NASA « Space Politics

When will commercial crew be ready?

By Jeff Foust on 2009 September 9 at 7:40 am ET

One of the key elements of the summary report of the Review of US Human Space Flight Plans Committee (aka the Augustine committee) issued yesterday is the role that commercial providers of crew transportation services can play. “As we move from the complex, reusable Shuttle back to a simpler, smaller capsule, it is an appropriate […]

“An unsustainable trajectory”

By Jeff Foust on 2009 September 8 at 2:45 pm ET

That’s from the first sentence of the summary report of the Augustine committtee, just posted on the OSTP web site: “The U.S. human spaceflight program appears to be on an unsustainable trajectory.” I haven’t had time yet to review the report, although at first glance it does not appear to be that surprising given the […]

Bolden’s ethics waiver

By Jeff Foust on 2009 September 5 at 2:26 pm ET

On Friday afternoon the White House announced that it was publishing the waivers to its stringent ethics policy it had granted to a handful of officials since the beginning of the administration. The ten waivers released Friday include the one granted to Charles Bolden, the new NASA administrator; others include Attorney General Eric Holder and […]

What astronauts want

By Jeff Foust on 2009 September 1 at 7:25 am ET

Or former astronauts, at least. Sunday’s Houston Chronicle included an op-ed by 16 former astronauts with their opinions for the Augustine committee and others on what direction national space policy should take. Their summarized conclusions:

We urge this panel, along with the president, Congress and the American people to consider that: Exploration must be […]

More calls for commercialization

By Jeff Foust on 2009 September 1 at 6:54 am ET

Several outlets reported yesterday that the Augustine committee was delaying the completion of its final report, originally planned for the end of August. That’s not surprising if you have been following the updates posted by the committee (officially the Review of US Human Space Flight Plans committee) on its web site: early last week it […]

Take that, Mike

By Jeff Foust on 2009 August 29 at 6:45 pm ET

On Friday NASA deputy administrator Lori Garver spoke at NASA Ames. Her prepared remarks aren’t on the NASA web site, but highlights of the speech and answers to questions were live-tweeted by one attendee, Matthew F. Reyes. Some of those highlights include praising NASA’s COTS program for doing “a good job letting private enterprise learn […]

Still trying to close the gap

By Jeff Foust on 2009 August 26 at 1:10 pm ET

For many months one of the mantras in the space community was to “close the gap”: find money to extend the life of the shuttle, accelerate Constellation, or both, to minimize the gap in US human spaceflight access (at least by government vehicles). That battle cry has died down in recent months, particularly as the […]

Seeking “adequate” budgets that are matched to “a worthy mission”

By Jeff Foust on 2009 August 19 at 7:26 am ET

While Congress is on summer recess this month, some members are keeping an eye on the Augustine committee’s deliberations and making public comments about them. On Monday Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ), chair of the space subcommittee of the House Science Committee, issued a statement on “threats to NASA’s budget”, citing the comments by the Augustine […]

Show exploration the money

By Jeff Foust on 2009 August 13 at 11:14 am ET

I missed the final, extended public meeting of the Review of US Human Space Flight Plans (aka Augustine) committee on Wednesday, unfortunately (I’m at the annual smallsat conference at Utah State University this week). So instead here’s a brief summary of the reports that came out of the hearing:

If there was a central theme, […]

A call for reviving NIAC

By Jeff Foust on 2009 August 7 at 12:58 pm ET

In 2007 a little-known organization, the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC), was quietly terminated by NASA. For nine years the organization spent about $4 million a year supporing the earliest stages of development of technologies that could, in decades’ time, have a “significant impact” on future NASA missions. NIAC died because it had been […]

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