Jeff Foust describes the administration's rollout of the new plan for NASA and the reception that it got: An agency in transition.
Bob Clarebrough argues for a new paradigm for space that involves a partnership of government and private enterprise: Maps and buried treasure
The last 50 years are history and we can’t change that. We can decide that the next half-century will be different: “we can believe in change”, to paraphrase a well-known campaign slogan. The new model spells the end of government monopoly and the opening up of space to entrepreneurial dynamism providing access to all who want to explore and exploit the solar system; the determination must be to replace the “Right Stuff” fixation with the “Wright Stuff” paradigm—that’s what brought us to today and will take us into the future.
Vision and action can change everything—despite the objections.
Vedda, a senior space policy analyst with the Aerospace Corporation, makes it clear in the book that he is not a fan of destination-based approaches like Apollo and the Vision for Space Exploration. “Continuation of the destination-driven approach, which has dominated thinking for a half-century, is a persistent non-vision we cannot afford,” he writes. “Programmatically, human landings on the Moon and Mars are treated like the finish line in a race, and planners have insufficient motivation and resources to think beyond that point.”
Vedda instead argues for a capabilities-based approach, one that arguably is even broader than what NASA has proposed in its new budget. NASA should focus on capabilities that can help life on Earth: something that includes, but is not limited to, Earth sciences work.
The schedule for The Space Show this week begins today (2-3:30 pm PST) with a discussion with Bob Zimmerman about the administration's new space policy proposals.
This Tuesday (7-8:30 pm PST) they will hold the first of the new Space Show Classroom sessions starting with guest panelist Paul Breed to discuss the rocket equation along with co-hosts Drs. Logan and Jurist. (The Space Show Classroom blog will post presentation material shortly before this program.)
On Friday (9:30-11:30 amPST), Kris Kimel of Kentucky Space will talk about "exciting new space programming". On Sunday (12-1:30 pm PST), Brent Sherwood will discuss the NASA Flexible Path option.
While Constellation's mourners keep bringing up the "threat" of a Chinese lunar landing, it's a bit ironic that the architecture the Chinese may use looks far more in the style of the new exploration philosophy that with Apollo on Steroids.
Henry Vanderbilt has posted the latest on the Space Access '010 conference, which will take place April 8-10 in Phoenix, Arizona. Includes confirmed speakers, registration, hotel, etc.
The new White House NASA space exploration policy looks as promising as anything we've seen come from those quarters for a long time. Passing responsibility for basic space access to the US commercial sector while refocusing NASA on developing the technology for future deep-space exploration has potential to radically reduce the costs of both basic access and deep exploration, vastly expanding our future exploration and development possibilities.
But it's a long way from a promising new policy to a successful program. First, the Congress gets to decide what will and will not actually get funded on a year-by-year basis. Then, NASA has to execute whatever program emerges from Congress, one year at a time. A lot can go wrong at every step of the way. We will be watching this process closely. Stay tuned for new Space Access Updates in the coming months.
We will also be discussing this new policy intensively at our next annual conference
BTW: So we have now apparently set China on course to capture the Moon by putting a couple of Taikanouts there with an Apollo repeat. I think the Trillion Yuan cost for that would be the perfect punishment for their devious plot to trick us into implementing an export control regime that successfully crippled our commercial space industry.
Well, immediately after I posted the previous item, the electricity went out again and stayed off till the start of the second half of the Super Bowl. I hope it is on for good this time, or at least till the next snowstorm, which is predicted for Tuesday...
Brrrrrr, the electricity finally came on in our condo but the central heat is still off. The juice went down yesterday around noon as the great Blizzard of 2010 knocked out the power for our area. At least the gas stove would fire up with a match and we could cook and warm up the kitchen a bit. Our rooms were in the low 50s this morning.
We haven't decided if we risk driving to our friend's Super Bowl party that we attend every year. The roads have been cleared to some extent but we see cars slipping and sliding.
Yesterday we dressed up in the gear we wear for cross-country skiing and went out for a long 'stroll". The snow was real pretty. Only place we found open was the big Giant store a couple of miles away. (You might think they would keep extra D batteries in stock for this sort of situation!) Never seen so much snow piled up on the trees. One good sized branch fell on a neighbor's car but it seemed to be cushioned by the snow and didn't do any damage.
Anyway, I'll try to catch up with postings today. I see that the Shuttle launch was postponed. Hope it goes up tonight.
Briefs: Bolstering the outline; NASA deja vu; Capsule questions
Bolden and his team still have a lot of work to do to develop all the details of the new plan, especially with respect to forming a clear plan for deep space human exploration: Obama Space Plan Is At Outline Stage - Aviation Week - Feb.5.10.
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Craig Covault talks about previous big plans at NASA that went awry such as when they attempted to convince President Nixon to back development of a "gigantic 100-astronaut space station" that would in turn support Mars missions in the 1985 time frame: Latest NASA crossroads is familiar territory for space - Spaceflight Now.
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A discussion of Orion and Orion-lite and whether you want to take your LEO capsule with you when you set off on deep space missions: A Capsule of Knowledge - Chair Force Engineer
