After seven months of intense and confusing wrangling, the House followed (for the most part) the Senate and voted an authorization bill for NASA. I'm not here to offer opinion of the bill, nor of the political machinations which brought all this on. There is plenty of that on other blogs and sufficient in the news.
I'm here for only one reason. Whatever path NASA is compelled to take, please do not let the dream die. There has been a great deal of hostility and criticism piled on NASA in these last several months. Some of it is credible, most of it is not. I realize that a great many people don't have insight into the workings of NASA, nor the budget process, no the technical insight to grasp why NASA may have seemed slow in the past to produce a follow-on to shuttle. I'm not here to criticize them either.
My one and only desire is to implore, with all my strength and ability, because that seems to be the only way to get through all the impediments. Don't let the dream die. The dream of space flight and exploration. There are reasons aplenty to push outward from the earth. There are practical reasons, such as technology development. There are less pragmatic reasons, such as the human nature to explore the unknown. Also, there are so many other reasons which I haven't breathed. And anyone who truly wants to understand NASA and the reason for its being should assay to comprehend all the reasons. If an individual just doesn't get why any nation would spend billions on space exploration, then this person should work to see the overall picture, not just one image. Though I do understand that there are so many people who do not want to understand, nor be bothered with trying to.
That leaves the burden to push for NASA's continued presence in space to those of us who do get it...and want it and support it. That's what this is about. In a time of splintering because of differing motives and differing political views and differing objectives for the nation's space program, let those of us who do support space exploration come together in support for that objective and keep the dream from dying.
Go outside tonight and look up. Look at the thin crescent moon. Look at Jupiter and Venus shining brightly. See all the stars so far away, so unknown and beckoning. Check http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/sightings/cities/skywatch.cgi?country=United+States and watch for the bright light of the International Space Station speeding over your head. We are already a permanent presence in space. There are men and women up there living and working and increasing our knowledge of outer space and inner space...our space. Think about that. What does it mean to you? If it means nothing, then I challenge you to reconsider and visit www.nasa.gov to find out more about NASA and all it has done and continues to do. If the knowledge that people are living in space excites you, then spread the excitement. Let your representatives know how you feel. Take a friend outside and share your excitement. It can be very contagious. And that contagion is life for NASA. Spread it generously.
And don't let the dream die.
Monday, October 4, 2010
Monday, November 16, 2009
Time Names Ares One of Best Inventions of 2009
http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/0,28757,1934027,00.html>
The Best Invention of the Year: NASA's Ares Rockets
By JEFFREY KLUGERThursday, Nov. 12, 2009
NASA
Metal has no DNA; machines have no genes. But that doesn't mean they don't have pedigrees — ancestral lines every bit as elaborate as our own. That's surely the case with the Ares 1 rocket. The best and smartest and coolest thing built in 2009 — a machine that can launch human beings to cosmic destinations we'd never considered before — is the fruit of a very old family tree, one with branches grand, historic and even wicked.
There are a lot of reasons astronauts haven't moved beyond the harbor lights of low-Earth orbit in nearly 40 years, but one of them is that we haven't had the machines to take us anywhere else. The space shuttle is a flying truck: fine for the lunch-bucket work of hauling cargo a couple of hundred miles into space, but nothing more. In 2004, however, the U.S. committed itself to sending astronauts back to the moon and later to Mars, and for that, you need something new and nifty for them to fly. The answer is the Ares 1, which had its first unmanned flight on Oct. 28 and dazzled even the skeptics.
From a distance, the rocket is unprepossessing — a slender white stalk that looks almost as if it would twang in the Florida wind. But up close, it's huge: about 327 ft. (100 m) tall, or the biggest thing the U.S. has launched since the 363-ft. (111 m) Saturn V moon rockets of the early 1970s. Its first stage is a souped-up version of one of the shuttle's solid-fuel rockets; its top stage is a similarly muscled-up model of the Saturn's massive J2 engines.
If that general body plan doesn't exactly break ground, that's the point. NASA tried breaking ground with the shuttles and in doing so broke all the rules. Shuttle astronauts sit alongside the fuel — next to the exploding motor that claimed Challenger, beneath the chunks of falling foam that killed Columbia. And when you fly a spacecraft repeatedly as opposed to chucking it after a single use, there's a lot of wear to repair.
When NASA engineers gathered to plan the next generation of America's rockets, they thus decided to go back to the future — way back. The Saturn V was the brainchild of Wernher von Braun, the German scientist whose bright genius gave the U.S. its finest line of rockets — and whose dark genius gave Hitler the V2 missile that rained terror on London. Von Braun had, in turn, drawn insights from American rocket pioneer Robert Goddard. Goddard built on the work of 17th century artillery innovator Kazimierz Siemienowicz, a Pole.
The Ares 1 is a worthy descendant of their rockets and others, with lightweight composites, better engines and exponentially improved computers giving it more reliability and power. The Ares 1 will launch an Apollo-like spacecraft with four crew members — perhaps by 2015. Alongside it, NASA is developing the Brobdingnagian Ares V, a 380-ft. (116 m) behemoth intended to put such heavy equipment as a lunar lander in Earth orbit, where astronauts can link up with it before blasting away to the moon. Somewhere between the two rockets is the so-called Ares Lite — a heavy-lift hybrid that could carry both humans and cargo and is intended to be a design that engineers can have in their back pockets if the two-booster plan proves unaffordable.
The new rockets could take astronauts to some thrilling places. The biggest costs — and risks — associated with visiting other celestial bodies are from landing and taking off again. But suppose you don't land? An independent commission appointed by the White House to make recommendations for NASA's future recently returned its 154-page report and made strong arguments for bypassing the familiar boots-in-the-soil scenario in favor of a flexible path of flybys and orbits.
Under the new thinking, astronauts could barnstorm or circle the moon, Mars and Mars' twin moons, deploying probes to do their rock-collecting and experiments for them. They could similarly sample near-Earth objects like asteroids. They could also travel to what is known as the Lagrange points — a scattering of spots between Earth and the moon and Earth and the sun where the gravitational forces on the bodies are precisely balanced and spacecraft simply ... hang where they are. These would serve as ideal spots for deploying probes and conducting cosmic observations.
Troublingly for Ares partisans, the same commission that called for such creative uses for the new rockets also called into question how affordable they are, arguing that it might be better simply to modify boosters now used to carry satellites and put a capsule on top. Maybe — but there's the question of safety too. NASA designers say the Ares line will be 10 times as safe as the shuttle and two to three times as safe as competing boosters.
There's no way of knowing if those projections are too rosy, but if history teaches us anything, it's that the space program's grimmest chapters — the launchpad fires and shuttle disasters — unfold when policy planners lean too hard on engineers. The finest moments occur when the bureaucrats give the designers a clean sheet of drafting paper and let them dream. There's genius in knowing how to create a truly big invention — and there's wisdom in knowing how to recognize it and use it.
See pictures of the Ares rockets launching.
The Best Invention of the Year: NASA's Ares Rockets
By JEFFREY KLUGER
NASA
Metal has no DNA; machines have no genes. But that doesn't mean they don't have pedigrees — ancestral lines every bit as elaborate as our own. That's surely the case with the Ares 1 rocket. The best and smartest and coolest thing built in 2009 — a machine that can launch human beings to cosmic destinations we'd never considered before — is the fruit of a very old family tree, one with branches grand, historic and even wicked.
There are a lot of reasons astronauts haven't moved beyond the harbor lights of low-Earth orbit in nearly 40 years, but one of them is that we haven't had the machines to take us anywhere else. The space shuttle is a flying truck: fine for the lunch-bucket work of hauling cargo a couple of hundred miles into space, but nothing more. In 2004, however, the U.S. committed itself to sending astronauts back to the moon and later to Mars, and for that, you need something new and nifty for them to fly. The answer is the Ares 1, which had its first unmanned flight on Oct. 28 and dazzled even the skeptics.
From a distance, the rocket is unprepossessing — a slender white stalk that looks almost as if it would twang in the Florida wind. But up close, it's huge: about 327 ft. (100 m) tall, or the biggest thing the U.S. has launched since the 363-ft. (111 m) Saturn V moon rockets of the early 1970s. Its first stage is a souped-up version of one of the shuttle's solid-fuel rockets; its top stage is a similarly muscled-up model of the Saturn's massive J2 engines.
If that general body plan doesn't exactly break ground, that's the point. NASA tried breaking ground with the shuttles and in doing so broke all the rules. Shuttle astronauts sit alongside the fuel — next to the exploding motor that claimed Challenger, beneath the chunks of falling foam that killed Columbia. And when you fly a spacecraft repeatedly as opposed to chucking it after a single use, there's a lot of wear to repair.
When NASA engineers gathered to plan the next generation of America's rockets, they thus decided to go back to the future — way back. The Saturn V was the brainchild of Wernher von Braun, the German scientist whose bright genius gave the U.S. its finest line of rockets — and whose dark genius gave Hitler the V2 missile that rained terror on London. Von Braun had, in turn, drawn insights from American rocket pioneer Robert Goddard. Goddard built on the work of 17th century artillery innovator Kazimierz Siemienowicz, a Pole.
The Ares 1 is a worthy descendant of their rockets and others, with lightweight composites, better engines and exponentially improved computers giving it more reliability and power. The Ares 1 will launch an Apollo-like spacecraft with four crew members — perhaps by 2015. Alongside it, NASA is developing the Brobdingnagian Ares V, a 380-ft. (116 m) behemoth intended to put such heavy equipment as a lunar lander in Earth orbit, where astronauts can link up with it before blasting away to the moon. Somewhere between the two rockets is the so-called Ares Lite — a heavy-lift hybrid that could carry both humans and cargo and is intended to be a design that engineers can have in their back pockets if the two-booster plan proves unaffordable.
The new rockets could take astronauts to some thrilling places. The biggest costs — and risks — associated with visiting other celestial bodies are from landing and taking off again. But suppose you don't land? An independent commission appointed by the White House to make recommendations for NASA's future recently returned its 154-page report and made strong arguments for bypassing the familiar boots-in-the-soil scenario in favor of a flexible path of flybys and orbits.
Under the new thinking, astronauts could barnstorm or circle the moon, Mars and Mars' twin moons, deploying probes to do their rock-collecting and experiments for them. They could similarly sample near-Earth objects like asteroids. They could also travel to what is known as the Lagrange points — a scattering of spots between Earth and the moon and Earth and the sun where the gravitational forces on the bodies are precisely balanced and spacecraft simply ... hang where they are. These would serve as ideal spots for deploying probes and conducting cosmic observations.
Troublingly for Ares partisans, the same commission that called for such creative uses for the new rockets also called into question how affordable they are, arguing that it might be better simply to modify boosters now used to carry satellites and put a capsule on top. Maybe — but there's the question of safety too. NASA designers say the Ares line will be 10 times as safe as the shuttle and two to three times as safe as competing boosters.
There's no way of knowing if those projections are too rosy, but if history teaches us anything, it's that the space program's grimmest chapters — the launchpad fires and shuttle disasters — unfold when policy planners lean too hard on engineers. The finest moments occur when the bureaucrats give the designers a clean sheet of drafting paper and let them dream. There's genius in knowing how to create a truly big invention — and there's wisdom in knowing how to recognize it and use it.
See pictures of the Ares rockets launching.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Someone had to say it
And Michael Griffin did.
He has the intelligence to cut through the bull, the boldness to push the bull aside, and the ability to effectively communicate his thoughts concisely and directly.
Here are his thoughts on the Augustine Commission's report. It's entertaining to see so many in the media call his letter sour grapes. That shows how little they understand one of the best administrator's that NASA had. A resource difficult to replace.
I stand aside and allow him to push aside the curtain...
From: "Michael D. Griffin" To: XXXXXXXXXX
1) It is clarifying to see a formal recognition by the Commission that, based upon budgetary considerations, "the human spaceflight program appears to be on an unsustainable trajectory". Given that the Constellation program was designed in accordance with the budget profile specified in 2005, yet has since suffered some $30 billion of reductions to the amount allocated to human lunar return (including almost $12 billion in just the last five fiscal years) this is an unsurprising conclusion, but one which provides the necessary grounding for all subsequent discussions.
2) Since NASA's budget as outlined in 2005 was hardly one of rampant growth (only a slight increase above inflation was projected even then), and since the Commission did not report any evidence of substandard execution of the Program of Record - Constellation - one wonders why the Commission failed to recommend as its favored option that of simply restoring the funding necessary to do the job that has, since 2005, been codified in two strongly bi-partisan Congressional Authorization Acts. Of all the options considered, this is the most straightforward, yet it was not recommended. The so-called "less constrained" options merely provide partial restoration of budget authority that was removed within just the last few years. The most obvious conclusion to be drawn from the Commission' report is this: put it back.
3) The continual reference to the supposedly planned cancellation and deorbiting of ISS in 2016 is a strawman, irrelevant to consideration of serious programmatic options. While it is certainly true that Bush Administration budgets did not show any funding for ISS past 2015, it was always quite clear that the decision to cancel or fund the ISS in 2016 and beyond was never within the purview of the Bush Administration to make. In the face of strong International Partner commitment to ISS and two decades of steadfast Congressional commitment to the development, assembly, and utilization of ISS, it has never been and is not now realistic to consider cancellation and deorbiting of ISS in 2015, or indeed on any particular date which can be known today. The fact that some $3+ billion per year will be required to sustain ISS operations past 2015 is, and has always been, a glaring omission in future budget projections. Sustained funding of the ISS as long as it continues to return value - certainly to 2020 and quite likely beyond - should have been established by the Commission as a non-negotiable point of departure for all other discussions. Failure to do so, when the implications of prematurely canceling ISS are well known to all, is disingenuous. The existence of future exploration programs cannot be traded against sustenance of the ISS on an "either-or" basis, as if the latter option was a realistic option. If the nation is to lay claim to a viable human spaceflight program, the requirement to sustain ISS while also developing new systems to go beyond low Earth orbit is the minimally necessary standard. If the nation can no longer meet this standard, then it should be so stated, in which case any further discussion of U.S. human exploration beyond LEO is moot for the next two decades.
4) Numerous options are presented which are not linked by common goals or a strategy to reach such goals. Instead, differing options are presented to reach differing goals, rendering it impossible to develop meaningful cost/schedule/performance/risk comparisons across them. These options possess vastly differing levels of maturity, yet are offered as if all were on an equally mature footing in regard to their level of technical, cost, schedule, and risk assessment. This is not the case.
5) "Independent" cost estimates for Constellation systems are cited. There is no acknowledgement that these are low-fidelity estimates developed over a matter of weeks, yet are offered as corrections to NASA's cost estimates, which have years of effort behind them. No mention is made of NASA's commitment to probabilistic budget estimation techniques for Constellation, at significantly higher cost-confidence levels than has been the case in the past. If the Commission believes that NASA is not properly estimating costs, or is misrepresenting the data it has amassed, it should document its specific concerns. Otherwise, the provenance of NASA's cost estimates should be accepted, as no evidence has been supplied to justify overturning them.
6) The preference for "commercial" options for cargo and, worse, crew delivery to low Earth orbit appears throughout the Summary, together with the statement that "it is an appropriate time to consider turning this transport service over to the commercial sector." What commercial sector? At present, the only clearly available "commercial" option is Ariane 5. Launching a redesigned Orion crew vehicle is a valid choice in the context of an international program if - and only if - the U.S. is willing to give up independent access to low Earth orbit, a decision imbued with enormous future consequences. With an appropriately enlightened USG policy there may one day be a domestic commercial space transportation sector, but it does not presently exist and will not exist in the near future; i.e., substantially prior to the likely completion dates for Ares-1/Orion, if they were properly funded. The existence of a prudently funded USG option for cargo/crew delivery to ISS is precisely the strategy which allows the USG to take reasonable risks to sponsor the development of a viable commercial space sector. The Commission acknowledges the "risk" associated with its recommendation, but is not clear about the nature of that risk. If no USG option to deliver cargo and crew to LEO is to be developed following the retirement of the Space Shuttle, the U.S. risks the failure to sustain and utilize a unique facility with a sunk cost of $55 billion on the U.S. side, and nearly $20 billion of international partner investment in addition. The Russian Soyuz and Progress systems, even if we are willing to pay whatever is required to use them in the interim, simply do not provide sufficient capability to utilize ISS as was intended, and in any case represent a single point failure in regard to such utilization. To hold the support and utilization of the ISS hostage to the emergence of a commercial space sector is not "risky", it is irresponsible.
7) The Commission is disingenuous when it claims that safety "is not discussed in extensive detail because any concepts falling short in human safety have simply been eliminated from consideration." Similarly, the Commission was "unconvinced that enough is known about any of the potential high-reliability launcher-plus-capsule systems to distinguish their levels of safety in a meaningful way." For the Commission to dismiss out of hand the extensive analytical work that has been done to assure that Constellation systems represent the safest reasonable approach in comparison to all other presently known systems is simply unacceptable. Work of high quality in the assessment of safety and reliability has been done, and useful discriminators between and among systems do exist, whether the Commission believes so or not. To this point, the Commission's report is confusing as regards the distinction between "reliability" and "safety", where the issue is discussed at all. The former is the only criterion of interest for unmanned systems; for manned systems, there is an important difference due to the existence of an abort system and the conditions under which that abort system can and must operate. Nowhere is this crucial distinction discussed.
8) "Technical problems" with Ares-1 are cited several times, without any acknowledgement that (a) knowledgeable observers in NASA would disagree strongly as to the severity of such problems, and (b) Constellation's "technical problems" are on display because actual work is being accomplished, whereas other options have no problems because no work is being done.
9) The recommendation in favor of the dual-launch "Ares-5 Lite" approach as the baseline for lunar missions is difficult to understand. It violates the CAIB recommendation (and many similar recommendations) to separate crew and cargo in whatever post-Shuttle human space transportation system is to be developed. Further, the dual-Ares-5 Lite mission architecture substantially increases the minimum cost for a single lunar mission as compared to the Ares-1/Ares-5 approach, a recommendation which is difficult to understand in an already difficult budgetary environment. Finally, the Ares-5 Lite is nearly as expensive to develop as the Ares-5, but offers significantly less payload to the moon when used -- as will be required -- in a one-way, single-launch, cargo-only mode. (The LEO payload difference of 140 mt for Ares-5 Lite and 160 mt for Ares-5 masks a much greater difference in their lunar payload capability.) All parties agree that a heavy-lift launcher is needed for any human space program beyond LEO. Because of the economies of scale inherent to the design of launch vehicles, such a vehicle should be designed to lift as large a payload as possible within the constraints of the facilities and infrastructure available to build and transport it. This provides the greatest marginal improvement in capability at the lowest marginal cost.
10) The use of "fuel depots" as recommended in the Summary appears to be a solution in search of a problem. It is difficult to understand how such an approach can offer an economically favorable alternative. The Ares-5 offers the lowest cost-per-pound for payload to orbit of any presently known heavy-lift launch vehicle design. The mass-specific cost of payload to orbit nearly always improves with increasing launch vehicle scale. The recommendation in favor of an architectural approach based upon the use of many smaller vehicles to resupply a fuel depot ignores this fact, as well as the fact that a fuel depot requires a presently non-existent technology - the ability to provide closed-cycle refrigeration to maintain cryogenic fuels in the necessary thermodynamic state in space. This technology is a holy grail of deep-space exploration, because it is necessary for both chemical- and nuclear-powered upper stages. To establish an architecture based upon a non-existent technology at the very beginning of beyond-LEO operations is unwise.
11) Finally, the Commission did not do that which would have been most valuable - rendering a clear-eyed, independent assessment of the progress and status of Constellation with respect to its ability to meet goals which have been established in two successive NASA Authorization Acts, followed by an assessment of what would be required to get and keep that program on track. Instead, the Commission sought to formulate new options for new programs, treating these options as if their level of maturity was comparable to that of the baseline upon which NASA has been working now for more than four years. This approach completely ignores the established body of law which has guided NASA's work for the last four years and which, until and unless that body of law is changed, must serve as the common reference standard for any proposed alternatives to Constellation as the program of record for the nation's existing human spaceflight program.
He has the intelligence to cut through the bull, the boldness to push the bull aside, and the ability to effectively communicate his thoughts concisely and directly.
Here are his thoughts on the Augustine Commission's report. It's entertaining to see so many in the media call his letter sour grapes. That shows how little they understand one of the best administrator's that NASA had. A resource difficult to replace.
I stand aside and allow him to push aside the curtain...
From: "Michael D. Griffin" To: XXXXXXXXXX
1) It is clarifying to see a formal recognition by the Commission that, based upon budgetary considerations, "the human spaceflight program appears to be on an unsustainable trajectory". Given that the Constellation program was designed in accordance with the budget profile specified in 2005, yet has since suffered some $30 billion of reductions to the amount allocated to human lunar return (including almost $12 billion in just the last five fiscal years) this is an unsurprising conclusion, but one which provides the necessary grounding for all subsequent discussions.
2) Since NASA's budget as outlined in 2005 was hardly one of rampant growth (only a slight increase above inflation was projected even then), and since the Commission did not report any evidence of substandard execution of the Program of Record - Constellation - one wonders why the Commission failed to recommend as its favored option that of simply restoring the funding necessary to do the job that has, since 2005, been codified in two strongly bi-partisan Congressional Authorization Acts. Of all the options considered, this is the most straightforward, yet it was not recommended. The so-called "less constrained" options merely provide partial restoration of budget authority that was removed within just the last few years. The most obvious conclusion to be drawn from the Commission' report is this: put it back.
3) The continual reference to the supposedly planned cancellation and deorbiting of ISS in 2016 is a strawman, irrelevant to consideration of serious programmatic options. While it is certainly true that Bush Administration budgets did not show any funding for ISS past 2015, it was always quite clear that the decision to cancel or fund the ISS in 2016 and beyond was never within the purview of the Bush Administration to make. In the face of strong International Partner commitment to ISS and two decades of steadfast Congressional commitment to the development, assembly, and utilization of ISS, it has never been and is not now realistic to consider cancellation and deorbiting of ISS in 2015, or indeed on any particular date which can be known today. The fact that some $3+ billion per year will be required to sustain ISS operations past 2015 is, and has always been, a glaring omission in future budget projections. Sustained funding of the ISS as long as it continues to return value - certainly to 2020 and quite likely beyond - should have been established by the Commission as a non-negotiable point of departure for all other discussions. Failure to do so, when the implications of prematurely canceling ISS are well known to all, is disingenuous. The existence of future exploration programs cannot be traded against sustenance of the ISS on an "either-or" basis, as if the latter option was a realistic option. If the nation is to lay claim to a viable human spaceflight program, the requirement to sustain ISS while also developing new systems to go beyond low Earth orbit is the minimally necessary standard. If the nation can no longer meet this standard, then it should be so stated, in which case any further discussion of U.S. human exploration beyond LEO is moot for the next two decades.
4) Numerous options are presented which are not linked by common goals or a strategy to reach such goals. Instead, differing options are presented to reach differing goals, rendering it impossible to develop meaningful cost/schedule/performance/risk comparisons across them. These options possess vastly differing levels of maturity, yet are offered as if all were on an equally mature footing in regard to their level of technical, cost, schedule, and risk assessment. This is not the case.
5) "Independent" cost estimates for Constellation systems are cited. There is no acknowledgement that these are low-fidelity estimates developed over a matter of weeks, yet are offered as corrections to NASA's cost estimates, which have years of effort behind them. No mention is made of NASA's commitment to probabilistic budget estimation techniques for Constellation, at significantly higher cost-confidence levels than has been the case in the past. If the Commission believes that NASA is not properly estimating costs, or is misrepresenting the data it has amassed, it should document its specific concerns. Otherwise, the provenance of NASA's cost estimates should be accepted, as no evidence has been supplied to justify overturning them.
6) The preference for "commercial" options for cargo and, worse, crew delivery to low Earth orbit appears throughout the Summary, together with the statement that "it is an appropriate time to consider turning this transport service over to the commercial sector." What commercial sector? At present, the only clearly available "commercial" option is Ariane 5. Launching a redesigned Orion crew vehicle is a valid choice in the context of an international program if - and only if - the U.S. is willing to give up independent access to low Earth orbit, a decision imbued with enormous future consequences. With an appropriately enlightened USG policy there may one day be a domestic commercial space transportation sector, but it does not presently exist and will not exist in the near future; i.e., substantially prior to the likely completion dates for Ares-1/Orion, if they were properly funded. The existence of a prudently funded USG option for cargo/crew delivery to ISS is precisely the strategy which allows the USG to take reasonable risks to sponsor the development of a viable commercial space sector. The Commission acknowledges the "risk" associated with its recommendation, but is not clear about the nature of that risk. If no USG option to deliver cargo and crew to LEO is to be developed following the retirement of the Space Shuttle, the U.S. risks the failure to sustain and utilize a unique facility with a sunk cost of $55 billion on the U.S. side, and nearly $20 billion of international partner investment in addition. The Russian Soyuz and Progress systems, even if we are willing to pay whatever is required to use them in the interim, simply do not provide sufficient capability to utilize ISS as was intended, and in any case represent a single point failure in regard to such utilization. To hold the support and utilization of the ISS hostage to the emergence of a commercial space sector is not "risky", it is irresponsible.
7) The Commission is disingenuous when it claims that safety "is not discussed in extensive detail because any concepts falling short in human safety have simply been eliminated from consideration." Similarly, the Commission was "unconvinced that enough is known about any of the potential high-reliability launcher-plus-capsule systems to distinguish their levels of safety in a meaningful way." For the Commission to dismiss out of hand the extensive analytical work that has been done to assure that Constellation systems represent the safest reasonable approach in comparison to all other presently known systems is simply unacceptable. Work of high quality in the assessment of safety and reliability has been done, and useful discriminators between and among systems do exist, whether the Commission believes so or not. To this point, the Commission's report is confusing as regards the distinction between "reliability" and "safety", where the issue is discussed at all. The former is the only criterion of interest for unmanned systems; for manned systems, there is an important difference due to the existence of an abort system and the conditions under which that abort system can and must operate. Nowhere is this crucial distinction discussed.
8) "Technical problems" with Ares-1 are cited several times, without any acknowledgement that (a) knowledgeable observers in NASA would disagree strongly as to the severity of such problems, and (b) Constellation's "technical problems" are on display because actual work is being accomplished, whereas other options have no problems because no work is being done.
9) The recommendation in favor of the dual-launch "Ares-5 Lite" approach as the baseline for lunar missions is difficult to understand. It violates the CAIB recommendation (and many similar recommendations) to separate crew and cargo in whatever post-Shuttle human space transportation system is to be developed. Further, the dual-Ares-5 Lite mission architecture substantially increases the minimum cost for a single lunar mission as compared to the Ares-1/Ares-5 approach, a recommendation which is difficult to understand in an already difficult budgetary environment. Finally, the Ares-5 Lite is nearly as expensive to develop as the Ares-5, but offers significantly less payload to the moon when used -- as will be required -- in a one-way, single-launch, cargo-only mode. (The LEO payload difference of 140 mt for Ares-5 Lite and 160 mt for Ares-5 masks a much greater difference in their lunar payload capability.) All parties agree that a heavy-lift launcher is needed for any human space program beyond LEO. Because of the economies of scale inherent to the design of launch vehicles, such a vehicle should be designed to lift as large a payload as possible within the constraints of the facilities and infrastructure available to build and transport it. This provides the greatest marginal improvement in capability at the lowest marginal cost.
10) The use of "fuel depots" as recommended in the Summary appears to be a solution in search of a problem. It is difficult to understand how such an approach can offer an economically favorable alternative. The Ares-5 offers the lowest cost-per-pound for payload to orbit of any presently known heavy-lift launch vehicle design. The mass-specific cost of payload to orbit nearly always improves with increasing launch vehicle scale. The recommendation in favor of an architectural approach based upon the use of many smaller vehicles to resupply a fuel depot ignores this fact, as well as the fact that a fuel depot requires a presently non-existent technology - the ability to provide closed-cycle refrigeration to maintain cryogenic fuels in the necessary thermodynamic state in space. This technology is a holy grail of deep-space exploration, because it is necessary for both chemical- and nuclear-powered upper stages. To establish an architecture based upon a non-existent technology at the very beginning of beyond-LEO operations is unwise.
11) Finally, the Commission did not do that which would have been most valuable - rendering a clear-eyed, independent assessment of the progress and status of Constellation with respect to its ability to meet goals which have been established in two successive NASA Authorization Acts, followed by an assessment of what would be required to get and keep that program on track. Instead, the Commission sought to formulate new options for new programs, treating these options as if their level of maturity was comparable to that of the baseline upon which NASA has been working now for more than four years. This approach completely ignores the established body of law which has guided NASA's work for the last four years and which, until and unless that body of law is changed, must serve as the common reference standard for any proposed alternatives to Constellation as the program of record for the nation's existing human spaceflight program.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Quite Prescient
This was brought to my attention this morning. It's a commentary from Jim Slade, with ABC when he wrote it exactly 18 years ago, 12 August 1991. It's strong enough to speak on it's own.
Jim Slade Commentary, ABC radio August 12, 1991
Kennedy Space Center, August 12: This is a special place. It is so special that people will come here someday to see where an evolutionary change in human history began.
Our ABC broadcast facilities sit on a mound about a half mile to the right of the big hangers and control rooms where the shuttles are groomed and then fired into orbit. It is easy to forget now that this is the same place where Neil Armstrong and the others stepped off for the moon.
The launch pads themselves are about 3 and a half miles out there toward the ocean. You can see them clearly across the acres of tropical scrub and swamp. Birds tumble, squawking, out of those bushes whenever a rocket bellows. But the rockets only sing once in a while compared to the birds and so far, the birds have always come back.
It's a busy place. This is Monday. Yesterday, space shuttle Atlantis dropped out of the sky here and was led back to the barn, still warm and sweating. This morning, a big tractor carried Discovery out to the same launch pad Atlantis used ten days ago. They hope to launch Discovery in mid September with a huge satellite in its hold that will study how the ozone layer is being depleted and what we humans have to do with it. That is important public business, the kind the shuttles ought to be doing.
As soon it's ready, Atlantis will be re-serviced and used to launch a missile-warning satellite sometime in November. That's important too.
Nobody has to tell the people here that their work is important, though. If you didn't have the spirit to work in this place, you would hate it. It takes a lot of pride to stand up to the pressure, some of, not very fair.
There is a cynical tendency to jeer whenever a big, visible program doesn't work right. Impatience, leavened with the idea that lots of money ought to mean perfection, leads us down that road. The fact of the matter is that non-destructive delays here are a sign of perfection. When a high speed computer stops the clock because it sees trouble in a tiny little gizmo buried among thousands of other tiny little gizmos, I find that nothing short of a miracle. The bottom line here is that no shuttle flies unless everything works at the time of liftoff. Something might break on the way "up the hill," but at that most crucial moment the spacecraft is a hundred percent or it doesn't go. Given the millions of parts and miles of wire in a shuttle, that's saying more than any other engineering or science program has even been able to say.
If you want to know what's wrong with NASA, you will have to dig back in your history book ten to fifteen years ago when neither the White House nor the Congress could decide if the space program was fish, fowl, or tinker toy. Funding was inadequate to the job and shortcuts were were taken that are showing up only today in projects like the Hubble Space Telescope. More importantly, though, the space agency was getting no direction. No political leader had the interest or the courage to say "this is what we ought we ought to do with the things we have learned," and, as a result, NASA drifted into one enterprise after another, trying to do all there was to do at once. Some great things happened, like Voyager's journey to Neptune by way of the other planets. Some terrible things happened too, like Challenger.
And i don't think things are much better now, although there has been one commission after another making a study of what the US should be doing in space in the next fifty years. Usually, they say the same thing: go back to the moon and on to Mars. And so far, there has been a lot of political talk about it. But if you look closely, what you still see is drift.
You want to go to space? The people here can do it. Somebody has to say go, but nobody wants to be the one.
When those people visit this place in the future, I wonder if that's what they'll remember.
Jim Slade Commentary, ABC radio August 12, 1991
Kennedy Space Center, August 12: This is a special place. It is so special that people will come here someday to see where an evolutionary change in human history began.
Our ABC broadcast facilities sit on a mound about a half mile to the right of the big hangers and control rooms where the shuttles are groomed and then fired into orbit. It is easy to forget now that this is the same place where Neil Armstrong and the others stepped off for the moon.
The launch pads themselves are about 3 and a half miles out there toward the ocean. You can see them clearly across the acres of tropical scrub and swamp. Birds tumble, squawking, out of those bushes whenever a rocket bellows. But the rockets only sing once in a while compared to the birds and so far, the birds have always come back.
It's a busy place. This is Monday. Yesterday, space shuttle Atlantis dropped out of the sky here and was led back to the barn, still warm and sweating. This morning, a big tractor carried Discovery out to the same launch pad Atlantis used ten days ago. They hope to launch Discovery in mid September with a huge satellite in its hold that will study how the ozone layer is being depleted and what we humans have to do with it. That is important public business, the kind the shuttles ought to be doing.
As soon it's ready, Atlantis will be re-serviced and used to launch a missile-warning satellite sometime in November. That's important too.
Nobody has to tell the people here that their work is important, though. If you didn't have the spirit to work in this place, you would hate it. It takes a lot of pride to stand up to the pressure, some of, not very fair.
There is a cynical tendency to jeer whenever a big, visible program doesn't work right. Impatience, leavened with the idea that lots of money ought to mean perfection, leads us down that road. The fact of the matter is that non-destructive delays here are a sign of perfection. When a high speed computer stops the clock because it sees trouble in a tiny little gizmo buried among thousands of other tiny little gizmos, I find that nothing short of a miracle. The bottom line here is that no shuttle flies unless everything works at the time of liftoff. Something might break on the way "up the hill," but at that most crucial moment the spacecraft is a hundred percent or it doesn't go. Given the millions of parts and miles of wire in a shuttle, that's saying more than any other engineering or science program has even been able to say.
If you want to know what's wrong with NASA, you will have to dig back in your history book ten to fifteen years ago when neither the White House nor the Congress could decide if the space program was fish, fowl, or tinker toy. Funding was inadequate to the job and shortcuts were were taken that are showing up only today in projects like the Hubble Space Telescope. More importantly, though, the space agency was getting no direction. No political leader had the interest or the courage to say "this is what we ought we ought to do with the things we have learned," and, as a result, NASA drifted into one enterprise after another, trying to do all there was to do at once. Some great things happened, like Voyager's journey to Neptune by way of the other planets. Some terrible things happened too, like Challenger.
And i don't think things are much better now, although there has been one commission after another making a study of what the US should be doing in space in the next fifty years. Usually, they say the same thing: go back to the moon and on to Mars. And so far, there has been a lot of political talk about it. But if you look closely, what you still see is drift.
You want to go to space? The people here can do it. Somebody has to say go, but nobody wants to be the one.
When those people visit this place in the future, I wonder if that's what they'll remember.
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Happy Birthday, Neil Armstrong
Happy birthday, Mr. Armstrong. I hope it is a grand one and that you have many, many more. Thank you for all your service to our country. Thank you for sharing yourself with us during NASA’s 50th anniversary and Apollo 11’s 40th anniversary.
If I were to meet you, I’d want only to shake your hand and to thank you. So many only seek to get from you. I’d like to be able to give, little as I would have to give.
I see why you crave privacy. People are astounding in their desire to “own” someone who is a public figure, as if they have a right. However, thank you for working with James Hansen on the excellent book, “First Man”. You wanted to be known for something more than being first on the moon. The book is a wonderful presentation of all you are. And still, as much as you don’t wish to be looked so highly to, the book gives so many reasons. Apart from Apollo 11, you are still a true American hero and a man of strong character. I’m glad to know the person you are and all your achievements.
Thank you, Mr. Armstrong.
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Who Put the I in ISS?
The crew of STS-127 did a grand job. So did all the support personnel on the ground. And don't forget the ISS crew. There's so much to say, but for the moment I'll leave the profound things and just 'wow' over the fact that there were 13 people in orbit on the same vehicle for the first time. And let's not forget the diverse coverage of countries included in that baker's dozen. That is profound enough on its own.
I have become, recently, a fan of old time radio programs. The big box that people listened to for entertainment before television became ubiquitous. (Sidebar, but interesting: a coworker returned a few weeks ago from a mission trip to Eleuthera. His team worked to repair a tiny shack damaged by hurricane winds in 2008. Yeah, the man had been waiting that long for help. However, to the point. Jon said the man had no bathroom in the house and no outhouse, but he did have cable TV!)
These radio programs are interesting to me for reasons other than only entertainment. They are social commentaries as well, and I am a student of society. Of course my favorite programs would be the science fiction episodes. And the overwhelming majority of them (remember the time frame) paint a very pessimistic picture of humanity's future. Many of them present a world destroyed by nuclear war or under heavy threat of it breaking loose any moment. I'd say 80+% of them present such a future, a hopeless one. That's the most interesting part to me.
Fast forward over half a century. Talks are going on to reduce nuclear arms further. And 13 people from seven nations lived and worked together in the same station for just less than two weeks. Was it perfect harmony? I doubt it. Did everyone drop all their prejudices? I doubt that too. After all, we are imperfect humans. And imperfect humans can destroy each other. However, imperfect humans can agree to disagree, bury differences for a time, and work together to a common goal. And that is one of the important lessons of the International Space Station.
Yes, there is the United Nations, which has worked hard to bring nations together and bring peace to the world. Give it the credit it is due, but also see reality. Again, imperfect humans.
Rise above the demographic boundaries where the earth looks borderless...and the atmosphere seems so thin and fragile. No presidents or ambassadors or councils to debate issues.
Space is the great equalizer. It sees no color or nation or politics. Everyone has the same need, to survive. Thirteen people worked to survive and to explore and to build.
There are great opponents of the ISS, for many reasons. There are those that say it serves no practical purpose, and some say no scientific purpose.
I say they are all quite incorrect.
International Space Station, the real UN.
I have become, recently, a fan of old time radio programs. The big box that people listened to for entertainment before television became ubiquitous. (Sidebar, but interesting: a coworker returned a few weeks ago from a mission trip to Eleuthera. His team worked to repair a tiny shack damaged by hurricane winds in 2008. Yeah, the man had been waiting that long for help. However, to the point. Jon said the man had no bathroom in the house and no outhouse, but he did have cable TV!)
These radio programs are interesting to me for reasons other than only entertainment. They are social commentaries as well, and I am a student of society. Of course my favorite programs would be the science fiction episodes. And the overwhelming majority of them (remember the time frame) paint a very pessimistic picture of humanity's future. Many of them present a world destroyed by nuclear war or under heavy threat of it breaking loose any moment. I'd say 80+% of them present such a future, a hopeless one. That's the most interesting part to me.
Fast forward over half a century. Talks are going on to reduce nuclear arms further. And 13 people from seven nations lived and worked together in the same station for just less than two weeks. Was it perfect harmony? I doubt it. Did everyone drop all their prejudices? I doubt that too. After all, we are imperfect humans. And imperfect humans can destroy each other. However, imperfect humans can agree to disagree, bury differences for a time, and work together to a common goal. And that is one of the important lessons of the International Space Station.
Yes, there is the United Nations, which has worked hard to bring nations together and bring peace to the world. Give it the credit it is due, but also see reality. Again, imperfect humans.
Rise above the demographic boundaries where the earth looks borderless...and the atmosphere seems so thin and fragile. No presidents or ambassadors or councils to debate issues.
Space is the great equalizer. It sees no color or nation or politics. Everyone has the same need, to survive. Thirteen people worked to survive and to explore and to build.
There are great opponents of the ISS, for many reasons. There are those that say it serves no practical purpose, and some say no scientific purpose.
I say they are all quite incorrect.
International Space Station, the real UN.
Friday, July 24, 2009
40 years
Today is the 40th anniversary of the splashdown of Apollo 11, bringing to an end man's greatest technological achievement and man's greatest exploration. One of the things that slips by on the recognition of the first moon landing is that the entire mission was eight days. That's a slightly lengthened week off from work. A quarter of a million miles to the moon in four days, and the same distance back in a like time. Of course gravity helps a great deal. Once the moon's gravitational influence on the craft exceeded the earth's, the pull of the moon was essentially doing all the driving. Or as Bill Anders of Apollo 8 said, I think Isaac Newton is doing most of the driving now."
A great deal of celebrating has taken place this week, and rightfully so. The great dream of so many people through a couple of centuries, and years of devoted and demanding work by a wide range of Americans, was fulfilled on July 20, 1969. Only twelve astronauts have stood on the surface of a body other than the earth. It's a tremendous accomplishment.
It's sad, however, that at the same time we are celebrating, the nation's space program suffers doubts, fading support and is in a state of confusion. The state of confusion being the limbo we float in while awaiting the Augustine commission to finish its study and issue a report. And beyond that how much longer will we have to wait for the new administration to make a decision and direct NASA, and hopefully provide the funds to support the direction?
The morale at the building where I work is high this week because of the celebration, but when the yelling is over and we go back to work on Ares, and read the hazing from media and blogs alike, reality sets in. It's true that NASA has made mistakes. I don't deny it or try to justify it. Fourteen people have died in the shuttle program. But unlike Apollo, there is no forgiveness. Apollo 1 was a terrible tragedy. NASA pulled itself together and two and a half years later landed on the moon. Well, after (no pun intended) going the distance, Apollo 1 was remembered but forgiven. NASA had redeemed itself with Apollo 11.
The shuttle program has flown for 28 years and 127 flights. Any one death is dreadful. Even with mistakes eliminated there will be failures because no system is perfect. (Let's not belabor statistics on how many people die every day in cars, in plane accidents. Humans aren't perfect. Neither are the products of their minds and hands.) Great achievements have been made during the shuttle era. However, lack of coverage and lack of appreciation or understanding on the part of the public blunts these accomplishments severely. So, not only are these things ignored, there is no tall pole at which to point, as with the moon landing (at least from the point of view of lay people), and say NASA has redeemed itself.
As a friend from work told me so very recently, we (NASA) are serving our country and we are making sacrifices to serve our country. We do because we give up a lot of personal time and energy to do our jobs. We miss many event things in personal time to do this job. I know that so many people have this vision of government workers with feet on desks and reading newspapers. There are rotten apples in every bunch. However, the largest part of people that I work with are busting tail and making sacrifice. It's another way NASA is ignored. The only way NASA gets coverage is if something goes wrong. Funny how the media doesn't always follow up on the bad news to tell the resolution. But that is another story.
To tie this all together, NASA is still capable of doing great things. We need a supportive administration. It would be nice to have a supportive populace. However, that is a luxury. A supportive administration is essential. If NASA doesn't achieve great things, do not always chalk it up to "incompetent" NASA.
Happy 40th to Apollo 11, and great going to the crew of STS-127 and the ISS. The space program has not reached its perigee. We are still climbing to apogee. But we do need a supportive gravity to pull us into orbit...of whatever program we are directed to pursue.
A great deal of celebrating has taken place this week, and rightfully so. The great dream of so many people through a couple of centuries, and years of devoted and demanding work by a wide range of Americans, was fulfilled on July 20, 1969. Only twelve astronauts have stood on the surface of a body other than the earth. It's a tremendous accomplishment.
It's sad, however, that at the same time we are celebrating, the nation's space program suffers doubts, fading support and is in a state of confusion. The state of confusion being the limbo we float in while awaiting the Augustine commission to finish its study and issue a report. And beyond that how much longer will we have to wait for the new administration to make a decision and direct NASA, and hopefully provide the funds to support the direction?
The morale at the building where I work is high this week because of the celebration, but when the yelling is over and we go back to work on Ares, and read the hazing from media and blogs alike, reality sets in. It's true that NASA has made mistakes. I don't deny it or try to justify it. Fourteen people have died in the shuttle program. But unlike Apollo, there is no forgiveness. Apollo 1 was a terrible tragedy. NASA pulled itself together and two and a half years later landed on the moon. Well, after (no pun intended) going the distance, Apollo 1 was remembered but forgiven. NASA had redeemed itself with Apollo 11.
The shuttle program has flown for 28 years and 127 flights. Any one death is dreadful. Even with mistakes eliminated there will be failures because no system is perfect. (Let's not belabor statistics on how many people die every day in cars, in plane accidents. Humans aren't perfect. Neither are the products of their minds and hands.) Great achievements have been made during the shuttle era. However, lack of coverage and lack of appreciation or understanding on the part of the public blunts these accomplishments severely. So, not only are these things ignored, there is no tall pole at which to point, as with the moon landing (at least from the point of view of lay people), and say NASA has redeemed itself.
As a friend from work told me so very recently, we (NASA) are serving our country and we are making sacrifices to serve our country. We do because we give up a lot of personal time and energy to do our jobs. We miss many event things in personal time to do this job. I know that so many people have this vision of government workers with feet on desks and reading newspapers. There are rotten apples in every bunch. However, the largest part of people that I work with are busting tail and making sacrifice. It's another way NASA is ignored. The only way NASA gets coverage is if something goes wrong. Funny how the media doesn't always follow up on the bad news to tell the resolution. But that is another story.
To tie this all together, NASA is still capable of doing great things. We need a supportive administration. It would be nice to have a supportive populace. However, that is a luxury. A supportive administration is essential. If NASA doesn't achieve great things, do not always chalk it up to "incompetent" NASA.
Happy 40th to Apollo 11, and great going to the crew of STS-127 and the ISS. The space program has not reached its perigee. We are still climbing to apogee. But we do need a supportive gravity to pull us into orbit...of whatever program we are directed to pursue.
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