Buzz Aldrin's Blog, page 2
March 17, 2010
Mr. President, Will You Lead Us to Greatness in Space?
It is time we sailed the sea of space once more in a bold, expansive space vision. To achieve such a goal we need strong leaders, for to sustain a growing and momentous effort in space requires that we reject a defeatist mentality.
Why We Need Better Rockets
NASA's recent launch of the Ares 1-X was billed as the prototype of a crew launch vehicle, a fancy term for a manned space booster. In fact, the much-hyped Ares 1-X was much ado about nothing.
In Search of a Real Spaceship
Two Shuttle accidents -- each caused by NASA hubris -- combined with a tight budget have caused NASA to retire the fleet. Understandable, but in a move that truly makes no sense, they will be replaced by...the space capsules we long ago outgrew.
February 23, 2010
Spaceships Worthy of the Name
In this blog I'm going to talk about what NASA needs to do once Congress has passed President Obama's new budget that starts on October 1st. Although I spent most of last year speaking about these concepts, they may be new to some readers - and they have even greater significance now that the space program is poised to make a great, and I believe necessary, transition. My ideas, if followed, would assure America of global space leadership for many years to come. And equally cool is the fact that to develop them won't break the already near-empty national budget.
First, is the idea of what type of commercial crew-carrying vehicle should follow the Space Shuttle. Next is why we should extend the life of the Shuttle program for a small number of additional flights. And last, what those Shuttles should carry up to the International Space Station - a true spacecraft that would live only in space.
Right now, NASA is hoping to spend about a billion dollars each year beginning next October to speed the development of a new fleet of all-commercial spaceships that would act as space taxis. These machines would take American astronauts and others bound for the orbiting station, but also serve as a vehicle for the repeated use of researchers and experimenters. I'm urging NASA to foster the development of what I call runway landers. No, that's not the name of a high stakes gambler from Vegas. It's a type of spacecraft that flies to orbit like the retiring Shuttles but then glides to a landing like an airplane on a runway. Just like the Shuttles do.
My reasoning is if these new spacecraft are to be true space taxis, then returning their human crew and perhaps research experiments quickly is essential. Landing in the ocean and waiting for the navy to come alongside and haul you out of the drink is what space capsules require. And after the capsule is recovered, it would take weeks for the ship to return to port. The astronauts might be flown home earlier by helicopter, but the cargo, and the capsule, will still be waiting long after the flight has faded from the business news web sites. This is just ridiculous, and no way to foster a true commercial space industry. As someone who flew two space capsules and twice landed in the ocean, I can attest from personal experience how much logistics work is needed to get you home. This is no way to treat a spaceship -- making it become a boat at the end of the flight? By comparison landing on a runway in the heart of a military or civilian airport or specially constructed spaceport would speed the retrieval and replacement of the cargo and crew. If that landing site is also the launching site, and the ship is fully reusable, then it can be mated to a new booster and readied for flight in a few weeks. This is exactly what we have learned flying the Shuttle for the last 30 years.
And, speaking of the Space Shuttle, why are we retiring it before the replacement vehicle is available? Makes no sense to me when there are enough parts to fly the Shuttles for other two, three or four flights, say. By stretching out the remaining handful of flights, we can close the infamous space flight "gap" that looms ahead between Shuttle retirement and first flights of the new commercial craft. Why should American's hard-earned taxpayer dollars go to Russia to buy flights on their Soyuz rockets, as is the current plan? Would it not be a better and more sensible thing to use that money to extend - only briefly - the life of the Shuttle?
Speaking of which, in the current debate, folks have seemed to forget that if we need a heavy lift booster to haul large payloads up to orbit, we already have one now-it's called the Space Shuttle. And I have a mission in mind for these handful of extra flights.
In storage at Marshall Spaceflight Center, and elsewhere around the country are spacecraft components from which we can build a true spaceship, one worthy of the name. I've called the Exploration Module, or XM. This vehicle, lifted up to orbit aboard the Space Shuttle in its final missions, would be a true spacecraft that lives only in space. Just like the Lunar Module Eagle that Neil Armstrong and I rode down to the moon's surface during our Apollo 11 flight. Once docked to the International Space Station, astronaut crews could practice and train for future deep space missions, to encounter asteroids say, or the moons of Mars. If the XM was shielded and connected with a spacecraft like the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle or some other return-to-Earth craft, once tested at the space station, we could take it out for a spin, say cycling between the Earth and the moon. My concept for a cycling spaceship, now universally called the Aldrin cycler, could be fashioned out of the XM. All we'd need would be a rocket to attach to it, maybe like the Centaur liquid hydrogen upper stage flown many times aboard many different launchers - and managed by Ohio's Glenn Research Center.
Consider what I'm proposing: commercial vehicles fly from the surface of the Earth to the station. Their destination - the XM, is built from existing hardware and managed by say the Johnson Space Center in Houston. The spaceship's propulsion and life support system could be managed by Huntsville's Marshall Spaceflight Center. And everything is assembled, tested and launched from Florida's Kennedy Space Center. Commercial providers do what they do best - flying people and cargo from Earth. NASA does what it does best - build deep space vehicles - and there is sufficient work to keep all of the existing Project Constellation centers humming along.
As someone once said, "Mission Accomplished!"
First, is the idea of what type of commercial crew-carrying vehicle should follow the Space Shuttle. Next is why we should extend the life of the Shuttle program for a small number of additional flights. And last, what those Shuttles should carry up to the International Space Station - a true spacecraft that would live only in space.
Right now, NASA is hoping to spend about a billion dollars each year beginning next October to speed the development of a new fleet of all-commercial spaceships that would act as space taxis. These machines would take American astronauts and others bound for the orbiting station, but also serve as a vehicle for the repeated use of researchers and experimenters. I'm urging NASA to foster the development of what I call runway landers. No, that's not the name of a high stakes gambler from Vegas. It's a type of spacecraft that flies to orbit like the retiring Shuttles but then glides to a landing like an airplane on a runway. Just like the Shuttles do.
My reasoning is if these new spacecraft are to be true space taxis, then returning their human crew and perhaps research experiments quickly is essential. Landing in the ocean and waiting for the navy to come alongside and haul you out of the drink is what space capsules require. And after the capsule is recovered, it would take weeks for the ship to return to port. The astronauts might be flown home earlier by helicopter, but the cargo, and the capsule, will still be waiting long after the flight has faded from the business news web sites. This is just ridiculous, and no way to foster a true commercial space industry. As someone who flew two space capsules and twice landed in the ocean, I can attest from personal experience how much logistics work is needed to get you home. This is no way to treat a spaceship -- making it become a boat at the end of the flight? By comparison landing on a runway in the heart of a military or civilian airport or specially constructed spaceport would speed the retrieval and replacement of the cargo and crew. If that landing site is also the launching site, and the ship is fully reusable, then it can be mated to a new booster and readied for flight in a few weeks. This is exactly what we have learned flying the Shuttle for the last 30 years.
And, speaking of the Space Shuttle, why are we retiring it before the replacement vehicle is available? Makes no sense to me when there are enough parts to fly the Shuttles for other two, three or four flights, say. By stretching out the remaining handful of flights, we can close the infamous space flight "gap" that looms ahead between Shuttle retirement and first flights of the new commercial craft. Why should American's hard-earned taxpayer dollars go to Russia to buy flights on their Soyuz rockets, as is the current plan? Would it not be a better and more sensible thing to use that money to extend - only briefly - the life of the Shuttle?
Speaking of which, in the current debate, folks have seemed to forget that if we need a heavy lift booster to haul large payloads up to orbit, we already have one now-it's called the Space Shuttle. And I have a mission in mind for these handful of extra flights.
In storage at Marshall Spaceflight Center, and elsewhere around the country are spacecraft components from which we can build a true spaceship, one worthy of the name. I've called the Exploration Module, or XM. This vehicle, lifted up to orbit aboard the Space Shuttle in its final missions, would be a true spacecraft that lives only in space. Just like the Lunar Module Eagle that Neil Armstrong and I rode down to the moon's surface during our Apollo 11 flight. Once docked to the International Space Station, astronaut crews could practice and train for future deep space missions, to encounter asteroids say, or the moons of Mars. If the XM was shielded and connected with a spacecraft like the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle or some other return-to-Earth craft, once tested at the space station, we could take it out for a spin, say cycling between the Earth and the moon. My concept for a cycling spaceship, now universally called the Aldrin cycler, could be fashioned out of the XM. All we'd need would be a rocket to attach to it, maybe like the Centaur liquid hydrogen upper stage flown many times aboard many different launchers - and managed by Ohio's Glenn Research Center.
Consider what I'm proposing: commercial vehicles fly from the surface of the Earth to the station. Their destination - the XM, is built from existing hardware and managed by say the Johnson Space Center in Houston. The spaceship's propulsion and life support system could be managed by Huntsville's Marshall Spaceflight Center. And everything is assembled, tested and launched from Florida's Kennedy Space Center. Commercial providers do what they do best - flying people and cargo from Earth. NASA does what it does best - build deep space vehicles - and there is sufficient work to keep all of the existing Project Constellation centers humming along.
As someone once said, "Mission Accomplished!"
February 3, 2010
President Obama's JFK Moment
Thank you, Mr. President.
That's what we should say to President Barack Obama in light of his Fiscal Year 2011 space budget for NASA. The President courageously decided to redirect our nation's space policy away from the foolish and underfunded Moon race that has consumed NASA for more than six years, aiming instead at boosting the agency's budget by more than $1 billion more per year over the next five years, topping off at $100 billion for NASA between now and 2015. And he directed NASA to spend a billion per year on buying rides for American astronauts aboard new, commercially developed space vehicles-that's American space vehicles. Other NASA funds will go into developing and testing new revolutionary technologies that we can use in living and working on Mars and its moons.
The Aldrin cycler (which I proposed two decades ago), your time has finally come! Those technologies will sustain long term, deep space exploration in the years ahead-just like my concept for a cycling spaceship moving between Earth and Mars. For that, we don't need the Moon!
But this change in direction will not be easy -- like turning a big ship around in a small space. For those who will think about opposing this new plan, let me explain why I think it's a necessary step forward, not back. Having walked on the Moon, I know something about what we need to explore, really explore, in space.
For the past six years America's civil space program has been aimed at returning astronauts to the Moon by 2020. That's the plan announced by President George W. Bush in January of 2004. That plan also called for developing the technologies that would support human expeditions to Mars, our ultimate destination in space. But two things happened along the way since that announcement, which became known as the Vision for Space Exploration.
First, the President failed to fully fund the program, as he had initially promised. As a result, each year the development of the rockets and spacecraft called for in the plan slipped further and further behind. Second and most importantly, NASA virtually eliminated the technology development effort for advanced space systems. Equally as bad, NASA also raided the Earth and space science budgets in the struggle to keep the program, named Project Constellation, on track. Even that effort fell short.
To keep the focus on the return to the Moon, NASA pretty much abandoned all hope of preparing for Mars exploration. It looked like building bases on the Moon would consume all of NASA's resources. Yet despite much complaining, neither a Republican-controlled nor a Democratic-controlled Congress was willing or able to add back those missing and needed funds. The date of the so-called return to the Moon slipped from 2020 to heaven-knows when. At the same time, there was no money to either extend the life of the Space Shuttle, due to be retired this year, or that of the International Space Station, due to be dropped into the Pacific Ocean in 2015, a scant handful of years after it was completed.
Enter the new Obama administration. Before deciding what to do about national space policy, Obama set up an outside review panel of space experts, headed up by my friend Norm Augustine, former head of Lockheed Martin and a former government official. Augustine's team took testimony and presentations from many people with ideas on what way forward NASA should take (that group included me). In October, it presented its report to the President and to Dr. John Holdren, Obama's science advisor and a friend and colleague of mine. The report strongly suggested the nation move away from the troubled rocket program, called Ares 1, and both extend the life of the space station and develop commercial ways of sending astronauts and cargoes up to the station. And it suggested a better way to spend our taxpayer dollars would be not focused on the Moon race, but on something it called a "Flexible Path." Flexible in the sense that it would redirect NASA towards developing the capability of voyaging to more distant locations in space, such as rendezvous with possibly threatening asteroids, or comets, or even flying by Mars to land on its moons. Many different destinations and missions would be enabled by that approach, not just one.
But with the limited NASA budget consumed by the Moon, no funds were available for this development effort -- until now. Now President Obama has signaled that new direction -- what I'm calling Flexible plus, containing much of the steps called for in the Augustine report. If Congress agrees, we'll turn over all space taxi services to the private sector and aim NASA at fully using the station -- extended to at least 2020 in Obama's plan -- and spending a billion dollars a year in creating these new private sector spaceships. When the time comes to start building deep space transports and refueling rocket tankers, it will be the commercial industry that steps up, not another government-owned, government managed enterprise. And if we want to use the Moon as a stepping stone in the future, we'll have to join with our international partners for the effort. No more "go it alone" space projects. If you or your children or grandkids ever hope to fly into orbit, these new vehicles are their only hope for a ride to space.
There is little reason to believe that Congress would add this kind of budget boost to the Bush lunar program, since it hasn't done that for the past six years. But if we really wanted to establish new companies and create new jobs in the space business, then Obama's idea is clearly the way to go. America's space entrepreneurs have all the talent and tools they need to take advantage of the proposed Obama plan. Even our rocket pads at the Kennedy Space Center, where the same pads from which Apollo 11 was launched more than 40 years ago are still used, will get a user-friendly makeover. And NASA will do what it does best -- preparing the capability to explore.
I know that change can be a scary thing. And I know the forces of the existing Constellation program are already preparing to fight the Obama plan. But I hope when the emotion subsides, my friends in Congress will see as I see the wisdom and strength that this new approach will give our nation's space program.
I'll be speaking out about the plan more in the weeks ahead. In the meantime, I ask my friends and readers to get behind Obama's new policy. Join with me and help usher in a new age of space. A space program that truly goes somewhere! With his deeds, not only words, President Obama has revitalized our struggling space program. His has been a "Profile in Courage" when it comes to space and science. And that's why I call it his JFK moment.
That's what we should say to President Barack Obama in light of his Fiscal Year 2011 space budget for NASA. The President courageously decided to redirect our nation's space policy away from the foolish and underfunded Moon race that has consumed NASA for more than six years, aiming instead at boosting the agency's budget by more than $1 billion more per year over the next five years, topping off at $100 billion for NASA between now and 2015. And he directed NASA to spend a billion per year on buying rides for American astronauts aboard new, commercially developed space vehicles-that's American space vehicles. Other NASA funds will go into developing and testing new revolutionary technologies that we can use in living and working on Mars and its moons.
The Aldrin cycler (which I proposed two decades ago), your time has finally come! Those technologies will sustain long term, deep space exploration in the years ahead-just like my concept for a cycling spaceship moving between Earth and Mars. For that, we don't need the Moon!
But this change in direction will not be easy -- like turning a big ship around in a small space. For those who will think about opposing this new plan, let me explain why I think it's a necessary step forward, not back. Having walked on the Moon, I know something about what we need to explore, really explore, in space.
For the past six years America's civil space program has been aimed at returning astronauts to the Moon by 2020. That's the plan announced by President George W. Bush in January of 2004. That plan also called for developing the technologies that would support human expeditions to Mars, our ultimate destination in space. But two things happened along the way since that announcement, which became known as the Vision for Space Exploration.
First, the President failed to fully fund the program, as he had initially promised. As a result, each year the development of the rockets and spacecraft called for in the plan slipped further and further behind. Second and most importantly, NASA virtually eliminated the technology development effort for advanced space systems. Equally as bad, NASA also raided the Earth and space science budgets in the struggle to keep the program, named Project Constellation, on track. Even that effort fell short.
To keep the focus on the return to the Moon, NASA pretty much abandoned all hope of preparing for Mars exploration. It looked like building bases on the Moon would consume all of NASA's resources. Yet despite much complaining, neither a Republican-controlled nor a Democratic-controlled Congress was willing or able to add back those missing and needed funds. The date of the so-called return to the Moon slipped from 2020 to heaven-knows when. At the same time, there was no money to either extend the life of the Space Shuttle, due to be retired this year, or that of the International Space Station, due to be dropped into the Pacific Ocean in 2015, a scant handful of years after it was completed.
Enter the new Obama administration. Before deciding what to do about national space policy, Obama set up an outside review panel of space experts, headed up by my friend Norm Augustine, former head of Lockheed Martin and a former government official. Augustine's team took testimony and presentations from many people with ideas on what way forward NASA should take (that group included me). In October, it presented its report to the President and to Dr. John Holdren, Obama's science advisor and a friend and colleague of mine. The report strongly suggested the nation move away from the troubled rocket program, called Ares 1, and both extend the life of the space station and develop commercial ways of sending astronauts and cargoes up to the station. And it suggested a better way to spend our taxpayer dollars would be not focused on the Moon race, but on something it called a "Flexible Path." Flexible in the sense that it would redirect NASA towards developing the capability of voyaging to more distant locations in space, such as rendezvous with possibly threatening asteroids, or comets, or even flying by Mars to land on its moons. Many different destinations and missions would be enabled by that approach, not just one.
But with the limited NASA budget consumed by the Moon, no funds were available for this development effort -- until now. Now President Obama has signaled that new direction -- what I'm calling Flexible plus, containing much of the steps called for in the Augustine report. If Congress agrees, we'll turn over all space taxi services to the private sector and aim NASA at fully using the station -- extended to at least 2020 in Obama's plan -- and spending a billion dollars a year in creating these new private sector spaceships. When the time comes to start building deep space transports and refueling rocket tankers, it will be the commercial industry that steps up, not another government-owned, government managed enterprise. And if we want to use the Moon as a stepping stone in the future, we'll have to join with our international partners for the effort. No more "go it alone" space projects. If you or your children or grandkids ever hope to fly into orbit, these new vehicles are their only hope for a ride to space.
There is little reason to believe that Congress would add this kind of budget boost to the Bush lunar program, since it hasn't done that for the past six years. But if we really wanted to establish new companies and create new jobs in the space business, then Obama's idea is clearly the way to go. America's space entrepreneurs have all the talent and tools they need to take advantage of the proposed Obama plan. Even our rocket pads at the Kennedy Space Center, where the same pads from which Apollo 11 was launched more than 40 years ago are still used, will get a user-friendly makeover. And NASA will do what it does best -- preparing the capability to explore.
I know that change can be a scary thing. And I know the forces of the existing Constellation program are already preparing to fight the Obama plan. But I hope when the emotion subsides, my friends in Congress will see as I see the wisdom and strength that this new approach will give our nation's space program.
I'll be speaking out about the plan more in the weeks ahead. In the meantime, I ask my friends and readers to get behind Obama's new policy. Join with me and help usher in a new age of space. A space program that truly goes somewhere! With his deeds, not only words, President Obama has revitalized our struggling space program. His has been a "Profile in Courage" when it comes to space and science. And that's why I call it his JFK moment.
November 25, 2009
In Search of a Real Spaceship
Imagine this scenario: you are a tourist coming home from a special vacation jaunt. Or maybe you're a researcher headed home from an assignment at a national laboratory. But instead of a nice gentle landing at an airport, you plunge into the cold waters of the Atlantic Ocean, bobbing about like a cork on a fishing line. Instead of a leisurely stroll to the airport concourse, you have to wait to be fished out of the drink by the U.S. navy.
Sound enticing? That's just the way future Americans will have to return from space visits to the International Space Station - whether you're a fancy high rolling space tourist or someone your government has sent to do space research - because space capsules - much like the tiny Gemini 12 and Apollo 11 capsules my colleagues and I flew more than 40 years ago - have been deemed the replacement shape for the craft that are to follow the winged and capable Space Shuttle fleet when it retires next year.
Space capsules? That's right, instead of following the Shuttles with something as capable - something that can guarantee American space leadership - we're going to race China, India, and Russia in a competition to build a limited and ungainly spacecraft that America retired a generation ago. And guess what? It will take another seven years before the NASA Orion capsule is ready to ferry astronauts. And that's on top of the five years we've already spent designing the thing. Seven more years, when we went from Mercury through Gemini to Apollo in less than five (the first unmanned Apollo test flights began even before Gemini carried astronauts, for Pete's sake). And it will cost the taxpayers, oh more than $50 billion for these Orion capsules and their booster rockets! Washington, we don't have liftoff.
Let me explain why what America flies in space matters.
Since April 1981 America has been flying a relatively huge spacecraft back and forth into space and back. In July, 1975, we flew the last of the Apollo spacecraft on a flight to dock with a Russian Soyuz. The tiny 12-foot cone was all that survived the trip back home. Inside were squeezed three astronauts. For all practical purposes, their ship was the same as the capsule Neil, Mike and I flew six years earlier to the Moon. Let me tell you that the lack of a galley - or a bathroom - was something all of us endured. We knew we were aboard a limited, experimental spaceship. And many of us looked forward to the day the Space Shuttle orbiters - a craft more than 120 feet long by comparison-would start making routine trips to Earth orbit. The Shuttles could carry as many as seven astronauts, a galley, a bathroom, and a huge cargo hold to ferry experiments up to space and back. By volume the Shuttles could carry a dozen Apollo capsules! The Space Shuttles could glide to landing sites either in Florida or California; once because of weather it landed in New Mexico. The astronauts and their experiments could be off-loaded and the ships readied for their next assignment.
We forget today that the Shuttle system was so advanced every other existing space power wanted one. The Europeans called theirs Hermes. The Russians Buran. Japan was designing the Hope space plane. Germany had a really radical design named after space pioneer Eugen Sanger. But alas what they all discovered was a winged vehicle was a complex design whose development would require a lot of cash-and patience. Both were in short supply. So America would wind up flying alone aboard space wings. The Shuttles would wind up doing many incredible things-among which was saving the Russian Mir space station, because the orbiters brought up more water, food and supplies that a dozen Russian Progress supply ships could carry. They deployed satellites. Returned a few back home. They were-and are-without match in the short history of human spaceflight.
One thing about these Shuttles is overlooked today. At the time, their life expectancy was believed to be about a decade, before they were replace with new designs. New Shuttles, that is.
Fast forward to today. Two Shuttle accidents -- each caused by NASA hubris -- combined with a tight budget have caused NASA to retire the fleet. Understandable, I think. But in a move that truly makes no sense, they will be replaced by...the space capsules we long ago outgrew. And to save even more money, these cannon-ball-like capsules would land once again in the ocean, not on dry land. To recover Orion will require deployment of ships in several landing zones. How much will that cost? Much of the Orion will be expendable, such as the heat shield. It seems we have decided to throw away our Shuttle experience and go "back to the future".
Our space partners and competitors are also designing capsules for their astronauts-because, for them, capsules are a step up. No other nation has ever had the logistics capability resident in a winged or lifting body vehicle-except us. And seems to be ready, in a penny-wise and pound foolish way-to abandon our own leadership in space transportation. By landing on a runway, gliding back from space, these unique re entry machines have many opportunities on each orbit of the Earth to find a landing site -- an airport or military airfield, say. Those capsules, since they don't glide anywhere, must line up more or less at their intended landing site. Bad weather? Oh, gotta stay up another day. Experiments? Gotta wait!
And we are compounding that felony by retiring the Shuttles before even the limited Orion capsules are ready to fly.
But I've got a better idea. Why not stretch out the remaining Shuttle flights for five years-flying once a year or so. Open up a commercial competition for a logistics vehicle to the station that includes a vehicle that can land on a runway, using the heritage learned from the 30+ years of the Shuttles. Any breakthroughs reached in the labs aboard the International Space Station can't wait for days while the navy hauls Orion out of the ocean and returned to port. A runway-capable vehicle can do that-and that is what we should build to follow our Space Shuttles. If NASA can't do it, let the private space entrepreneurs do it. Build and fly a logistics spaceship worthy of the name-and worthy of the historic heritage of America's Space Shuttle experience. And how to launch these capable craft? I propose an intermediate booster, one that would come between the underpowered Ares 1 and the incapable Ares V. I call it the Ares III, and such a booster could be used in many different ways, both as a carrier for astronauts as well as cargoes and powerful upper stages. Such a booster would make maximum use of Shuttle-era components, including the existing launching facilities at the Kennedy Space Center. All of these ideas are part of what I have been calling my Unified Space Vision. That's my comprehensive plan for America's future in space. I'll be talking about different parts of my vision in future blogs.
But, for now, think of spacecraft worthy of following our Shuttles. We don't need any stinkin' capsules!
November 9, 2009
Why We Need Better Rockets
Well, it looked spectacular.
I'm referring to NASA's recent launch of the Ares 1-X, billed as the prototype of the Ares 1 as a crew launch vehicle, a fancy term for a manned space booster. The rocket is said to have performed as planned, and ushered in the era of the Ares rockets to replace the Space Shuttle next year. Only it won't. In fact, the much-hyped Ares 1-X was much ado about nothing.
Yes, the rocket that thundered aloft from NASA's Launch Pad 39B sure looked like an Ares 1. But that's where the resemblance stops. Turns out the solid booster was - literally - bought from the Space Shuttle program, since a five-segment booster being designed for Ares wasn't ready. So they put a fake can on top of the four-segmented motor to look like the real thing. Since the real Ares' upper stage rocket engine, called the J-2X wasn't ready either, they mounted a fake upper stage. No Orion capsule was ready, so - you guessed it - they mounted a fake capsule with a real-looking but fake escape rocket that wouldn't have worked if the booster had failed. Since the guidance system for Ares wasn't ready either they went and bought a unit from the Atlas rocket program and used it instead. Oh yes, the parachutes to recover the booster were the real thing -- and one of the three failed, causing the booster to slam into the ocean too fast and banging the thing up. So, why you might ask, if the whole machine was a bit of slight-of-hand rocketry did NASA bother to spend almost half a billion dollars (that's billion with a "b") in developing and launching the Ares 1-X?
The answer: politics.
Technical problems, the kind that follow every new rocket's development, have haunted the Ares like leftovers from Halloween. The rocket as currently designed shakes so much during launch that shock absorbers are needed beneath its capsule payload. All of this takes time to fix -- and money, money that NASA really doesn't have. To stave off critics, three years ago the Project Constellation managers conceived of the 1-X flight to supposedly show some progress. They could instrument the rocket with hundreds of sensors gathering information never before obtained during a booster use in a Shuttle mission. It would give the launch team some practice in the assembly of an Ares. And NASA would find out if something as ungainly as the Ares 1 design - a thicker top than the bottom booster - could survive during ascent through the Earth's atmosphere. Of course, all of the changes to the Shuttle launch pad to accommodate the Ares wouldn't be ready in time, so they decided to just leave all of the Shuttle hardware, such as the rotating tower that envelops the Shuttles there. A success might just buy more time for Ares to fix its problems.
And that's just what happened.
Meanwhile, the huge Ares V super booster is just a series of drawings. Unlike the plan used to send Neil Armstrong, Mike Collins and me to the Moon in 1969, whereby we used just one rocket to lift all of the elements of our Apollo spaceships, the current return-to-the-Moon plan requires not one rocket but two-one launch of an Ares 1 carrying the astronauts in the Orion capsule, and an Ares V lifting a big upper stage, a sort of space tug, and the lunar landing craft called Altair. Together, the two ships dock in orbit and then the tug, called the Earth Departure Stage, fires up for the outbound trip to the Moon. Two rockets in development; two launching systems. And two price tags. Two ways for failure to occur. Or delays to develop.
Worse yet, neither rocket alone can accomplish a deep space mission. And deep space, such as Mars is, as our friends in the recent Augustine report stated, our destination in space. These rockets were originally supposed to all be derivatives of the Space Shuttle-using four segment boosters and Shuttle engines - but the designs were changed to save money and development time. Neither of which has proven to be the case today. Our Augustine panel colleagues stated flatly that some new heavy lift rocket would be needed no matter which direction President Barack Obama chose for the space program. But Ares 1 is too small, barely able to lift the crew space capsule. And Ares V is too weak to boost all of the elements together.
What do we need? One rocket for all our deep space missions. Save the taxpayer's money by canceling the Ares 1 and V. And go "back to the future" in designing the big beast. So how do we get to the space station without Ares 1? Let the commercial space firms develop their own crew launchers, and crew vehicles. Why should Uncle Sam be in the people hauling business?
Here's my plan -- and yes, I am a rocket scientist -- cancel Ares 1 now and the version of the Orion capsule that is supposed to fly astronauts back and forth to the International Space Station. Instead, unleash the commercial sector by paying them for transportation services to the station. Could be capsules. Could be winged ships like the Space Shuttle, capable of flying back to a runway with its crews and cargoes, not splashing in the ocean like a cannonball. With the money saved, start developing a true heavy lifter worthy of the Saturn V's successor. Could be a side-mount rocket like the Shuttles, with a tank-and-booster set flanked by a payload pod jammed full of cargo-or a space capsule with astronauts in tow. Or new upper stages capable of deep space missions. Let's open 'er up to a true competition, with designs from inside -- and outside -- NASA. If we bypass a foolish Moon race and let the development of the Moon be an international affair, we will have time to refine the super booster to make sure it is compatible with our deep space goals, like missions flying by comets or asteroids -- or to the moons of Mars. Such a rocket would be ready when the time comes to colonize Mars. No more false starts and dead end rockets.
Maybe use innovative elements like new upper stage engines, or entirely new propulsion systems. Or designs truly evolved from the Shuttle era. The idea is to get the best thinking from rocketeers before we start spending Uncle Sam's space bucks.
I confess I have a design in mind that I and my team have worked on for years. It's called Aquila, and it is a true offspring of the Space Shuttle. It makes maximum use of the existing Shuttle infrastructure -- unlike the real Ares -- and Shuttle boosters, engines and the side-mounted design where today the winged orbiter rides into space. If we need bigger rocket engines, Boeing's RS-68 behemoth is always available, flight proven and flight tested aboard the Delta IV commercial launchers. You see, heavy lifting doesn't need to be heavy spending, if we do the job right.
But let the designers take the field-and may the best booster win. To paraphrase David Letterman, we don't need any stupid rocket tricks. Just good sound engineering. For without good new rockets to carry our payloads and crews, nobody is ever going to follow in Neil, Mike and my footsteps into deep space. And that's where we are destined to go.
I'm referring to NASA's recent launch of the Ares 1-X, billed as the prototype of the Ares 1 as a crew launch vehicle, a fancy term for a manned space booster. The rocket is said to have performed as planned, and ushered in the era of the Ares rockets to replace the Space Shuttle next year. Only it won't. In fact, the much-hyped Ares 1-X was much ado about nothing.
Yes, the rocket that thundered aloft from NASA's Launch Pad 39B sure looked like an Ares 1. But that's where the resemblance stops. Turns out the solid booster was - literally - bought from the Space Shuttle program, since a five-segment booster being designed for Ares wasn't ready. So they put a fake can on top of the four-segmented motor to look like the real thing. Since the real Ares' upper stage rocket engine, called the J-2X wasn't ready either, they mounted a fake upper stage. No Orion capsule was ready, so - you guessed it - they mounted a fake capsule with a real-looking but fake escape rocket that wouldn't have worked if the booster had failed. Since the guidance system for Ares wasn't ready either they went and bought a unit from the Atlas rocket program and used it instead. Oh yes, the parachutes to recover the booster were the real thing -- and one of the three failed, causing the booster to slam into the ocean too fast and banging the thing up. So, why you might ask, if the whole machine was a bit of slight-of-hand rocketry did NASA bother to spend almost half a billion dollars (that's billion with a "b") in developing and launching the Ares 1-X?
The answer: politics.
Technical problems, the kind that follow every new rocket's development, have haunted the Ares like leftovers from Halloween. The rocket as currently designed shakes so much during launch that shock absorbers are needed beneath its capsule payload. All of this takes time to fix -- and money, money that NASA really doesn't have. To stave off critics, three years ago the Project Constellation managers conceived of the 1-X flight to supposedly show some progress. They could instrument the rocket with hundreds of sensors gathering information never before obtained during a booster use in a Shuttle mission. It would give the launch team some practice in the assembly of an Ares. And NASA would find out if something as ungainly as the Ares 1 design - a thicker top than the bottom booster - could survive during ascent through the Earth's atmosphere. Of course, all of the changes to the Shuttle launch pad to accommodate the Ares wouldn't be ready in time, so they decided to just leave all of the Shuttle hardware, such as the rotating tower that envelops the Shuttles there. A success might just buy more time for Ares to fix its problems.
And that's just what happened.
Meanwhile, the huge Ares V super booster is just a series of drawings. Unlike the plan used to send Neil Armstrong, Mike Collins and me to the Moon in 1969, whereby we used just one rocket to lift all of the elements of our Apollo spaceships, the current return-to-the-Moon plan requires not one rocket but two-one launch of an Ares 1 carrying the astronauts in the Orion capsule, and an Ares V lifting a big upper stage, a sort of space tug, and the lunar landing craft called Altair. Together, the two ships dock in orbit and then the tug, called the Earth Departure Stage, fires up for the outbound trip to the Moon. Two rockets in development; two launching systems. And two price tags. Two ways for failure to occur. Or delays to develop.
Worse yet, neither rocket alone can accomplish a deep space mission. And deep space, such as Mars is, as our friends in the recent Augustine report stated, our destination in space. These rockets were originally supposed to all be derivatives of the Space Shuttle-using four segment boosters and Shuttle engines - but the designs were changed to save money and development time. Neither of which has proven to be the case today. Our Augustine panel colleagues stated flatly that some new heavy lift rocket would be needed no matter which direction President Barack Obama chose for the space program. But Ares 1 is too small, barely able to lift the crew space capsule. And Ares V is too weak to boost all of the elements together.
What do we need? One rocket for all our deep space missions. Save the taxpayer's money by canceling the Ares 1 and V. And go "back to the future" in designing the big beast. So how do we get to the space station without Ares 1? Let the commercial space firms develop their own crew launchers, and crew vehicles. Why should Uncle Sam be in the people hauling business?
Here's my plan -- and yes, I am a rocket scientist -- cancel Ares 1 now and the version of the Orion capsule that is supposed to fly astronauts back and forth to the International Space Station. Instead, unleash the commercial sector by paying them for transportation services to the station. Could be capsules. Could be winged ships like the Space Shuttle, capable of flying back to a runway with its crews and cargoes, not splashing in the ocean like a cannonball. With the money saved, start developing a true heavy lifter worthy of the Saturn V's successor. Could be a side-mount rocket like the Shuttles, with a tank-and-booster set flanked by a payload pod jammed full of cargo-or a space capsule with astronauts in tow. Or new upper stages capable of deep space missions. Let's open 'er up to a true competition, with designs from inside -- and outside -- NASA. If we bypass a foolish Moon race and let the development of the Moon be an international affair, we will have time to refine the super booster to make sure it is compatible with our deep space goals, like missions flying by comets or asteroids -- or to the moons of Mars. Such a rocket would be ready when the time comes to colonize Mars. No more false starts and dead end rockets.
Maybe use innovative elements like new upper stage engines, or entirely new propulsion systems. Or designs truly evolved from the Shuttle era. The idea is to get the best thinking from rocketeers before we start spending Uncle Sam's space bucks.
I confess I have a design in mind that I and my team have worked on for years. It's called Aquila, and it is a true offspring of the Space Shuttle. It makes maximum use of the existing Shuttle infrastructure -- unlike the real Ares -- and Shuttle boosters, engines and the side-mounted design where today the winged orbiter rides into space. If we need bigger rocket engines, Boeing's RS-68 behemoth is always available, flight proven and flight tested aboard the Delta IV commercial launchers. You see, heavy lifting doesn't need to be heavy spending, if we do the job right.
But let the designers take the field-and may the best booster win. To paraphrase David Letterman, we don't need any stupid rocket tricks. Just good sound engineering. For without good new rockets to carry our payloads and crews, nobody is ever going to follow in Neil, Mike and my footsteps into deep space. And that's where we are destined to go.
October 21, 2009
Mr. President, Will You Lead Us to Greatness in Space?
The roadmap is now complete. Today the commission formed to provide President Barack Obama with a series of potential pathways to America's future in space has delivered its final report. Officials in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP, as they say in Washington) received the report from my friend Chairman Norm Augustine, and have begun the formal process of reviewing the analysis it contains. The plan is for President Barack Obama to select one of the "options" for America's future in space that the plan lays out-or none at all or something else entirely.
For me, one option is superior to all the rest. A review of that option -- called by Norm the "flexible path" -- will be the subject of this week's blog. In future blogs, I'll explain some of the other elements of this important report, especially in terms of new heavy lift boosters and the use of commercial providers to send our crews to the space station. This is a report that should be read and digested by all Americans. But now, let's talk about flexible path.
Like, what is it?
In the words of the report:
The Committee developed five alternatives for the Human Spaceflight Program. It found:
• Human exploration beyond low-Earth orbit is not viable under the FY 2010 budget guideline (no bucks, no Buck Rogers!)
• Meaningful human exploration is possible under a less constrained budget, ramping to approximately $3 billion per year above the FY 2010 guidance in total resources.
• Funding at the increased level would allow either an exploration program to explore Moon First (we shouldn't!) or one that follows a Flexible Path of exploration. Either could produce results in a reasonable timeframe. (Yes, we can!)
It is option 5 that got my heart racing! It says:
Option 5. Flexible Path. This option follows the Flexible Path as an exploration strategy. It operates the Shuttle into FY 2011, extends the ISS until 2020, funds technology development and develops commercial crew services to low-Earth orbit. There are three variants within this option; they differ only in the heavy-lift vehicle.
Variant 5A is the Ares Lite variant. It develops the Ares Lite, the most capable of the heavy lift vehicles in this option. Variant 5B employs an EELV-heritage commercial heavy-lift launcher and assumes a different (and significantly reduced) role for NASA. It has an advantage of
potentially lower operational costs, but requires significant restructuring of NASA.
Variant 5C uses a directly Shuttle-derived, heavy-lift vehicle, taking maximum advantage of existing infrastructure, facilities and production capabilities.
All variants of Option 5 begin exploration along the flexible path in the early 2020s, with lunar fly-bys, visits to Lagrange points and near-Earth objects and Mars fly-bys occurring at a rate of about one major event per year, and possible rendezvous with Mars's moons or human lunar
return by the mid to late 2020s.
Why do I support this option for America's future in space? Unlike the current plan, called Project Constellation, it bypasses a "Moon-centric" race that spends all of our time and precious development money on the Moon, and basically for the same amount of money -- a $3 billion annual boost for NASA -- allows us to roam the inner Solar System, developing the long-duration spacecraft and experience to travel deeper and deeper into space. We gain that experience -- and the valuable scientific research and engineering -- by making rendezvous with comets or Earth-threatening asteroids, eventually flying by Mars itself -- our "ultimate destination" in the words of Norm's group -- making early landings on the moons of Mars, like Phobos, before taking the plunge and setting up our first human colonies on the Red Planet itself.
And by the way, I think the new heavy booster we need should be a variant of their 5C: a true booster derived from the Space Shuttle, a side-mount monster that can carry both big cargoes and astronauts, too. Why on Earth (or off it!) do we need to waste money and time on the unstable and costly Ares 1 rocket that can barely limp into orbit? Let's make the best use of the money we have and shoot for a heavy lifter with both crew AND cargo capabilities. Option 5 also preserves the ability of America to return to the Moon as part of a grand global alliance that I have urged policymakers to consider.
All in all, option 5 makes dollars -- and sense -- for America.
I repeat the call I made last summer at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, when I spoke about the future of the space program. It is time we sailed the sea of space once more in a bold, expansive space vision. To achieve such a goal we need strong leaders, for to sustain a growing and momentous effort in space may require that we reject a defeatist mentality that mires us in second place, reject the loss of jobs that lack of leadership would cause, and that we set our sights higher, that if needed we sail against the wind. Not everyone will understand this need for America to lead the world in space.
In his grand novel about the space program, author James Michener put it plainly. "The world is called dark," Michener wrote, "not because the sun fails to shine, but because people fail to see the light." So let there be light.
President Barack Obama, the rest is up to you.
America, will you urge the president to pick a bold new mission for our nation in space? Call or text the president at 202-456-1111 or Switchboard: 202-456-1414. or email him at http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact.
In Twitter-friendly style, ask him this simple but profound question: Mr. President, will you lead us to greatness in space?
All Americans await his answer. For me, it is clear:
Ad Astra-per aspera! ("To the stars with difficulty!)
For me, one option is superior to all the rest. A review of that option -- called by Norm the "flexible path" -- will be the subject of this week's blog. In future blogs, I'll explain some of the other elements of this important report, especially in terms of new heavy lift boosters and the use of commercial providers to send our crews to the space station. This is a report that should be read and digested by all Americans. But now, let's talk about flexible path.
Like, what is it?
In the words of the report:
The Committee developed five alternatives for the Human Spaceflight Program. It found:
• Human exploration beyond low-Earth orbit is not viable under the FY 2010 budget guideline (no bucks, no Buck Rogers!)
• Meaningful human exploration is possible under a less constrained budget, ramping to approximately $3 billion per year above the FY 2010 guidance in total resources.
• Funding at the increased level would allow either an exploration program to explore Moon First (we shouldn't!) or one that follows a Flexible Path of exploration. Either could produce results in a reasonable timeframe. (Yes, we can!)
It is option 5 that got my heart racing! It says:
Option 5. Flexible Path. This option follows the Flexible Path as an exploration strategy. It operates the Shuttle into FY 2011, extends the ISS until 2020, funds technology development and develops commercial crew services to low-Earth orbit. There are three variants within this option; they differ only in the heavy-lift vehicle.
Variant 5A is the Ares Lite variant. It develops the Ares Lite, the most capable of the heavy lift vehicles in this option. Variant 5B employs an EELV-heritage commercial heavy-lift launcher and assumes a different (and significantly reduced) role for NASA. It has an advantage of
potentially lower operational costs, but requires significant restructuring of NASA.
Variant 5C uses a directly Shuttle-derived, heavy-lift vehicle, taking maximum advantage of existing infrastructure, facilities and production capabilities.
All variants of Option 5 begin exploration along the flexible path in the early 2020s, with lunar fly-bys, visits to Lagrange points and near-Earth objects and Mars fly-bys occurring at a rate of about one major event per year, and possible rendezvous with Mars's moons or human lunar
return by the mid to late 2020s.
Why do I support this option for America's future in space? Unlike the current plan, called Project Constellation, it bypasses a "Moon-centric" race that spends all of our time and precious development money on the Moon, and basically for the same amount of money -- a $3 billion annual boost for NASA -- allows us to roam the inner Solar System, developing the long-duration spacecraft and experience to travel deeper and deeper into space. We gain that experience -- and the valuable scientific research and engineering -- by making rendezvous with comets or Earth-threatening asteroids, eventually flying by Mars itself -- our "ultimate destination" in the words of Norm's group -- making early landings on the moons of Mars, like Phobos, before taking the plunge and setting up our first human colonies on the Red Planet itself.
And by the way, I think the new heavy booster we need should be a variant of their 5C: a true booster derived from the Space Shuttle, a side-mount monster that can carry both big cargoes and astronauts, too. Why on Earth (or off it!) do we need to waste money and time on the unstable and costly Ares 1 rocket that can barely limp into orbit? Let's make the best use of the money we have and shoot for a heavy lifter with both crew AND cargo capabilities. Option 5 also preserves the ability of America to return to the Moon as part of a grand global alliance that I have urged policymakers to consider.
All in all, option 5 makes dollars -- and sense -- for America.
I repeat the call I made last summer at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, when I spoke about the future of the space program. It is time we sailed the sea of space once more in a bold, expansive space vision. To achieve such a goal we need strong leaders, for to sustain a growing and momentous effort in space may require that we reject a defeatist mentality that mires us in second place, reject the loss of jobs that lack of leadership would cause, and that we set our sights higher, that if needed we sail against the wind. Not everyone will understand this need for America to lead the world in space.
In his grand novel about the space program, author James Michener put it plainly. "The world is called dark," Michener wrote, "not because the sun fails to shine, but because people fail to see the light." So let there be light.
President Barack Obama, the rest is up to you.
America, will you urge the president to pick a bold new mission for our nation in space? Call or text the president at 202-456-1111 or Switchboard: 202-456-1414. or email him at http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact.
In Twitter-friendly style, ask him this simple but profound question: Mr. President, will you lead us to greatness in space?
All Americans await his answer. For me, it is clear:
Ad Astra-per aspera! ("To the stars with difficulty!)
October 12, 2009
A Different Kind of Moon Race
A quarter of a million miles from where you are reading these words, on the dusty surface of our companion Moon, lies the best chance in decades for America to reestablish itself as a global space leader. It is time for our country to foster a new Moon race -- but not the kind that our space program has been planning for the past five years. Instead of duplicating -- at great cost and effort -- the lunar competition that Neil Armstrong, Mike Collins and I won more than four decades ago last summer, I propose instead America call the world to the Moon. In a new global effort to use the Moon to establish a global space consortium with a lunar surface facility as its epicenter, America can gain new leadership, international respect, and technological progress by collaborating with emerging space powers, not merely competing with them. Such competition, in an Apollo-style race back to the Moon, would be a fruitless exercise in national hubris whose rewards, if we "won" again, would prove fleeting. New space powers such as China and India have dedicated and complex space programs now under development, with the Moon as their target. Trying to "win" a Moon race with them would be foolish. They would eventually reach the Moon, with or without our help. What would be our policy then? Try to deny them access to the Moon's bountiful resources in minerals -- and maybe water as well? Such an attitude is more appropriate for the Cold War era that has been over for more than two decades.
I am proposing a different way back to the Moon: international collaboration.
I propose that America gives form to the president's call for greater global cooperation; in a first step we host a conference in Washington with the goal of creating a new public-private partnership to develop the Moon. I call it the Lunar Infrastructure Development Corporation (LIDC). The purpose of the LIDC would be to enable the nations of the Earth joint together and return to the Moon as an international cooperative venture. The LIDC will pool the financial, technical and human resources of its member nations to build the lunar communication, navigation and transportation systems needed for human exploration of the Moon. It would be a public/private global partnership to make the Moon accessible to all humanity. The LIDC will build the communication and navigation satellites needed by future lunar travelers, develop fuel depots using lunar LOX -- perhaps derived from the recently discovered lunar water -- and construct habitats that will shelter space travelers while on the surface. It will enable a sustainable human presence on the Moon that will be accessible to all the nations on Earth.
Unlike the International Space Station (ISS), which is governed by complex treaties, the LIDC will have the same flexibility as an NGO in working with different nations and private entities to finance build and operate the facilities and equipment needed for lunar exploration. Using a corporate structure, the LIDC will allow nations to join through the purchase of shares and enable them to contribute at a level that is sustainable for their economies. Intelsat, the international corporation that bought the benefits of communication satellites to the nations of the world is an example of the potential benefits of a focused NGO in developing global space infrastructure. Just as NASA provided technical support to Intelsat through its American partner Comsat, NASA will support the LIDC in its development of lunar infrastructure. In this way, America will help lead-but not exclude or dominate -- his new lunar renaissance.
Last summer there was much talk about ways to honor those of us who journeyed to the Moon during the Apollo era. To do so doesn't require rerunning a long-ago Cold War race in which America plays the role of a space-going Colonial power. Instead we should honor the words Neil and I left on the Moon in a tiny silver plaque that was affixed to a leg of our lunar lander, the Eagle. "We came in peace for all mankind", it read.
I believe it's time we took those words seriously, giving rise to a new age of international cooperation in space exploration.
I am proposing a different way back to the Moon: international collaboration.
I propose that America gives form to the president's call for greater global cooperation; in a first step we host a conference in Washington with the goal of creating a new public-private partnership to develop the Moon. I call it the Lunar Infrastructure Development Corporation (LIDC). The purpose of the LIDC would be to enable the nations of the Earth joint together and return to the Moon as an international cooperative venture. The LIDC will pool the financial, technical and human resources of its member nations to build the lunar communication, navigation and transportation systems needed for human exploration of the Moon. It would be a public/private global partnership to make the Moon accessible to all humanity. The LIDC will build the communication and navigation satellites needed by future lunar travelers, develop fuel depots using lunar LOX -- perhaps derived from the recently discovered lunar water -- and construct habitats that will shelter space travelers while on the surface. It will enable a sustainable human presence on the Moon that will be accessible to all the nations on Earth.
Unlike the International Space Station (ISS), which is governed by complex treaties, the LIDC will have the same flexibility as an NGO in working with different nations and private entities to finance build and operate the facilities and equipment needed for lunar exploration. Using a corporate structure, the LIDC will allow nations to join through the purchase of shares and enable them to contribute at a level that is sustainable for their economies. Intelsat, the international corporation that bought the benefits of communication satellites to the nations of the world is an example of the potential benefits of a focused NGO in developing global space infrastructure. Just as NASA provided technical support to Intelsat through its American partner Comsat, NASA will support the LIDC in its development of lunar infrastructure. In this way, America will help lead-but not exclude or dominate -- his new lunar renaissance.
Last summer there was much talk about ways to honor those of us who journeyed to the Moon during the Apollo era. To do so doesn't require rerunning a long-ago Cold War race in which America plays the role of a space-going Colonial power. Instead we should honor the words Neil and I left on the Moon in a tiny silver plaque that was affixed to a leg of our lunar lander, the Eagle. "We came in peace for all mankind", it read.
I believe it's time we took those words seriously, giving rise to a new age of international cooperation in space exploration.
