nasa. For those claiming it’s a conspiracy between Cernan and Griffin to slander Bolden, you need to put some compelling evidence that Cernan is lying. But you don’t have any.

    All in all a great day for those of us believing that Obama’s plan is a disaster for NASA at all levels whether its human space flight or not.

  • One damning statements that have yet to be rebutted:
    Armstrong said this: “I have yet to find a person in NASA, the Defense Department, the Air Force, the National Academies, industry, or academia that had any knowledge of the plan prior to its announcement,”

    Why is it damning? In what way does that distinguish it from the VSE?

  • For that matter, in what way does it distinguish it from the ESAS study?

  • Sum Guy

    nobody in a position of line responsibility or in depth knowledge of America’s space industry was involved in crafting Obama’s plan. Who was involved? Congress will want to know. If the experienced managers and engineers weren’t involved that leaves the political types as the architects, in short the ideologues.

    Everybody with any in depth knowledge already knows exactly who the real architects are of this space policy. Those people in Obama’s inner circle the OSTP and OMB can read, reading was the only skill required here and canceling Constellation and going commercial was a well known paradigm and basically a no brainer decision – it didn’t take too long.

    The big question was the congressional compromises on lifeboats, new propulsion and launch initiatives (SLI anyone?) i.e. – what can these civil servant types actually do, what are their capabilities, since DESIGNING launch vehicle architectures and space programs isn’t two of them, apparently. They’ve got the little compromises all lined up to go as well.

    Take off your tin foil hat and join the rest of us in the reality based world.

  • Wayne

    The private sector has always been more competitive and certainly more cost effective than government when there is a market and a demand for products and or services.

    The United States has proven over and over again that capitalism is a business model for ingenuity, quality and cost effectiveness.

    The only problem here is that you first need a demand for that service and or product, and when government becomes the only entity that is in demand for that product and or service you essentially have inefficiencies and most certainly high costs.

    Examples of companies with government contracts:

    1. Boeing
    2. Northrop Grumman
    3. Raytheon
    4. General Dynamics
    5. GE

    Do you for a second think that the U.S. government gets anything on the cheap from these companies?

    Don’t get me wrong here, the technology and quality that these companies offer is second to none, but the government is integrally involved and in the case of military and NASA hardware rightly so!
    That gets to my point here and the question I’m about to ask…

    What private firm/company has ever put something like the Mars rovers Sogener, Spirit and Opportunity and the Phoenix Lander on to another planet?

    Although Private firms i.e. listed above were most definitely involved they were not at the helm!

    So, for Obama to think companies like SpaceX or Orbital Science can just all of a sudden start launching Astronauts into Low Earth orbit (LEO) is a pipe dream.

    Good luck SpaceX and Orbital Science you’re going to need more than a miracle just to get cargo to LEO not to mention Astronauts.

    These companies are promising to be able to launch Astronauts by 2013 -2015 time periods and if the U.S. puts all their eggs in to these two baskets we are going to be unable to get anyone to LEO for some time to come.

    Obama will most certainly go down in history alright… he will go down in history for being the one that axed the U.S. rocket science brain trust and the U.S. manned space program!

  • yakman

    Well, maybe the ISS “mission” will get extended to 2025 or 2028 or even beyond, but what never seems to get discussed is what happens if – post Shuttle – some physically large or massive critical component eventually fails (there are a lot of them, not to mention the toilets)? How do you get the new component up there in the Grand Plan As Currently Envisioned? Soyuz/Progress can’t do it, neither can Jules Verne or the Japanese carrier, nor even can cargo Dragon – they all are basically limited in physical size and carrying capacity. There is a window of vulernability in the Plan during which such a critical single-point failure can seriously compromise or even terminate ISS extension. Heavy lift is absolutely necessary.

  • Bennett

    Wayne wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 1:27 pm

    “you’re going to need more than a miracle just to get cargo to LEO”

    I believe SpaceX had already delivered cargo (a satellite) to LEO, so no miracle required. Granted, cargo to the ISS will be delivered on a Falcon 9.

    “These companies are promising to be able to launch Astronauts by 2013 -2015 time periods and if the U.S. puts all their eggs in to these two baskets we are going to be unable to get anyone to LEO for some time to come.”

    Why only two baskets? What about ULA? When you folks try to discredit the proposed direction for NASA, why do you think cherry picking and ignoring facts will get a pass from folks who actually read and understand what’s been proposed?

    Being obtuse is really lame.

    yakman wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 1:34 pm

    Fine, if you can figure out a way to eek out an extra 3 billion per year for NASA (above what’s been proposed in FY2011) then I’m sure the President will have NASA start on the HLV right away. Starting right away was part of Option 5b of the Augustine Report, but where does that money come from?

  • Vladislaw

    richardb wrote:

    “If we don’t hear from authoritative individuals in those organizations in the next day or so, we should all take Armstrong’s statement as truth that nobody in a position of line responsibility or in depth knowledge of America’s space industry was involved in crafting Obama’s plan. Who was involved?”

    The President is trying to change an entrenched government agency. When that is the case, since when has any President FIRST went to the major stakeholders and announced that he is ending their gravy train? All it does is give them the time and ammunition they need to derail those plans. What the President should have polled ATK, Lockheed, Boeing and asked their opinions about closing them down? Sorry politics doesnt work that way.

    Wayne wrote:

    “So, for Obama to think companies like SpaceX or Orbital Science can just all of a sudden start launching Astronauts into Low Earth orbit (LEO) is a pipe dream.”

    All of a sudden in 5-7 years? Sheesh, you really hate the American aerospace worker don’t you. Why such a lack of faith? Are the Republic’s aerospace engineers and workers that incompetent that they can not launch a soyuz style rocket and capsule? Are you saying the Nation’s engineers are that stupid?

    Please explain this hated of the ability of american workers.

  • yakman

    @bennett: per: “Fine, if you can figure out a way to eek out an extra 3 billion per year for NASA (above what’s been proposed in FY2011) then I’m sure the President will have NASA start on the HLV right away. Starting right away was part of Option 5b of the Augustine Report, but where does that money come from?”

    Sir, you state an unproven as a given; a bump of 3 gigabucks is frankly peanuts in this economy and budget, but we can argue that til the cows come home. The real point is that a major risk – The Elephant Sitting in the Living Room – is that the whole current raison d’etre for going to LEO (ISS) is at major risk starting with the end of current high volume heavy lift (Shuttle); the risk of those toilets backing up (or to be serious, other major massive or high-cargo-volume critical system failure) increases with time; eventually something will happen, and at this point it does not look like there is any means of solving the problem until some sort of alternative “Heavy Lift” is implemented in what, the mid 20’s. If what you are saying is that the comparative merit of taking that risk versus spending that extra 3 gigabucks per year nods toward not spending the money, then please say so – or better, maybe the People Running the Show should more clearly explain the manner in which they are betting the ranch.

  • Robert G. Oler

    CI wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 11:22 am

    Ares is a non starter. it cost far to much to build and operate (all versions).

    Robert G. Oler

  • eh

    NASA gets a plus up and all they can do is whine that it’s not more? Funny, not a peep during the Bush years while Cxp was slowly dying.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Wayne wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 1:27 pm


    Obama will most certainly go down in history alright… he will go down in history for being the one that axed the U.S. rocket science brain trust and the U.S. manned space program!

    assuming you are talking about the group that is essentially defined by the space shuttle and Constellation…why do you think that anyone cares about that group?

    While this group might be individually talented it is hard to argue that those talents have paid back the cost to maintain them to The Republic.

    People who have your viewpoint dont seem to grasp that there is another way…ie government simply buying a service from private industry…not government using private industry as design bureaus.

    sad

    Robert G. Oler

  • Bennett

    @yakman per “If what you are saying is that the comparative merit of taking that risk versus spending that extra 3 gigabucks per year nods toward not spending the money, then please say so”

    I agree with you. I thing there IS enough money to do HLV and take the wise course of Option 5b. We NEED the infrastructure planned for in this path, we NEED a sustainable program with milestones and goals, plural, goals. What we don’t need is a single HSF program that eats up all the NASA budget, leaving nothing for completing the actual mission in 2035.

    If Congress is willing to increase NASA’s budget to cover the cost of developing a HLV (non-shuttle derived, because we KNOW how expensive that is) while fully funding what is laid out in Option 5b, then I’d be happy, and since BOTH major political parties fought for this budget I’d rest a tad easier, knowing it would be harder to kill it in ’12 or ’16.

    I’ve watched NASA since before Apollo 11, and once Nixon did his little number, and then years of nothing until the shuttle finally flew, I am too aware of how quickly the years pass when a program is in trouble and over budget. I want to watch humanity start to flex it’s technology around HSF. I want to see progress before I die of old age.

  • There’s not enough manned spaceflight traffic from the US side to the ISS to sustain more than one company. The emerging private spaceflight companies should focus on space tourism and launching their own space stations into orbit, not NASA contracts.

    Once tourist have a place to go and reliable spacecraft to take them there, manned space tourism will quickly dwarf any manned space activities involving NASA.

  • Ben Joshua

    Mr. Armstrong is not likely to meet NASA or contractor insiders who will bite the hand that feeds them, by failing to tow the NASA party line.

    By contrast, how many on this site have been to a space conference where NASA / contractor shortcomings, alternative architectures and private sector potential were discussed in detail, in the halls, at dinner, in breakout sessions and on panels? Just wondering…

    btw, if you tout NASA successes as proof that NASA should be the sole arbiter of what constitutes good space policy, you must also accept that NASA must bear responsibility for its failures, the most notable and tragic being, sadly, preventable.

    It would be better if a change this big could take place more smoothly. Entrenched powers though, are loathe to give up their taxpayer funded quest for a return to Apollo glory. That singular moment in space politics and history is over.

  • Wayne

    Bennett wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 1:43 pm

    “Why only two baskets? What about ULA? When you folks try to discredit the proposed direction for NASA, why do you think cherry picking and ignoring facts will get a pass from folks who actually read and understand what’s been proposed?”

    For your information SpaceX has launched 5 Falcon 1’s with 3 failures, and the falcon 9 has never launched.

    If you actually spent time listening to the U.S. Senate committee NASA administrator Bolden specifically put SpaceX out there as the primary commercial entity that would be taking Astronauts to the ISS with Orbital Science following.

    Let’s just throw in all of the private companies out there and let’s keep in mind the goal is to send “Astronauts” not just cargo to the ISS, Lockheed Martin’s Atlas V and Boeing’s Delta IV… I actually don’t think you have a clue of what it takes to human rate these rockets and the time and costs involved.

    Several things that you are also completely missing the boat on is the added redundancies that are needed with human rated vehicles, which in essence mean a complete redesign, not to mention they don’t even have the safety requirement written in which these companies have to adhere to.

    The commercial sector is a huge risk and to say the least is a pipe dream, but sense you have no doubt put yourself out there with others… you will have a lot of splainin to do when they can’t produce and they leave the US grounded for probably a decade.

    I would suggest that you are the one that doesn’t understand the complexities that are involved.

  • For your information SpaceX has launched 5 Falcon 1’s with 3 failures, and the falcon 9 has never launched.

    Apparently you don’t understand the concept of a flight test program. Each of those three failures got progressively better, with the last two flights completely successful (i.e., they wrung the bugs out). The lessons learned from that have been applied to the Falcon 9, which is on the pad, and expected to launch within a couple weeks or so.

    If you actually spent time listening to the U.S. Senate committee NASA administrator Bolden specifically put SpaceX out there as the primary commercial entity that would be taking Astronauts to the ISS with Orbital Science following.

    Yes, that was dumb. He’s sabotaging his own program by ignoring ULA, and allowing others to do so.

    Several things that you are also completely missing the boat on is the added redundancies that are needed with human rated vehicles, which in essence mean a complete redesign, not to mention they don’t even have the safety requirement written in which these companies have to adhere to.

    No additional redundancy or reliability is required to launch humans on Atlas, Delta or Falcon. The former have excellent reliability records, and launch billion-dollar satellites. The Falcon has already been designed to NASA’s existing human-rating standards.

    The commercial sector is a huge risk and to say the least is a pipe dream, but sense you have no doubt put yourself out there with others… you will have a lot of splainin to do when they can’t produce and they leave the US grounded for probably a decade.

    The commercial sector has much more incentive not to kill people than NASA does. If they have an accident, it could put them out of business. When NASA kills astronauts, it gets more money.

  • Wayne

    Rand Simberg wrote

    “Apparently you don’t understand the concept of a flight test program. Each of those three failures got progressively better, with the last two flights completely successful (i.e., they wrung the bugs out). The lessons learned from that have been applied to the Falcon 9, which is on the pad, and expected to launch within a couple weeks or so.”

    Again another self taught rocket scientist…

    Do you know what a statistical sample size is?

    Obama is betting on a sample size of 5 and I guess you are as well… good luck!

    Hope you don’t go to Vegas to often!

  • Bennett

    Wayne wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 2:42 pm

    What a nice guy you are! Thanks for filling me in on all those details, how did I ever get along without you as my friend?

    “For your information SpaceX has launched 5 Falcon 1’s with 3 failures, and the falcon 9 has never launched.” – Wow, would I find that info on the SpaceX web site?

    “I actually don’t think you have a clue of what it takes to human rate these rockets and the time and costs involved.” – Whatever number you pull out of your hat is billions less money and years less time than Ares 1.

    “The commercial sector is a huge risk” – Soyuz is a commercial LV, and has a better track record than the Shuttle.

    But you’re right, I must not understand the complexities that are involved.

  • amightywind

    At the very least the result of this hearing should be another hearing into the planning of Obamaspace. To this point no one in the Obamasphere has stepped forward to claim responsibility. As Neil pointed out, the uninformed plan had to have been hatched by a few disconnected individuals without due input from the space community. The NASA plan, is a naked power grab, just like Obamacare. I don’t think it will stand.

    A better plan will be to restructure the Constellation program and reapportion NASA’s budget to support it. I have to believe there is lots of waste on the science side.

  • Wayne

    Rand Simberg wrote

    “No additional redundancy or reliability is required to launch humans on Atlas, Delta or Falcon. The former have excellent reliability records, and launch billion-dollar satellites. The Falcon has already been designed to NASA’s existing human-rating standards.”

    If you would like I could guide you to NASA’s human rated standards and this shows you don’t have a clue about what you are talking about.
    So just to fill you in… A human rated vehicle needs to have at least three tiers of redundancies.

    And I don’t make things up as I go along… I actually look them up before I put myself out there.

    Good Luck!

  • CI

    I’m not buying Ares 1 is a non starter and would cost way to much. That’s crazy…
    Seriously, it’s a damn shuttle rocket with an extra segment and a capsule.
    How can it cost too much?
    Every shuttle launch they have has TWO rockets AND an external tank. And they fly MANY flights a year and employee a much larger workforce than Constellation would. Somehow that is affordable…

    And let’s say that after the shuttle retires the Constellation program employed half of what Shuttle did; how can it be to expensive to build Ares 1?
    Cmon. Stop smoking whatever your smoking.
    It’s just a bigger version of what they already have been using. It’s not like it’s worlds different. For god sakes, they’ve already flown a mockup of the thing and tested the 5 stage out in Utah. Once the shuttle money is freed up from A) Launch Costs and B) Employee costs, they couldn’t get Ares 1 going?
    Like I said they’ve already launched a mockup WHILE shuttle flights are ongoing and a full shuttle workforce employed. So think about it this way… 5 years it took to get a test flight. Free up a ton of money from shuttle flights and workforce and maybe it takes 2.5 years to fly the real thing.
    I’m not buying this Augustine hoo-ee about it will take 15 years for Ares, blah blah blah
    They are just saying that garbage to push commercial, and that’s what it is, GARBAGE.

    Then you have the capsule that has being built, water tested, escape engines tested, parachutes tested. Perfect ! Put it on a dang Ares 1 as designed and be done with it.

    Ares 1 with an Orion has got to be in the near future. I don’t buy after all the money and testing that it’s just WAY TO MUCH and will take another zillion years as Augustine would like you to buy into.

    The fact is, we have come to a certain point with the extra cost of shuttle.
    So, the logical conclusion is once the money is freed up so will the launch of a manned Ares/Orion.

    And as most people here/Congress/Astronauts know, I’m on the right track with this. We’re not falling for the Obama buffoonery.

  • Again another self taught rocket scientist…

    No, I was taught by the best in the business, though there’s no such thing as a “rocket scientist.”

    Do you know what a statistical sample size is?

    I do. Do you know what dependent events are? Or is this just a different way of explaining that you don’t understand flight test programs?

    Obama is betting on a sample size of 5 and I guess you are as well…

    Ummmmmm….

    No.

    If you would like I could guide you to NASA’s human rated standards

    I am (sadly) all too familiar with them. As I said, Falcon has been designed to them.

  • Wayne

    Bennett wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 3:01 pm
    “Soyuz is a commercial LV, and has a better track record than the Shuttle.”

    So… you would like to rely on the Russian’s?

    The Soyuz is a very solid design and was design by the Soviet Union and was designed on the backs of slaves…

    Not a very good example…

    Also, a friend doesn’t say that “I don’t seem to grasp that there is another way”….

    Take care and I don’t think you do “grasp” the complexities…

  • amightywind

    Bennett wrote:
    “But you’re right, I must not understand the complexities that are involved.”

    Looks like you picked on the wrong guy chump. A Falcon 9 is laughingly incomparable to an Ares I. And Ares I has flown.

  • Seriously, it’s a damn shuttle rocket with an extra segment and a capsule.

    How can it cost too much?

    Why ask us? Go ask NASA. They’re the ones who will say that its development costs are thirty-five billion. That’s too much.

  • And Ares I has flown.

    Why do you continue to perpetuate this falsehood? It only makes you look like a liar, or a fool.

  • Wayne

    Bennett wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 3:01 pm

    “Do you know what dependent events are? Or is this just a different way of explaining that you don’t understand flight test programs?”

    Ohhh but I do, but again… a statistical universe is dependent on applicable design requirements i.e. human or cargo… big difference…

    SpaceX is a far cry from close to being human rated there Falcon 9 let not to mention it hasn’t even flown yet!

    You must like to gamble???

  • Robert G. Oler

    CI wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 3:13 pm

    I’m not buying Ares 1 is a non starter and would cost way to much. That’s crazy…

    well I dont get it either but it does. So far Ares development has cost more then Falcon 9/1, Atlas and Delta combined.

    The cost are just stunning. I am told (but have not verified) that the cost in real dollars to do the single Orion LAS vrs the test that were done by Little/Big Joe on the Apollo LAS is higher. It cost 1/2 billion dollars to do that bottle rocket stunt, which isnt even a flight test article or a flight test config (NO ARES 1 has not flown).

    NASA seems to think that it is going to take another 20-30 billion dollars to make the rocket work.

    I dont get it, but thats the numbers.

    Deal with reality

    Robert G. Oler

  • SpaceX is a far cry from close to being human rated there Falcon 9 let not to mention it hasn’t even flown yet!

    Its design meets all existing NASA requirements for human rating. Sorry to have reality intrude.

  • Wayne

    Rand Simberg wrote

    “Its design meets all existing NASA requirements for human rating. Sorry to have reality intrude.”

    No it does not meet all of Nasa’s designs.

    Safety requirements have not even been written yet to ensure that any of these vehicles are safe for astronauts to fly in… and safety requirements include hardware as well…

    So intrude as you will but think before you write..

    Also, if it blows up does that still count?

  • Vladislaw

    Gosh Rand, I think you are deep water now with Wayne. I mean he does raise a valid point. SpaceX has never launched the Falcon 9 and hell let’s face it .. who would be crazy enough to sign on the dotted line with a company that has a rocket on the pad and never flown?

    “PARIS — Satellite two-way messaging service provider Orbcomm said its core markets of commercial truck fleets and heavy-equipment vehicles are rebounding with the broader economy and that its new maritime vessel-identification and tracking service — which the company views as a major growth opportunity — is also gaining traction.

    The Ft. Lee, N.J.-based company, which operates a constellation of 29 satellites, said it has sufficient cash on hand to fund the construction and launch of its 18 second-generation satellites, to be placed into low Earth orbit starting in early 2011.

    In a May 10 conference call with investors and in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Orbcomm officials said the company is having discussions with startup launch-services provider Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) on whether Orbcomm’s small satellites could be launched as secondary payloads on SpaceX’s medium-lift Falcon 9 rocket.”
    Space News

    oops .. never mind.

  • Safety requirements have not even been written yet to ensure that any of these vehicles are safe for astronauts to fly in… and safety requirements include hardware as well…

    That’s why I said existing requirements. But there’s no reason to think that they will somehow become a lot more stringent, especially considering that NASA itself has not designed a vehicle that met them in over four decades. I don’t know what your blather about “includes hardware as well” means.

  • Wayne

    To Rand Simberg

    Existing requirements means “COTS” which when SpaceX signed on to “COTS” only included cargo not humans…

    Safety requirements is just that and if you watched the senate committee hearing yesterday safety was a sticking point for Bolden.

    Also, to monitor safety that includes hardware… you know as opposed to software???

  • Wayne

    You’re right Vladislaw you couldn’t get me to sign on that dotted line even if you had a gun pointed at me.

  • Existing requirements means “COTS” which when SpaceX signed on to “COTS” only included cargo not humans…

    No, existing requirements means NPR 8705.2B, NASA Human-Rating Requirements. Falcon 9 has been designed to them. And I continue to not understand why you blather about hardware and software. Falcon 9 meets them with both. SpaceX has always planned to launch passengers on the Falcon, from long before COTS.

  • Vladislaw

    Rand, did those requirements by NASA change at all during the ESAS evalution of competitive systems and post ESAS once NASA started with Ares I ?

    I seem to recall that the rules of the road were changed after Constellation started.

  • The requirements haven’t changed, but NASA waived them for Ares/Orion, just as it did for Shuttle. As I said, no vehicle has ever been built that meets them. Well, until Falcon, that is…

  • I should revise that. They may have changed, because the most recent version is dated 2008. I haven’t dug into the revision tables to see what’s new.

  • Wayne

    To Rand Simberg

    Actually NASA revised their safety requirements because they were initially written for the Shuttle after it disintegrated on reentry, and they saw that it would be very difficult to have Ares stick to those stringent safety requirements… so they actually made them a little more lax for Ares due to the fact the Ares 1 would have the ability to jettison the capsule if there was a major malfunction.

  • Actually NASA revised their safety requirements because they were initially written for the Shuttle after it disintegrated on reentry, and they saw that it would be very difficult to have Ares stick to those stringent safety requirements

    Shuttle never met NASA’s human-rating requirements.

    so they actually made them a little more lax for Ares due to the fact the Ares 1 would have the ability to jettison the capsule if there was a major malfunction.

    Now you’re just making things up. You’re obviously completely unfamiliar with them.

  • Vladislaw

    Wayne wrote:

    “so they actually made them a little more lax for Ares due to the fact the Ares 1 would have the ability to jettison the capsule if there was a major malfunction.”

    So when Griffin and his junta were privately evaluating alternative systems, during the ESAS deliberations were they “made them a little more lax” for other launch systems? Or did they say that the other systems were impossible because the requirements were just to demanding and ONLY the Ares I would be safe enough because of these high standards they were following?

  • Gary Church

    All the pieces are there for AresI. Just saying it will cost too much to complete is not good enough. If it is so overpriced than maybe taking a look at bringing the costs down is the way to go. If it is overpriced than it can be accurately priced and then flown for the rest of the century. IMHO the configuration is correct; an SRB resuable first stage, and a reusable capsule with an escape tower. The problem is that railed in from utah segmented SRB is not powerful enough. There is a deserted factory in the everglades that was ready to produce a 6 million pound thrust SRB made in one piece with submarine hull technology; that was over 40 years ago. The second problem is the throw away second stage; the engine can be reentered with an ablative, recovered and re-used just like the 1st stage while the second stage tank stays in orbit as a wet workshop. Throwing away the second stage with the engine is no good. And the escape tower can be reused and recovered also. That is the machine we should build- AresI could be developed into a fully reusable wet workshop design over time just as the R-7 was improved into soyuz.

  • Robert G. Oler: Ares is a non starter. it cost far to much to build and operate (all versions).

    You keep spreading the same misinformation…but one has to ask, “Where’s the beef?”

    Now, I have mine, which is from the Augustine Committee Final Report, recent testimony from Doug Cooke and a letter from NASA, all of which indicate that the above statement by you is incorrect. But, if you are as educated about the space program as you claim to be, you already know that.

    Here are the facts:
    Doug Cooke (March 24): Marginal cost of an Ares I launch, at 2 launches per year, is $176M.

    NASA: (March 23): Fixed cost of Ares I, at 3 launches per year, $1.1B.

    Augustine (p. 50): Fixed cost of Shuttle is $1.5B.

    Shannon (Space News): Marginal cost of Shuttle, at two launches per year, is $500M.

    So Robert, how does Ares cost far to much to build and operate (all versions) when at 2 flights per year it’s $1B less ($2.5B – $1.5B) than Shuttle to operate?

    It does not.

  • Rand Simberg: As I said, no vehicle has ever been built that meets them. Well, until Falcon, that is…

    Then you must know something Charlie Bolden, Doug Cook, Vice Admiral Joe Dyer, John Frost, and Wayne Hale don’t. Possible, but not very likely.

    According to The Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel in its 2009 report, the human rating guidelines have not yet been released. In testimony by John Frost of the same panel before the Senate Appropriations Science Subcommittee on April 22nd, he confirmed that the hardware human rating guidelines have not been released, not even in draft form. Doug Cooke testified that the draft of the hardware human rating guidelines would be released by the end of April. That date has come and gone without such a draft release.

    What SpaceX did was take a guess, based on the 2008 guidelines, and hope for the best. So, SpaceX’s CEO Gwynne Shotwell mis-spoke when she <a href="http://www.americaspace.org/?p=1973"stated on March 18th to Senator Nelson that SpaceX's Falcon 9 and Dragon capsule are human rated.

    They. Are. Not.

    More pointedly, Bolden the human rating guidelines to be released this year are hardware only. Later to come are the much more complicated process guidelines.

    Heck, read Wayne Hale’s blog about the human rating requirements and you would realize that what you have been writing about this matter is poorly informed at best.

  • All the pieces are there for AresI.

    No, they’re not. It doesn’t have an upper-stage, or an engine for it.

    As for building a reusable version of it, the expendable version is going to cost tens of billions. Do you really think you’re going to save in development costs by making it reusable?

    Here are the facts:
    Doug Cooke (March 24): Marginal cost of an Ares I launch, at 2 launches per year, is $176M.

    NASA: (March 23): Fixed cost of Ares I, at 3 launches per year, $1.1B.

    Augustine (p. 50): Fixed cost of Shuttle is $1.5B.

    Shannon (Space News): Marginal cost of Shuttle, at two launches per year, is $500M.

    So Robert, how does Ares cost far to much to build and operate (all versions) when at 2 flights per year it’s $1B less ($2.5B – $1.5B) than Shuttle to operate?

    You apparently don’t understand the meanings of those words. Marginal costs are pretty much independent of flight rate. Fixed costs are also pretty much independent of flight rate (within limits). I don’t know where you got that Shannon number (other than “Space News”), but that can’t be right. Marginal cost of the shuttle is much less than half a billion per flight. And Shuttle fixed costs are much higher than $1.5B (perhaps twice that).

    Of course, the point you’re missing is that marginal costs are irrelevant when the flight rate is so low, and the development costs so high. If it costs thirty-five billion to develop Ares, that has to be amortized over its flights. If it flies seventy times (that is, a couple times a year for decades), that cost will be half a billion dollars per flight. Even if you sink the 9 billion already spent, it’s till close to $400M. Then add in the fixed annual costs, and each Ares flight is well over a billion. That’s about the same as Shuttle at a flight rate of three per year, but the Shuttle has much more capability. And I didn’t include the costs of Orion.

  • Ben Russell-Gough

    @ CL,

    You have slightly simplified your description of Ares-I. In between the extended SRM and the capsule is an all-new cryogenic rocket stage with an all-new engine with near-unprecendented performance. Oh, and that solid rocket lower stage? It has a different propellent grain and propellent geometry to the shuttle’s SRM. There is also different steering hardware too. You are looking at a virtually all-new LV that has little commonality with the well-understood and mass-produced shuttle RSRM.

    This is all before you start talking about the safety equipment to turn the shaky SRM into a human-safe rocket. None of these features are needed for the shuttle, whose weight and configuration absorbs most of the more unpleasent dynamic features of the long, narrow SRM.

    Overall, Ares-I is a real cutting-edge beast, more challenging in its own way than any other rocket that has ever flown. It makes sense that it would be enormously expensive.

    Hindsight is 20/20. I wonder if anyone at NASA ever pulls out the ESAS, looks at the politically-unacceptable options and thinks “If only…!”

  • Ben Joshua

    This non-tech outsider, who, like all of you, helps pay the bill, would like to comment on the politics of the hearing.

    Sen. Nelson got his Commerce Committee hearing, and got some accomplished honored astronauts to appear, out of their depth, to put a foot in the door for Nelson’s hope of a compromise HLV addition to FY2011.

    Nelson got his “Astronauts say…” headlines (some), which will be yesterday’s headlines as the media and nation continue to watch the gulf and gulf coast traumatized by the oil spew.

    I suspect most of you would have chosen different panel members, whichever view you take of Ares (I, I-X, IV,V, plan B), 5b / flexible path, black zones, mass fractions, private sector newcomers (hiring lots of old hands), and of course, the president.

    Thing is, the hearing was an embarrassment. Pro, con or third way, I would guess you wish other folks had presented, able to lay out each option as accurately and accessibly as possible (well, maybe with a thumb on the scale for your side).

    I find myself wishing those who want to deep six ISS, just as it’s completed, had spoken out against ISS back when it squeaked through the Senate.

    that those who speak urgently about the space gap, had spoken out back when it was set in stone by Bush and Griffin.

    that those who say the privates just aren’t ready to pull off LEO, had been true to NASA’s mission, and encouraged the privates when they were roadblocked by the NASA / contractor monolith over the last few decades.

    NASA, by insisting it be given a blank check and sole authority over policy, has run out of good will. Nelson may get some kind of HLV study or preliminary design work, into the budget. But a green light for a Direct-like SD HLV (instead of a future, more economical design), will require support from Sen. Nelsons colleagues.

    They are not in the mood. Congress is content to let the president take the heat for a long overdue reset of NASA.

    Quietly, they will go along.

  • According to The Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel in its 2009 report, the human rating guidelines have not yet been released.

    Those are the new guidelines. The fact that new ones are coming out doesn’t mean that there aren’t existing ones.

    What SpaceX did was take a guess, based on the 2008 guidelines, and hope for the best.

    Of course they did. What else could they do, under the circumstances?

    So, SpaceX’s CEO Gwynne Shotwell mis-spoke when she <a href="http://www.americaspace.org/?p=1973"stated on March 18th to Senator Nelson that SpaceX's Falcon 9 and Dragon capsule are human rated.

    Yes, she did misspeak. But I didn’t. What I said remains true. Falcon 9/Dragon have been designed to existing NASA human-ratings requirements.

    Heck, read Wayne Hale’s blog about the human rating requirements and you would realize that what you have been writing about this matter is poorly informed at best.

    I am familiar with Wayne’s work. I talk to him occasionally. And if I’m poorly informed on this matter, I’m an expert compared to anyone else who has been posting in this thread.

  • ISSvet

    CI wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 11:22 am

    testimony from Bolden yesterday saying that he hopes to have manned launches to the ISS from commercial companies by 2015. And you have the testimony from Norm Augustine yesterday where he said he thinks it will be more like 2017

    When Norm mentioned 2017, he was talking about Constellation. It was a clumsy transition and threw me for a moment too, until I reviewed his exact words.

  • Wayne

    Rand Simberg Wrote

    “Now you’re just making things up. You’re obviously completely unfamiliar with them.”

    God are you contentious…

    From NASA’s Blog website and good going Jim Hillhouse

    There is a debate going on about human rating spacecraft – making them safe enough for people to fly on. It is really a debate about safety and how much NASA will be involved in ensuring that commercial providers of space transportation services are safe. There has been a lot said about human rating space vehicles lately, much of it confusing. Read NASA’s requirements document for yourself at this location:

    http://nodis3.gsfc.nasa.gov/displayDir.cfm?t=NPR&c=8705&s=2B

    Even if you read it thoroughly you will not understand what is really being said unless you understand the context and the NASA culture in which it resides. Just reading the document without understanding the organization will lead you to wildly erroneous conclusions. Let me try to put this document in perspective and plain language.

    The first conclusion is obviously this document was written for a government run program in the style of Shuttle or Station. The underlying assumption is that the NASA Program Manager makes the decisions within the framework of the NASA management structure. So to apply this document to commercial human spaceflight will take a re-writing. In fact, a committee is already working on a new version which would apply to vehicles on which NASA might buy seats.

    So the Human Rating Requirements “NPR 8705.2B” is only a small selection of the standards and processes that go into human rating a spacecraft. As the document says early on “ . . . complex space hardware requires all missions to meet high standards . . . This NPR is to define and implement additional processes . . . necessary to human-rate space systems . . . this NPR is linked to, and depends upon, many of the requirements . . . contained in other NASA directives.”

    Are you getting the picture?

    When I was shuttle program manager, I asked how many standards were levied on the shuttle program. The answer was in excess of 40,000. How can that be, you might ask. Easily, I would reply. There are all kinds of standards: welding standards, parts standards, cleanliness standards, fracture control standards, vibration standards, EMI standards, wiring standards, mil standards and mil specs, software design and testing standards, and on and on and on.

    For a short list of some of NASA technical standards – all of which are likely to be applied to commercial human spaceflight – visit this page: http://standards.nasa.gov/documents/nasa

  • God are you contentious…

    [laughing]

    Better take your irony meter in for a tune up.

    Even if you read it thoroughly you will not understand what is really being said unless you understand the context and the NASA culture in which it resides. Just reading the document without understanding the organization will lead you to wildly erroneous conclusions.

    I’m quite familiar with both, thanks. I’ve done it for a living. And when I say that NPR 8705.2B is followed, that includes all its references.

  • Wayne

    Rand Simberg wrote

    “Even if you read it thoroughly you will not understand what is really being said unless you understand the context and the NASA culture in which it resides. Just reading the document without understanding the organization will lead you to wildly erroneous conclusions.”

    If you are familiar with both, as am I, then if you read this following statement which is what I was talking about… you must not be all that familiar with it…

    “The first conclusion is obviously this document was written for a government run program in the style of Shuttle or Station. The underlying assumption is that the NASA Program Manager makes the decisions within the framework of the NASA management structure. So to apply this document to commercial human spaceflight will take a re-writing. ”

    And you were saying what about irony???

    Back at ya…

  • If you are familiar with both, as am I, then if you read this following statement which is what I was talking about… you must not be all that familiar with it…

    What major mental malfunction would draw you to such a strange and illogical conclusion?

  • Then Rand, you would know, from Wayne’s post, that…

    So on about the fourth page of the Human Ratings Requirements document you can read that before work starts on a spacecraft design, a meeting is convened of the technical authorities to tell the program manager what standards and specifications the new vehicle will have to meet.

    Don’t forget the legend that is stamped on the top of the front page: “Compliance is Mandatory”

    I take it that SpaceX held that meeting? And since you seem to know quite a bit about how SpaceX operates, who were the NASA human safety technical authorities for safety, engineering, health/medical, and crew with whom SpaceX met?

    I’d like to know if SpaceX meets the all the requirements, including but not limited to,

    “NASA-STD-4003 September 8, 2003 Electrical Bonding for NASA Launch Vehicles, Spacecraft, Payloads, and Flight Equipment (25 pages)
    + Mil – C-5541, Rev E 11/30/1990 Military Specification, Chemical Conversion Coatings on Aluminum and Aluminum Alloys
    + SAE-AMS-M-3171 4/01/1998 Magnesium Alloy, Processes for Pretreatment and Prevention of Corrosion on
    + SAE-ARP-5412 11/1/1999 Aircraft Lightning Environment and Related Test Waveforms”

    Rand Simberg: And if I’m poorly informed on this matter, I’m an expert compared to anyone else who has been posting in this thread.

    I’ll concede you are more qualified than me on this issue–I cannot speak for others.

    Being knowledgeable, you would know that the current human rating guidelines were for NASA internal consumption and that, until the human rating standards are approved, there are no current human rating standards for commercial crewed launches.

    Of course, left out of this whole discussion are the process guidelines that are equally important to the hardware standards, according friends who do launch a human rated rocket called the Shuttle. There is zero chance that SpaceX is in compliance with the process standards since those standards are ‘years’ away from being formalized.

    So, we can all conclude that SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and Dragon are not human rated.

  • Of course, left out of this whole discussion are the process guidelines that are equally important to the hardware standards, according friends who do launch a human rated rocket called the Shuttle. There is zero chance that SpaceX is in compliance with the process standards since those standards are ‘years’ away from being formalized.

    The Shuttle is not now, and never has been, human rated, by NASA’s own standards. If your friends told you otherwise, they misinformed you. SpaceX is more so now than the Shuttle ever will be (though it’s obviously not there yet). And as standards evolve, it will presumably continue to keep up with them, unless they become so onerous that it will only be able to fly non-NASA customers.

  • Rand Simberg: You apparently don’t understand the meanings of those words. Marginal costs are pretty much independent of flight rate.

    What manufacturing or production business are you in? Marginal cost is variable, based upon units purchased or manufactured, whereas fixed costs are just that–fixed.

    Yes, I miscalculated the fixed costs of Ares I at three launches per year at $400M. Subsequently, I was shown documentation that revealed such fixed costs for Ares I were in the neighborhood of $900M – $1.1B, depending upon certain variables.

  • DCSCA

    Cernan is trying to save the American manned spaceflight program and deserves high praise for throwing anything againt the wall to see if it will stick. And Armstrong has hardly had his words ‘ghost written’ for him by Griffin. His position has been remarkably consistent for decades. Revisit his public comments from May, 1989 and you’ll see he voiced a similar position on government/private human spaceflight activities. This is a bureaucrat battle between Garver and Griffin and that bad blood goes back years. With all due respect to Bolden, he’s useless. His job is to implement the policy of the President. Once shuttle is retired and astronauts are routinely fltying up to the ISS on Soyuz, American taxpayers, who grew up with shuttle, not Apollo, won’t miss it or manned spaceflight at all. In out years as the U.S. economy continues to crater, budgets for space will evaporate on all fronts and there will be less and less rationale to continue NASA as an independent agency. Without a viable manned space program, there is no need for NASA. It’s assets will be folded into DoD and, as Armstrong rightly noted, American leadership in space will simply fade away. Yet another nail in the coffin of the ‘American Century.’

  • Cernan is trying to save the American manned spaceflight program and deserves high praise for throwing anything againt the wall to see if it will stick.

    He deserves high praise for spouting innumerate nonsense?

    This is a bureaucrat battle between Garver and Griffin and that bad blood goes back years.

    Yes, all the way back to 2008.

  • What manufacturing or production business are you in? Marginal cost is variable, based upon units purchased or manufactured, whereas fixed costs are just that–fixed.

    I’m in the launch business. Marginal cost is the cost of building or flying the next one. The formula is cost(n)-cost(n-1) where “n” is the total number per year. Fixed costs fall out in the wash in this equation, because they’re the same for both terms.

    It doesn’t vary much for a launch system. It’s basically the cost of anything expended (the entire rocket for an expendable, the ET plus propellants and SRB refurb for the Shuttle, mission-specific crew training and payload integration). The marginal cost for the Shuttle is between a hundred and hundred fifty million. And as I said, for low flight rates, and high development costs, marginal costs don’t mean much. Average cost, including amortization, is the one you use for making a decision on developing a new system.

  • DCSCA

    @RandSimberg- Garver and Griffin have been tangling for years.

  • Vladislaw

    Jim Hillhouse wrote:

    “What manufacturing or production business are you in? Marginal cost is variable, based upon units purchased or manufactured, whereas fixed costs are just that–fixed.”

    You are not fully expressing marginal costs. They actually can reflect fixed costs. Plant and equipment are fixed costs. If I place an order for one additional unit and you would be required to build more factory space and install more production equipment to produce it that additional cost, even though it is a fixed cost, would have to be reflected in the marginal costs.

    From wiki:

    “marginal cost is the change in total cost that arises when the quantity produced changes by one unit. That is, it is the cost of producing one more unit of a good. Mathematically, the marginal cost (MC) function is expressed as the first derivative of the total cost (TC) function with respect to quantity (Q). Note that the marginal cost may change with volume, and so at each level of production, the marginal cost is the cost of the next unit produced.

    In general terms, marginal cost at each level of production includes any additional costs required to produce the next unit. If producing additional vehicles requires, for example, building a new factory, the marginal cost of those extra vehicles includes the cost of the new factory. In practice, the analysis is segregated into short and long-run cases, and over the longest run, all costs are marginal. At each level of production and time period being considered, marginal costs include all costs which vary with the level of production, and other costs are considered fixed costs.

    A number of other factors can affect marginal cost and its applicability to real world problems. Some of these may be considered market failures. These may include information asymmetries, the presence of negative or positive externalities, transaction costs, price discrimination and others.”

  • If I place an order for one additional unit and you would be required to build more factory space and install more production equipment to produce it that additional cost, even though it is a fixed cost, would have to be reflected in the marginal costs.

    Yes, I’m ignoring that, because step functions like that aren’t relevant to the current discussion.

  • Garver and Griffin have been tangling for years.

    Over what?

  • DCSCA

    The core future for manned space exploration to the Moon and Mars for the next 75 years is with a government funded, directed and managed space program, not privately funded space ventures.

  • DCSCA wrote:

    Cernan is trying to save the American manned spaceflight program …

    The “manned spaceflight program” is alive and well.

    President Obama’s proposal extends ISS to at least 2018 and we’re negotiating to extend it with our partners to 2028. American astronauts will be in space for many years to come — unlike after Apollo was cancelled when no astronauts went to space other than the Apollo/Soyuz stunt.

    Furthermore, I suggest you read the National Aeronautics and Space Act. Nothing in it requires NASA to fly humans in space, or to own rockets, or to send humans on deep space missions. It does, however, require NASA to make commercialization of space a top priority.

    Obama’s proposal complies with the law in a way that NASA budgets haven’t in many years.

  • The core future for manned space exploration to the Moon and Mars for the next 75 years is with a government funded, directed and managed space program, not privately funded space ventures.

    That’s a debatable point, but even granting for the sake of the argument that it’s true, it has nothing to do with how we should be getting to low earth orbit, which is what all the current fuss is about.

    Obama’s proposal complies with the law in a way that NASA budgets haven’t in many years.

    The Apollo cargo cultists don’t care about the law. They just want to relive the unaffordable past.

  • Ben Joshua

    The decision has been made between a POR that could not have worked for a huge list of reasons (except as corporate welfare) and a flexible path that at least has possibilities, tech advances and multiple paths to LEO.

    Along the way, there will be details to resolve and procedures to be created, this being a new NASA / corporate arrangement.

    Best case, a new NASA culture emerges, freed up to make great things happen in BEO propulsion and craft development, precursor robotic demonstrators / probes, advanced in-space observatories, ISS utilization, a host of other areas and eventually, human flights to Mars’ companions and Mars itself.

    Worst case, LEO activities continue and economic hard times stretch out the BEO schedule.

    The general public is non-plussed by shuttle flights. I wish that weren’t so, but it’s good to face PR reality regarding space politics. However, the public was wowed by Hubble and the Hubble repair missions. When Webb images begin to appear, they will grab the public’s attention, and if planetary search efforts actually find an earth-like planet, however exotic, it will also get great ink.

    In the meantime, NASA and the private sector can usher in a sustainable approach to spaceflight. That is the new game in Washington. If you can show Congress progress toward a sustainable access to space, they will see dollar signs and economic growth (votes). They will want a piece of the new action in their states and districts.

    Achieve the sustainability goal (that should be the real goal) and BEO destinations will follow.

  • Doug Lassiter

    “Furthermore, I suggest you read the National Aeronautics and Space Act. Nothing in it requires NASA to fly humans in space, or to own rockets, or to send humans on deep space missions.”

    In fact, even the word “exploration” comes up in it as almost an afterthought in the Space Act, which defines NASA, and certainly doesn’t pertain explicitly to HSF, as NASA makes it out these days. That’s not to say that HSF isn’t important, but NASA simply has no formal mandate to do it. It is not a goal in and of itself. That was extraordinarily wise to write the Space Act that way. HSF has to be a means to an end, rather than an end in and of itself.

  • red

    DCSCA: “The core future for manned space exploration to the Moon and Mars for the next 75 years is with a government funded, directed and managed space program, not privately funded space ventures.”

    Why do you think that’s true?

    If it is true in the Griffin sense, what is the point of it, then?

    Even if it’s true, why shouldn’t this government funded, directed and managed space program use and encourage commercial services as the new budget proposes.

    “Cernan is trying to save the American manned spaceflight program and deserves high praise for throwing anything againt the wall to see if it will stick.”

    That seems to be the general strategy of the Constellation and similar supporters. It doesn’t work, because it’s Constellation that’s destroying the manned spaceflight program and the rest of NASA.

    “Once shuttle is retired and astronauts are routinely fltying up to the ISS on Soyuz, American taxpayers, who grew up with shuttle, not Apollo, won’t miss it or manned spaceflight at all.”

    They won’t miss it because it won’t be gone.

    There will be lots of U.S. manned spaceflight activity, unlike the Constellation plan. The current plan keeps the Shuttle longer than Constellation, keeps the ISS, improves the ISS, actually uses the ISS, uses manned commercial suborbital RLVs, sends robotic precursors specifically for HSF to various destinations, starts work on an HLV, puts more funds into commercial cargo, runs a commercial crew development effort, demonstrates key technologies like propellant depots, closed-loop life support, inflatable habitats, etc, in a flagship technology demonstration program, develops and demonstrates other key technologies like ISRU and many others, funds a general space technology program that will have partial applicability to HSF, develops the Orion super-lite CRV, etc.

    In contrast, Constellation would have us run the ISS for a couple more years but hardly use it, and then dump it in the ocean. A few years later, Ares I/Orion would start missions to the ISS, unless someone observed that the ISS is no longer there and therefore cancels Ares I/Orion.

    “In out years as the U.S. economy continues to crater, budgets for space will evaporate on all fronts and there will be less and less rationale to continue NASA as an independent agency. Without a viable manned space program, there is no need for NASA.”

    That’s all the more reason to get rid of Constellation, which certainly cannot handle difficult budgets. The new program is robust in the face of such pressure. It also offers lots of near-term benefits to the taxpayer, more jobs, and more short-term progress, and thus would be better able to justify its budget. Failing that, whatever commercial capabilities are made will still have a shot at surviving in the tough budget times, and whatever technologies are developed will still be usable. That’s very different from a mega-rocket, which becomes useless when it is shut down and the infrastructure is abandoned.

  • HSF has to be a means to an end, rather than an end in and of itself.

    Yes. Unfortunately, the historical anomaly of Apollo, which didn’t have that much to do with space, has warped the views of too many space enthusiasts.

  • red

    Gary Church: “All the pieces are there for AresI. Just saying it will cost too much to complete is not good enough. If it is so overpriced than maybe taking a look at bringing the costs down is the way to go.”

    Constellation has been trying to do that for years. It hasn’t worked.

    amightywind: “A Falcon 9 is laughingly incomparable to an Ares I.”

    That’s true. Ares I is much more expensive to develop and operate.

    “And Ares I has flown.”

    That’s not even close to being true.

    Cl: “I’m not buying Ares 1 is a non starter and would cost way to much. That’s crazy…”

    From your comments it sounds like you don’t believe the Augustine Committee. How about Bush’s GAO? How about the CBO? How about all the NASA programs that got shut down already to fund Constellation? How about Griffin, whose plan was to shut down not just the Shuttle but also the ISS on top of all the other things to fund Constellation?

  • HSF has to be a means to an end, rather than an end in and of itself.

    Said more eloquently than Sen Rockefeller, but the question remains, what is this end you speak of?

  • Jim McDade

    Quotes from the Senate Commerce Committee hearing:

    Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) – “It was reported to me that in the conference call with Mr. Armstrong and Captain Cernan last week that you had… you told them that you would, ‘do whatever it takes’ to make commercial work, including ‘bailing them out’, even if that would mean ‘a bigger bailout than Chrysler and GM’.”

    Charlie Bolden- ““I’m not sure I said that…I will do everything in my power to facilitate the success of the commercial entities in access to low Earth orbit. I have to have that…I don’t remember using the sort of language (specifically the word BAILOUT) you used. I don’t remember that.”

    Eugene Cernan- “Charlie (Bolden) expressed some concern over the potential of the commercial sector to be successful in any reasonable length of time. He indicated we might have to subsidize them until they are successful. And, I can say with authority because I wrote this down and out the words ‘wow’ right next to it, because Charlie did say it may be a bailout like GM and Chrysler. As a matter of fact, it may be the largest bailout in history.”

    So, who is the liar, folks? Bolden or Cernan? Who has the most to gain or lose if the Obama plan fails to come to pass? Bolden or Cernan?
    Cernan, living as he is in comfortable semi-retirement, has nothing to gain and nothing to lose.

  • Jim McDade wrote:

    Cernan, living as he is in comfortable semi-retirement, has nothing to gain and nothing to lose.

    Cernan has gone on the public record many times as saying he has a personal motivation to no longer be the last human to walk on the Moon. It’s in the video on the KSC tour bus. He makes it quite clear it is a matter of personal honor to him. In fact, it may be a personal embarrassment because he doesn’t want the title any longer.

    Given all the other inane things he said yesterday, I wouldn’t rely on anything he recalls from his conversation with Bolden.

  • Okay, I give up … I’ve been trying to figure out what POR is an acronym for. Everyone seems to know but me. :-)

    Thanks in advance.

  • Vladislaw

    Program of Record

  • Fred

    At its peak Apollo had a budget of 5% of the national budget.
    Today NASA has a budget of 0.5% of the national budget.
    If anyone wants to re-do apollo. i.e. Constellation then let them get Congress to authorise the ncessary budget.
    Instead of $18B a year just raise NASA’s budget to $180B a year. THEN you get Constellation.
    Not gunna happen?
    Right.
    What say insead of crying for the impossible we focus on doing something that is really within our reach, and within our budget.
    Something like the president’s new path.

  • Doug Lassiter

    “HSF has to be a means to an end, rather than an end in and of itself.”

    “Said more eloquently than Sen Rockefeller, but the question remains, what is this end you speak of?”

    That’s what our nation has to have some real discussion about. A lot of good discussion appears right here in this forum. It’s a question that, since Apollo, our nation has been carefully avoiding, instead hiding behind ill defined and catch-all concepts like “exploration” and “inspiration”. That question is a challenge that we’ve really been loathe to face as a nation, and develop some consensus on. What makes it especially hard is that machines can do a lot of what humans used to be needed for.

    For myself, the unambiguous reason for HSF is insurance for the species. Developing the ability to go other places because someday we might have to. But there is hardly a national consensus on that. I don’t believe we’ve ever seen words like that come out of a President, or Congress, or the U.N., or whatever.

  • Jim, why does someone have to be lying? Humans are fallible creatures that often hear or remember things inaccurately. Now if either of these participants had the sense to record the conversation.. as is the standard practice for all NASA teleconferences.. and bring it along, there would be no need for this he-said she-said nonsense. Of course, another alternative is to just do what every court in the land does, ignore hearsay as irrelevant and stick to the facts.

  • yakman

    @Fred per: “Instead of $18B a year just raise NASA’s budget to $180B a year. THEN you get Constellation. Not gunna happen? Right.”

    Yeah, Fred, that’s true. However, at $36 billion a year (1% national budget, which is what the NASA fraction ran at from 1975 through 1993 if you can believe that) you can do it well ahead of the original time-scale. The real situation is that the NASA budget fraction has dwindled over recent Administrations, including the Current One with its tricky leger de main employed in the spring of 2009 vis a vis allocations to Constellation.

  • Doug, “planetary protection” is something for which, I think, a broad base of support exists. That has many facets: earth monitoring, solar monitoring, potentially hazardous NEO monitoring, basic science for the understanding of the sun and asteroid/comet composition, high performance computer simulation and prediction of solar and NEO threats, technology development and demonstration for the purposeful diversion of NEO threats, harnessing of solar power, utilization of extraterrestrial resources, and eventual migration of polluting industry off-earth. Yes, quite a number of these are best done using robotic tools, satellites for example, but some of them are what we could call “exploration” and can be done most effectively, in terms of time, with human missions – and time matters. Every day we don’t have a good understanding of NEO composition, for example, we’re in danger of incorrectly characterizing those threats. And when we start recognizing that external threats to the earth are real and require constant diligence to avoid, the argument for getting all the eggs out of the one basket starts to become less pie-in-the-sky and more sensible precaution.

  • Vladislaw

    “HSF has to be a means to an end, rather than an end in and of itself.”

    Human automobile travel has to have a means to an end. – it safely moves your brain cells from point A to point B.

    Human water craft travel has to have a means to an end. – it safely moves your brain cells from point A to point B.

    Human airplane travel has to have a means to an end. – it safely moves your brain cells from point A to point B.

    Human train travel has to have a means to an end. – it safely moves your brain cells from point A to point B.

    As you may be able to guess, my answer to human space flight travel is to safely move your brain cells from point A to point B.

    It is a transportation issue, nothing more or less. Once the vehicles are common place it will no longer be a question. People use all modes of transportation for all modes of activities. It will be the same in space, for research/science, recreational activities, commercial activities and military activities.

  • Vladislaw, wow, that was content free.. The National US Human Spaceflight Program has to be a means to an end, rather than an end in and of itself.

  • @ Nasa Fan…..On your May 13th Comment. YES, I AGREE….If I hear that phrase “Game Changing Technology” once more, I think I’ll puke too!! Believe you me: THERE WILL BE NO NEW FUTURISTIC ADVANCES IN SPACEFLIGHT TECHNOLOGY IN THE NEXT FIVE YEARS. All this notion of cancelling the Aries 5, in favor of some glittery new game changer vehicle, is but a dumb further excuse for NASA to fool around in LEO for even more decades!! Why don’t we just bring the ISS to an end, a little sooner? That way, we’d have billions of additional dollars to get started on the Lunar Return initiative. And PLEASE do NOT give me any of that “Where will our astronauts have to go, then?” jazz!!! We DON’T need anymore giant aluminum cans for them to float around in!! Please, NO more LEO! We just get on with traveling to other worlds. (Preferably the large, sphere-shaped kind!) The Moon is our first port-of-call—just three days away. Let’s just get on with it! With the REAL exploration & base-building.

  • Vladislaw

    Trent, the question was human spaceflight, a general question, not the United States of America’s policy about space, a specific question about a specific country’s policy.

    As I said in my answer to the general question of human spaceflight, I addressed the specific, as it relates to the Republic. Human spaceflight can be used to move researchers and scientists brain cells from point A to point B to carry out their endevors for National ends.

  • Vladislaw, whenever you think someone has asked a question that has an obvious and meaningless answer then you really should look deeper to see if they’ve asked something pertinent. It’s great way to get a conversation that is interesting and relevant rather than declining into point scoring.

  • Vladislaw

    Trent, for me, the question about human spaceflight, IS that simple. You do not have to dig deeper. For 50 years a million and one “excuses” have been tried and used to somehow justify human spaceflight and why it is needed.

    Personally, I believe we should dump all the retoric and address it and the real question for exactly what it is. A transportation issue. Everything else just clouds the issue.

    Currently, America has a transportation issue regarding space. Everything else is secondary, including science and exploration. A car is a car, we do not concern ourselves if researchers are going to use it conducting field tests, vacationers to travel to the grand canyon or if pizza hut is going to use for deliveries. It can be utilized by all parties and that is the same for vehicles for space access. To try and sell it for any single use not only makes the sale harder but denies the other uses.

  • DCSCA

    @StephenCSmith- A comment only a bureaucrat could embrace. The tragic fact that the Reagan Administration amended the space act by peppering ‘commercialization’ into NASA’s charter has not been lost to history given the failure of NASA to turn its shuttle fleet into profit makers as the Challenger disaster so sadly benchmarked. It is also not lost on history that before Reaganomics poisoned the space agency, NASA had it’s best days and the agency has literally been going in circles for over a quarter century. At this time in history, the folly of privatization has been made clear for 25 years. It is wrong and wrong headed to try to make a government agency, particularly a R&D organization like NASA, into a commercially viable profit center. Look at the postal service. Try it with the Army– maybe the stars in the flags of Gulf War troops were really Texaco stars after all. This writer is in full support of any private enterprise space venture that can raise capital on its own, construct infrastructure and private launch facilities, develop and man-rate spacecraft, launch them and recover them… without government help or socializing the loss. Slap in a DVD of ‘Destination Moon’ and go for it, fellas, but not on the back of NASA or being subsidized by the American taxpayer.

  • Vladislaw, so what you’re saying is that there’s no need to justify why highly skilled government employees need to be transported into space. It really does sound like you’re making an argument against a national space transportation system.

  • DCSCA

    @red- Perhaps I’ve not been clear. Orion makes sense. Constellation as currently configured doesn’t– and Ares (solids) are not the right way to go. This writer supports perfecting and flying Orion as a general purpose space vehicle atop existing LVs; perfecting a heavy lift LV, lunar lander and long-stay lunar surface facility, then adapting the knowledge base and protocol for an expedition to Mars, per Armstrong’s comments, with the oversight, management and direction of a government agency– NASA. There’s your space program for the next 40 years. Profit-centered private industry(s) will never invest in this kind of massive exploration at this point in human history without a guarantee of socializing the financial risk. That’s why governments do it. And don’t kid yourself. When shuttle is retired without any new United States manned spacecraft in the pipeline, American manned spaceflight and most likely NASA is in jeopardy — and Cernan knows it. So does Armstrong. The agency will be ripe for the budget ax, have its assets folded into the DoD and leftover funding directed to other national priorities and entitlements. Part of this business is connecting with the people who pay for it. Astronauts planting flags and fixing telecopes does that; bland robots do not. The most vivid memory this writer has from the afternoon of July 20, 1976, are the TV images from Viking 1 on Mars and a commentator noting as great as it was, it wasnt like the moon landing 7 years earlier with a man there and gee, what’s over the horizon.

  • Vladislaw

    Trent, my comments on here about that should stand on their own. I am 100% against a National space transportation system. we do not have a national car, train or plane factory for producing government vehicles. (excluding military in this)

    I have no problem with NASA buying an off the shelf turn key system like white knight/spaceshiptwo. Maybe they could operate something like that cheaper than what they usually do. But I have long argued that I would like to see NASA out of the launch business.

  • DCSCA

    @Oler- “… the era of big government space programs is over.”

    The Chinese and the Russians are still laughing. Especially the Russians– their checks from NASA just cleared.

  • Vladislaw

    Ya the russian COMMERCIAL company that launches soyuz must be laughing that America doesn’t have their own commercial companies to launch astronauts.

  • Vladislaw, ok, so you’ve just made the justification for a national human spaceflight program even more important. Why should NASA be training and flying astronauts at all? What’s it *for*?

  • Robert G. Oler

    Jim Hillhouse wrote @ May 13th, 2010 at 5:23 pm

    well.

    you dont seem to know how NASA uses the terms “fixed” and “marginal” cost.

    First off someone who will tell you what the “fixed” or “marginal” cost of Ares 1 will be either is a liar or thinks the person they are talking to is a fool.

    There is no way to even make rough guesses at those right now. The vehicle does not exist, Orion does not exist and theyhave never processed with vehicle hence they have no clue what the “army” is going to be that does that.

    As for the shuttle and terms in general.

    Fixed cost in the NASA world are the cost it takes to encompass operations inside the margin of “no flights at all” to some number of flights that the infrastructure can sustain safely. What that top number is (ie before the infrastructure needs to be expanded) is really not known with any precision. My guess it is between five and six a year. That number has gone down as the fixed cost have gone up…in 85 the shuttle was headed (with much lower cost) toward I think 10 or so flights.

    What are the fixed cost? They are not the number or numbers you push out. NASA has tried to move more and more things into “fixed cost” and the numbers of people have gone up…but the operable data point is that the infrastructure takes about 200 million a month to feed no matter if the shuttle is flying or sitting. Those numbers are not mine. John Shannon showed up here recently and in some of his post” confirmed them…KBH seemed to confirm them in her statements recently. And looking at the Columbia stand down in real dollars…thats about correct.

    What are marginal cost? At NASA they are the cost above the fixed number with no flights to fly whatever campaign that they have in mind divided by the number of flights.

    When Shannon dropped by his line was (and I am paraphrasing but its close) that the shuttle budget should be looked at as the total cost for 1 flight and you get the rest for free. Thats about how they do accounting at NASA and if you play all the numbers that puts the fixed at about 2.4 to 2.5 billion and the marginal cost at about 100-125 million.

    Or put it another way…I bet that they could not add another flight to the 5 or 6 a year and not need a LOT more money. With a low flight rate the cost per mission are outstanding. KBH seemed to recoginize in the hearings that adding one more shuttle flight in the next year would consume a little over 2 billion dollars.

    None of this of course factors in development cost for either shuttle or Ares…NASA considers those sunk cost…so the 35 billion or so to develop Ares 1 just is paid as out year “fixed” cost and doesnt work into the over all cost.

    That makes shuttle and Ares some of the most expensive launch vehicles on the planet.

    Robert G. Oler

  • Vladislaw

    So they can hop a seat on a commercial carrier, board their reusable, space-based craft, pop over to the commercial fuel station, tank up and go explore space. Visit one of 20 or so lagrange points, trips to asteroids and comets, orbital trips to the moons of mars and earth, orbital trips to mars and venus. I would prefer we do not worry about landing until we have gas n’ go capability. We spend billions to get OUT of a gravity well with the express purpose to explore space, the last thing we should do, for the near term, is to land in another gavity well and get so bogged down in a money pit that all real space exploration goes out the window.

    I am not against Luna exploration or Martian exploration in the long term, but that is not exploring space. For now, I am more concerned that NASA focus it’s mission on getting the “car & gas station” in place in low earth orbit and let the commercial sector handle the “pop & drop” capsule and rocket that grants space access to commercial, recreational and the public sectors of our economy. I prefer the trifecta of a win win win situation.

  • Vladislaw, sigh. Why am I having such trouble communicating a simple question to you? If NASA was sending people to explore the Las Vegas strip one would ask “why are you sending them there?” It wouldn’t matter if they flew there in their T-38s or if they jumped on a commercial jet and hired a rental car, would it? The crux of the question is: why is NASA spending money to train and send astronauts into space? What’s the point? Why are the US taxpayers paying for it? How does it affect their lives? If it wasn’t being done, what would they lose? What’s the national need for human spaceflight?

  • Vladislaw

    Trent, my apologies for being so dense and failing to grasp the meat of your statement.

    Ask 100 space nuts this question and you get almost that many answers. For me, I look to Larry Niven an American science fiction writer:

    “The dinosaurs became extinct because they didn’t have a space program. And if we become extinct because we don’t have a space program, it’ll serve us right!”

    My personal opinion is space rocks should be a foundational part of the Nation’s human spaceflight program. I am pro science and exploration, but if a rock hits us before we learn how to bulldoze it out of the way then the rest is irrelavant. I know the arguements for “robots are cheaper”, but for me, when push comes to shove and the fate of the species is on the table, I would prefer a fleet of ships already based in space filled with Americans ready to get the job done. Again just my personal opinion. I do not advocate for “robbie the robot” he has enough advocates already, I prefer advocating for Robert the Astronaut.

  • Vladislaw, great, couldn’t agree more. I wonder when the recognition of planetary protection and, eventually, survival of the species will translate into national policy.

  • Doug Lassiter

    “As you may be able to guess, my answer to human space flight travel is to safely move your brain cells from point A to point B.”

    That’s nice. I however have no strong desire to pay to move someone elses brain cells from point A to point B. I don’t recall any President telling us in, for example, an executive order, that moving brain cells justified our large investment in human space flight and was a national priority. Gee, I have a bicycle that moves brain cells.

    Why brain cells? Why not intellect? Oops, telerobotics sort of does that.

    The question is, what accomplishments justify our national investment in human space flight? That’s the consensus that our nation has to develop. This exchange just underscores the problem we have with HSF. We not only don’t know the answer, but we haven’t quite agreed on what the question is.

  • Doug Lassiter

    “I wonder when the recognition of planetary protection and, eventually, survival of the species will translate into national policy.”

    That, in my view, is precisely right. It’s more than just me and you saying that species protection is important, but that our nation and our leaders start saying that. Our leaders haven’t had the courage to say those words. We aren’t going to preserve the species with robots.

    In the meantime, we get heroes like Gene Cernan flailing around with rationale that comes across as faintly embarrassing, but with a sheen of lunar dust on his lips.

    This isn’t about bailouts. It’s about a ship that’s just going the way the breeze happens to be blowing.

  • Vladislaw

    Doug Lassiter wrote:

    “That’s nice. I however have no strong desire to pay to move someone elses brain cells from point A to point B. I don’t recall any President telling us in, for example, an executive order, that moving brain cells justified our large investment in human space flight and was a national priority.”

    But you and the rest of the Nation does that in fact, everyday. The government utilizes every form of transportation there is to shuttle government workers around. The reason no President has said it is because of what I stated earlier, for some reason spaceflight is supposed to be somehow different then all other forms of transportation. It goes without saying for all other forms of transportation but the sacred cow of spaceflight is different.

    I believe we should call it for what it is, transportation plain and simple and we need it in our transportation basket. We do not need to justify it anymore then we need to justify a car. Again, just my own personal opinion.

  • Vladislaw

    Doug Lassiter wrote:

    “The question is, what accomplishments justify our national investment in human space flight?”

    In humanity’s long march from the tree branches of the savannah to the rise of the mud brick huts of mesopotamia it was the advent of writing that was the real springboard to advancement. In our roughly 5500 years of written history, for 99% of those years the earth was for humankind and the heavens were reserved for the gods. For humanity to visit the abode of the gods is not enough for you?

    As I said to Trent, I do not want NASA in the launch business, so obviously I do not feel the high prices are justified. All other forms of transportation has been commercialized, hell you can even buy off the shelf commercial submarines. NASA, I feel, has been a roadblock to commercialization, lower prices and an opening of the heavens for more people besides a select few public servants.

  • All of you: If you were an astronaut, WHAT would you rather do? A six month stay on board the ISS, same old endless dull, merry-go-round? Or, would you rather do a Lunar expedition, and actually get to another world? I cannot speak for others, but as for me, I have zero, zilch, nada interest in going to the ISS!! If I were a trillionare, I would NOT spend one dollar to be sent up to THAT aluminum castle in the sky, just to float around weightless, and brag “Look, I’m in space!” To me, REAL space travel is always going to be about actually GOING SOMEPLACE! That’s the goal of the game. I would, however, pay large sums to be a tourist on board a circumlunar flight. To fly to deep space, and reach the Moon, even if it was just to orbit it or flyby it, would be a tremendous excitement!!

  • I cannot speak for others, but as for me, I have zero, zilch, nada interest in going to the ISS!! If I were a trillionare, I would NOT spend one dollar to be sent up to THAT aluminum castle in the sky, just to float around weightless, and brag “Look, I’m in space!”

    You don’t speak for others. Many people have expressed an interest in visiting the ISS. Several have paid millions for the privilege.

  • I cannot speak for others, but as for me, I have zero, zilch, nada interest in going to the ISS!! If I were a trillionare, I would NOT spend one dollar to be sent up to THAT aluminum castle in the sky, just to float around weightless, and brag “Look, I’m in space!”

    I would also add that this is a stupid mischaracterization of why people want to go, and what they do when they get there.

  • common sense

    @ Chris Castro wrote @ May 14th, 2010 at 1:35 pm

    There are as many opinions as there are astronauts as to what one astronaut wants to do in space. Not only can you not speak for others but neither can you speak for any one astronaut.

  • Robert G. Oler

    Chris Castro wrote @ May 14th, 2010 at 1:35 pm

    All of you: If you were an astronaut, WHAT would you rather do? A six month stay on board the ISS, same old endless dull, merry-go-round?

    I find statements like this very funny.

    You dont think being on the Moon with outside views mostly by HDTV and even when one goes “outside” one goes to the same scenary is going to keep someones imagination active who gets bored on ISS?

    Your comments are “fan boy” comments. Space is about doing something constructive about accomplishing task, not about being entertained.

    LOL

    Robert G. Oler

  • Vladislaw

    “All of you: If you were an astronaut, WHAT would you rather do? ”

    I would rather the Republic have a commercial system in place for access to low earth orbit, insuring I actually GET to space in some form of a timely manner. You have about what 24-35 Americans getting into space per year? After 50 years? The program of record is calling for two lunar launches per year, that equals 8 people and 2-4 more people at that ISS. So we can look forward to 10 – 12 people in space per year.. ya that constellation is really forward looking and opening space up for more astronauts. We are REGRESSING!

    As an astronuat I would be playing the lottery and hope to win the powerball, and buying a seat from SpaceX to a Bigelow station, my odds of getting there would be better then trying to achieve orbit with NASA.

  • richardb

    Ok, 48 hours have gone by and Bolden still hasn’t knocked down Cernan’s statement that Bolden would bail out the tiny commercials regardless of cost. I think its time to take Cernan’s statement as truth that Obama has designed a space program that is designed for a massive bailout from the get go. What makes Obama’s plan different from Bush’s is that the bailout will dwarf the cost of Bush’s plan. While extending the gap by many more years.

    Oler, Simberg and others, you’ve been snookered and Gene Cernan outed the Music Man that fooled you. Don’t be depressed though. you had Gene Cernan expose the fraud at the heart of your new mantra. You could have done worse.

  • @ RichardB….. Well put, my friend! Bolden’s vision for NASA’s future could end up as the biggest corporate bailout in U.S. history yet! And get this: they’re condemning NASA to Low Earth Orbit & nothing but that, for the next 15 to 20 years, in the process. You’ve all no doubt heard about the proposals to extend the ISS EVEN FURTHER in the future than 2020. Who’s to say that after the BIG BAILOUT of 2015, and after the “plan” for a new NEW heavy-lift rocket, with game-changing tech, flounders, that come 2020 the next President decides yet again to pull the plug on Project Virgo (a prospective name for the flag-planting “Let’s-be-first-there” asteroid jaunt, I’ve heard floated around). THEN he decides, since America’s got nothing better to do in space, that we just carry on as usual with the aluminum castle building in LEO for EVEN LONGER. Maybe extending the ISS till 2030! Mr. Obama never had to commit himself to anything, in his first term. But he steered the ship straight into the iceberg, in the long run.

  • Vladislaw

    Chris Castro wrote:

    “And get this: they’re condemning NASA to Low Earth Orbit & nothing but that, for the next 15 to 20 years, in the process.”

    You must have missed listening to the President’s speech in Florida, or maybe you can not hear and instead didn’t read the speech. Or maybe you can not read or hear and don’t know what you are talking about.

    He said early in the next decade (2020 – nine years from the time the new budget goes into effect) that crewed flights would start taking place to test beyond low earth orbit systems. By 2025 attempt an asteroid visit about 14 years if the budget is approved.

    You should stop making things up. You lose any credibility you have when you do that. 14 years is not 20 years and the program of record is STILL 20 -25 years out from just a lunar orbit. I will go with the 14 years for an asteroid rather than the current progam’s 25 years for a lunar orbit.

  • Ok, 48 hours have gone by and Bolden still hasn’t knocked down Cernan’s statement that Bolden would bail out the tiny commercials regardless of cost.

    This is kind of stupid.

    In what way was the Shuttle, and the manned space program in general for the past few decades, not a “bail out”?

  • richardb

    Simberg, I give up, explain to us how ISS, Shuttle and Skylab are bailouts.
    Please explain to all of us your clever belief that ISS, shuttle, Skylab were good money for bad. Explain to your vast media audience how those programs are the same as recent bail outs such as “cash for clunkers”, GM and Chrysler, Country Wide, wind turbines from China, Lehman Brothers and other Wall Street frauds. We await your nuanced, clever cynicism.

    Perhaps you’re feeling blue about the industry you cover. Here’s a link for job you are obviously well qualified for:
    http://www.ringling.com/uploadedFiles/Ringling/TextContent/FunZone/Circus_Works_Education_Center_Details/139-CLOWN-COLLEGE.pdf

    And yes, you’re welcome Rand.

  • Vladislaw

    richardb wrote:

    “Simberg, I give up, explain to us how ISS, Shuttle and Skylab are bailouts.”

    Because in all those cases NASA had to come back to congress, hat in hand, asking for more money because their assumptions were wrong and it was taking longer than expected and if congress wanted the program to continue they would have to pony up more money?

    Actually, Lockheed was bailed out in 1971 when congress passed the emergency loan guarantee. If you are looking more traditional bailouts.

  • @ Vladislaw….. You “Anywhere-but-the-Moon” people never cease to dumbfound me!! President Obama is making EMPTY promises. He commits NASA to beyond LEO flights on spacecraft which might as well be imaginary. He commits NASA to accomplish all this jazz WAY after he’s gone from office. He entrusts this Wonderland enterprise to the building of a “game-changer-tech” heavy-lift rocket, which supposedly will be no more harder to get from drawing board to fruition than the ARES 5 was, (before HE destroyed it). Project Virgo, or whatever they freaking decide to call it, will be far more vulnerable to multiple Presidential whims & temptations to cancel. Then, all NASA will have left, is the virtually uncancellable ISS. The LEO merry go round will never end! All this twenty-year charade, ending right back where we started in LEO, just because you people CAN’T bear through a Lunar Return interlude! Obama is just as lost in the clouds as Charles Bolden is!

  • Vladislaw

    I would have to disagree with how you catagorize my position. I am not against returning to the moon, I am against LANDING on the moon, ONLY until we have a reusable, space based, gas n go, vehicle .. FIRST.

    If the Nation primes the pump for commercial space, America will never again be without space access and will never EVER have to goto the russians again hat in hand begging for rides to space. That has always been a problem for me, a single fault system where if NASA has a failure, the entire Republic’s space access is shut down until the problem is solved.

    By moving away from the Apollo model of space exploration and going with fuel stations, and space based reusable vehicles we also escape the need for spending 50 – 60 billion on a super heavy lift and can put that 50 billion in more actual space hardware.

    I do not see the need, to launch a capsule from the surface of the earth, drag it to your destination, discard 2-3 billion in hardware on the way and return with just the capsule. That is not politically sustainable. Apollo proved that. We should be looking beyond the Apollo model after 50 years and fuel stations make EVERY destination beyond LEO a whole hell of a lot easier.

    Every President since Nixon has called for more commercial space so that NASA can free up the billions in operational costs and use it for more hardware. Reagan even had a law passed ordering NASA to use more commercial. I see nothing wrong with turning over LEO access to commercial providers.

    Not some, not most, ALL transportation systems are handled commercially EXCEPT the sacred cow of space access. After 50 years it is long over due.

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