Obama's 2011 budget calls for a radical change in NASA's longterm goals. Under the Bush administration, NASA was retasked to return to the moon by 2020, and once there to establish some sort of base in preparation for a manned mission to Mars at some point after that. Constellation was the rocket program under development for the mission to the moon. It's detractors have criticized it for being way behind schedule, and over budget. It's notable defenders are the Republican Senators from Georgia, Florida, and Texas, where NASA's main development centers are located. Think Saxby Chambliss and Ben Nelson. They're calling this change a death knell for US spaceflight.
Now, Obama wants to end the Constellation program. He agrees with the detractors that it is a waste of time and money. Many critics also note that the money being spent on the Constellation is seriously cutting into basic scientific R&D, as well as unmanned robotic exploratory missions of the solar system. Obama's plan would increase NASA's funding in 2011 by almost a billion dollars, would end the Constellation program, and would basically hand off resupply missions of the International Space Station to private aerospace companies. NASA's new mission? Technology. Obama wants to spend billions of dollars for NASA to develop the next generation of space exploration technology. NASA's Administrator, Charles Bolden, seems pretty excited about the idea. He's mentioned the fact that, with new propulsion technologies, the US might actually return to the moon, or even Mars, well before the 2020 deadline under Constellation, and especially the 2028 date that the critics say Constellation was actually on task to hit.
Now, Congress wrote a measure into the budget when Constellation was put into effect that said the president couldn't cut Constellation without Congressional say so. Thus, Obama can't make an executive decision on this one, he needs Congressional approval.
So what do we think? Personally, I have a mixed opinion. I think going back to the moon was a pretty lame concept from the start. Announcing you're going back to the moon decades after having first gone there, and not really doing anything special once they get there is like how exciting it might have been for Columbus to announce he was going back to America in 1530, just to hang out, then he was coming home. I think that if we want to get excited about space exploration in America again, it needs to be Mars. When was the last time we were excited? It was the Mars rovers. Current technology makes a manned mission to Mars not impossible, but extremely difficult. Also, the lack of available funds because of Constellation makes exploration of Mars in preparation of a manned mission very difficult. That problem would go away under the new plan.
Yet, I'm worried that the critics who say this is the death of America's space program might have some teeth. Is this all just a smokescreen to detract from the fact that we're retreating from space? Based on the fact that Obama's future budget actually increases funding by $5 billion over the next several years, I find that argument difficult to swallow outright. I find I'm sort of ambivalent about the idea of not having an actual plan in place, of some concrete goal like we've had in the past. But I think that claims of other nations getting ahead of us ignore the fact that this could lead to technological breakthroughs that allow us to leapfrog the competition. I'm not totally sure how I feel, but I think Constellation wasn't going anywhere fast, and Mars would have been decades away. Obama's plan appears to have promise. All in all, what appears clear is that NASA suffers more than most agencies from presidential changeovers, as their mandate seems to radically shift every four or eight years. Oy.
Man, I haven't started this many threads in such a short span of time in quite awhile. It's weird. But it's nice to have the time to actually keep up on things for a change. Last semester I was so buried in work, I feel like I was cut off from the world.
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What's so wrong with the moon? There's a couple generations worth of people who either weren't alive or are unable to remember the last set of lunar landings. A successful landing would probably get a lot of public support and help NASA aquire more funding to achieve its future goals.
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If we announced we were landing materials for the construction of a moon base, then I'd be excited, but it's going to take us 20 years just to land there? NASA in the 60s figured it out in a decade, but it'll take us twice as long with a massive budget and technology that's generations ahead of what they had? How lame is that?
Capturing the public's imagination is a lot harder to do when you proclaim that we're boldly going somewhere where we've already been a half dozen times, but it's going to take us twice as long to figure out as last time. How exciting is that? How much more exciting would be if the government said instead that we're going to Mars. Our first planet! Actual manned exploration outside of Earth's gravity. That's new! It's exciting! Can we do it? I don't know, but I want to try!
Going to the moon? Sure I guess. But I'm not exactly geeked about it.
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I thought part of the goal with the moon was that it would be multipurpose. Like all the technology would be usable either for the moon or the first stage in a mission to mars.
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If Constellation was really on track for 2028, it might be better to throw in the towel early rather than raise expectations just to inevitably crush them (especially as Lyrhawn has pointed out, there isn't much at stake for the US since it has already been to the moon).
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That part of the goal was always sort of fuzzy. The idea was sort of that going to the moon was the first step towards building an eventual moon base that would give us practice for eventually building such a base on Mars, in like, 50 years. The technology for getting there was sort of a hazy promise. Though, some have said that a fraction of the research already done on Constellation might be applied to other projects, but not necessarily to Mars.
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NASA, as it is, is a money pit. I love the idea of space exploration, but let the corporations do it. Obama is talking about Mars, I'm talking about computers for my classroom that need to be less than five years old.
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quote:NASA, as it is, is a money pit. I love the idea of space exploration, but let the corporations do it. Obama is talking about Mars, I'm talking about computers for my classroom that need to be less than five years old.
What about the ability to stop that asteroid from turning your classroom into a crater? It will happen eventually. It's inevitable. The only question is whether or not we'll be ready for it when it comes.
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I'm not up on this specific debate so I need to read more, but I am curious what is meant by 'space exploration technology'. My Dad has a lot of projects with NASA which would require a loose definition of 'space exploration' to qualify for that. I know a lot of the projects he was working on were cancelled or not initiated as a result of this Mars push, and that was an across the board trend. Meaning research missions were significantly down (i.e. science) so we could make a go at Mars. I'm in favor of dropping the whole manned space-flight thing in favor of more productive uses of money but I'm not clear on what Obama is looking for exactly...
posted
I feel sort of incredulous about our ability to effectively use the moon to stage a trip to Mars by 2020 or 2028. Unless this becomes a huge national project, with something like the investment into WW2...
We'd need some sort of industrial capacity on the moon. Otherwise we're talking about boosting materials and supplies into earth orbit, landing them on the moon, and then boosting from the moon again. How does that help?
I want a space program, I want us in space, but I don't want the likes of GWB setting our goals. We should aim to develop robotic and nano-scale technology to the point where we can start to exploit resources on anything we land on without having to boost a city's worth of infrastructure into orbit.
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quote:but I don't want the likes of GWB setting our goals.
Do you mean W. specifically, or presidents in general? I like the idea of a president raising our vision, and helping us to see a bigger picture, go places we never would've. That's the difference (to me) between a leader and a paper-pusher. The great example of course being the already mentioned Kennedy declaration that we'd be on the moon in a decade which I find quite inspiring.
I understand the general sentiment, particularly since the visions he was trying to foster on us was pretty stupid IMO, but who else should set our goals? If the American people don't like it they can let their leaders know, which they did and now we're (maybe) going in a different direction.
posted
I think that was more a statement about how ineffective and uninspiring his particular ideas were.
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I'll be honest- I don't really care what NASA does or doesn't. What I do care about is the 20,000 jobs in Houston that go to NASA- and the projected 5,500 jobs that rely on Constellation and the space shuttle. Selfish perhaps, but I do not want husband unemployed and both of us starting the job hunt again (while I am very happy staying home with kid, if he loses his job, we need to maximize chances at finding employment). Of course, right now things are so up in the air, it is impossible to know what will happen.
ETA- husband works on shuttle stuff now, contracted to work on constellation when that ended.
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quote:NASA, as it is, is a money pit. I love the idea of space exploration, but let the corporations do it. Obama is talking about Mars, I'm talking about computers for my classroom that need to be less than five years old.
What about the ability to stop that asteroid from turning your classroom into a crater? It will happen eventually. It's inevitable. The only question is whether or not we'll be ready for it when it comes.
Thats what telescopes are for.
You see one, offer 100 billion to the first company to knock it down. Plenty of money saved in the meantime.
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Computers that are heavily used, like these, also just sort of die after a while. I've got two overheated already this year. No money in any budget to replace them.
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quote:Originally posted by scholarette: I'll be honest- I don't really care what NASA does or doesn't. What I do care about is the 20,000 jobs in Houston that go to NASA- and the projected 5,500 jobs that rely on Constellation and the space shuttle. Selfish perhaps, but I do not want husband unemployed and both of us starting the job hunt again (while I am very happy staying home with kid, if he loses his job, we need to maximize chances at finding employment). Of course, right now things are so up in the air, it is impossible to know what will happen.
ETA- husband works on shuttle stuff now, contracted to work on constellation when that ended.
That is a valid concern. Has the job loss from this shift been addressed by Obama?
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It really is a valid concern, especially with the very large and demanding group of rocket scientists who are pinching pennies and taking the bus to work.
The tech that gets us to the moon hasnt really changed much, and the fact that we may be able to harvest water on the lunar surface is so amazing that no one knows how to actually go about it. We need more efficient ways of leaving and returning the planet, more definate and productive studies while past the outer atmosphere and to give the people of Earth a reason to care. We all gasped about the first lunar landing, and everyone wanted to be an astronaut but nowadays astronauts just kinda go and hangout, do work that no one really needs to know about and in short, the goals of NASA do not resemble the technological promise that they are capable of.
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quote:Originally posted by Hobbes: I agree with you, except this part:
quote:but I don't want the likes of GWB setting our goals.
Do you mean W. specifically, or presidents in general? I like the idea of a president raising our vision, and helping us to see a bigger picture, go places we never would've. That's the difference (to me) between a leader and a paper-pusher. The great example of course being the already mentioned Kennedy declaration that we'd be on the moon in a decade which I find quite inspiring.
I understand the general sentiment, particularly since the visions he was trying to foster on us was pretty stupid IMO, but who else should set our goals? If the American people don't like it they can let their leaders know, which they did and now we're (maybe) going in a different direction.
Hobbes
I'm musing over this. I don't know if I properly considered the role of a President in mobilizing and inspiring us to do things that matter. My main concern is that a politician is ill suited to identify and scope meaningful technological milestones and the proper timeframe for them. But I do worry that if we don't push it through politics now, we may find that we can never justify the economics to get into space another way, and then we'll see the crucial asteroid and not have enough time. Posts: 4287 | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:quote: Originally posted by Alcon: quote: NASA, as it is, is a money pit. I love the idea of space exploration, but let the corporations do it. Obama is talking about Mars, I'm talking about computers for my classroom that need to be less than five years old. What about the ability to stop that asteroid from turning your classroom into a crater? It will happen eventually. It's inevitable. The only question is whether or not we'll be ready for it when it comes. Thats what telescopes are for.
You see one, offer 100 billion to the first company to knock it down. Plenty of money saved in the meantime.
Wrong. Our telescopes aren't that good. There are too many asteroids, too much space for them to be in, and not enough telescopes.
With in the last few years multiple asteroids have come really close to hitting Earth - and we didn't notice until it would have been way too late to do anything about it.
One in particular that stuck in my mind was an asteroid that would have been capable of turning an area the size of France into a giant crater and leaving the rest of us in a nuclear winter. It came inside the moon's orbit - between us and the moon. We didn't notice it until it was 8 days out. This was no small asteroid. There are much smaller capable of leveling an area the size of Manhattan.
8 days.
No company - not for 100 trillion dollars - could possibly have stopped it if it was actually on a collision course. Our only hope for stopping them is if we're out there. If we already have the ships, technology and equipment in orbit. If we're capable of responding with in a week or two - we'll be safe. But as long as it takes months or years to get a ship off the ground - we're screwed.
It's just a matter of time.
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quote:Originally posted by Stephan: Computers that are heavily used, like these, also just sort of die after a while. I've got two overheated already this year. No money in any budget to replace them.
Probably too late now, but it might be worth cleaning out the heat-sink with some compressed air every once in a while.
Also we're (the company) actually recycling/donating computers from roughly that era (P4 3.2, 1GB memory). As a stop-gap, it might be worth checking out if there are similar programmes in your area since there should be other businesses in the same boat.
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quote:Originally posted by Stephan: Computers that are heavily used, like these, also just sort of die after a while. I've got two overheated already this year. No money in any budget to replace them.
Probably too late now, but it might be worth cleaning out the heat-sink with some compressed air every once in a while.
Also we're (the company) actually recycling/donating computers from roughly that era (P4 3.2, 1GB memory). As a stop-gap, it might be worth checking out if there are similar programmes in your area since there should be other businesses in the same boat.
I'll try both! This is my first year teaching technology, and the prior teachers took horrible care of these machines.
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This might sound harsh...but I don't think we should be basing our space plans and technological research goals on job loss.
If we could never change a policy for fear of cutting jobs, we'd never, ever reduce the budget, we'd only ever add to it. Changing priorities means some people lose jobs, some gain jobs, some people get moved to new projects. That's just how it works.
As far as moving material into space...really, I don't think we're going to be able to do it economically without one of two innovations: A space elevator, or an entirely new type of propulsion that we haven't even come close to developing yet.
Of those, I think we're most actively working towards space elevator technology...but "most actively" is sort of placing fast and loose with the phrase. NASA has a sort of X Prize type project for private companies trying to develop materials suitable for the creation of a space elevator. I think in 2010, they have to have a material that can move X weight of material Y distance vertically, but I can't remember the numbers. The problem is still the material, but most of what I've read has said that some sort of nanotechnology will have to be advanced to the point where it can both support the weights being discussed, and be cheap enough to be built in extremely large numbers for not a great deal of cost.
I don't know if more money could make it go faster, but most people say that space elevator tech won't be good enough for practical uses for another 50 years. Maybe a new focus could shorten that time, but science only moves so fast, regardless of money.
Either way, supposedly, Obama's "new focus" for NASA would include more basic research, and more unmanned space exploration, but from what I can tell, it's undirected research with vague goals. Personally, I sort of like it better that way. "Make faster engines," is vague enough to allow the scientists to come at it from a lot of different angles, and I think science tends to operate best with fewer limitations, but within the confines of specific goals.
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One thing folks over at JSC are upset about is the way things are worded, they think a lot of money will be headed to China and India. I haven't looked into that much to substantiate that, but that's the complaint over there- that most of this research and development will take place outside the county.
On basic research- I can't find a source, but basic research is huge for building the economy- like every dollar goes in brings back several times that. It is supposed to be one of the biggest payoffs, but generally ignored because of the long term nature of R&D.
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quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: ... If we could never change a policy for fear of cutting jobs, we'd never, ever reduce the budget, we'd only ever add to it ...
Very true. (Even though I do have a lot more sympathy for rocket scientists than the previous example on Hatrack which was not changing healthcare because it would hurt the healthcare insurance industry)
Stephan: Cool. Feel free to ask/comment here if anything strange pops up Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
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quote:Originally posted by scholarette: One thing folks over at JSC are upset about is the way things are worded, they think a lot of money will be headed to China and India. I haven't looked into that much to substantiate that, but that's the complaint over there- that most of this research and development will take place outside the county.
On basic research- I can't find a source, but basic research is huge for building the economy- like every dollar goes in brings back several times that. It is supposed to be one of the biggest payoffs, but generally ignored because of the long term nature of R&D.
This is something I hadn't heard or even heard hints of. I find it extremely, extremely hard to believe. There's no way in a million years that Congress would allow him to shut down Constellation AND outsource American space research to China and India, even if he did want it.
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Like I said, it isn't something I have heard outside of people at NASA and certainly through no official channels. And it could just be people griping and overanalyzing (or underanalyzing). In a lot of ways, nothing is actually known so people are trying to fill in the blanks.
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I just read a couple different articles from today that said NASA and the Obama Administration will spend the next couple of months working up a new long term plan for NASA, and it will include a timeline of sorts for what they plan to accomplish in the way of manned missions in space. Administrator Bolden seemed particularly giddy about the idea of going to Mars.
Some of the details came out today on what the money was being allocated for. A big chunk is for climate change research. Some is for a rather expensive mission to the sun that looks pretty interesting. There's another half billion for developing new advanced propulsion technology, and for partnerships with private companies for space vehicles. And there's a bunch more for other unmanned probes throughout the solar system, as well as money for a possible replacement for the Hubble Telescope. I actually thought the James Webb was supposed to replace the Hubble, so maybe it's funding for that, or for yet another, newer telescope. That, by the way, is the type of science that many feel was being neglected by putting so much of NASA's money into Constellation.
Another report I read, which was released at the tail end of last year, said that an independent review of the Constellation program showed that they were so far behind schedule, that it was unlikely they'd return to the moon until the 2030s, and that even if they got there, they didn't even have the funding necessary to build a landing craft to actually touch down on the moon. So, not only was Constellation choking off funding for other research and exploration, but there wasn't even enough money to do Constellation the way it was designed.
I'm going to say I hesitantly approve of this change, but that approval is dependent upon the plan that NASA and Obama's team come up with in the months to come. We don't know all the details yet.
quote: Another report I read, which was released at the tail end of last year, said that an independent review of the Constellation program showed that they were so far behind schedule, that it was unlikely they'd return to the moon until the 2030s, and that even if they got there, they didn't even have the funding necessary to build a landing craft to actually touch down on the moon.
This is the part that keeps baffling me. Did we throw away the plans for the Apollo? Cause this is something we've already done. How do we not know how to build something we've got sitting outside the visitors' center?
Anyway, out of that list, I really like the mission to the sun. I'd be excited to see what more we can learn form the largest source of energy nearby about how energy generation's supposed to work.
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The mission to the sun (this is from memory mind you), I think had the largest specified amount of funding for any of the individual exploratory research projects. Stuff like two billion dollars for a new climate research satellite ranks higher, but no other probe was getting the sort of dedicated funding, that I could find, that the proposed, vague, sun mission was tagged with. Of course, this is all very unofficial, and we won't get details for months, but it sounds like sometime in the summer we should be getting a firmer grasp of what exactly is being considered.
As far as getting to the moon, I think the problem isn't so much that we don't know how to build an Apollo and a Saturn V rocket, it's that if and when we go, we'd want to do so much more than we were able to do in the 60s. Look at the weight of the shuttle, and the amount of equipment we generally send up on these things. If we're actually going to land on the moon, do any sort of research once we get there, or even consider establishing a colony, we'll need to send more than a moon dune buggy and a crew return capsule. At least, that's the situation as I understand it.
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posted
I think OSHA requirements for moon landers have become considerably more stringent in the intervening decades.
(Only mostly a joke. I would assume we're going to take fewer risks with missions than they did back then.)
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The mouse was quite cheerful about this turn of events, since it was a hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional being anyway, although it was mildly disappointed about having to leave Earth before The Question was discovered.
The worm's only thought, before it met its end in the cold, dark vacuum of space was, oddly enough, 'Not again'.
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Obama wants to spend billions of dollars for NASA to develop the next generation of space exploration technology. NASA's Administrator, Charles Bolden, seems pretty excited about the idea. He's mentioned the fact that, with new propulsion technologies, the US might actually return to the moon, or even Mars, well before the 2020 deadline under Constellation, and especially the 2028 date that the critics say Constellation was actually on task to hit.
Absolutely. Bush's "plan" was a cynical hand-off to Republican states in the first place. He shredded NASA's budget for R&D and actual research (hubble, for instance) while handing them a dubious mandate to return to the moon, despite the advice of everyone actually *involved* in real space exploration. I remember reading the article way back when in Time magazine and thinking... WTF.
Manned space missions have been half PR and half pork for the last 20 years- Bush just wanted more of the same. He didn't give a crap about science.
I'm all for manned space flight that makes sense. It made a lot of sense in 1969. It makes no sense on the moon now. Bush's napkin math on the moon and mars made mars sound like "the next step" for manned space flight. But it's not like the difference between an airplane and a space shuttle. This is the difference between a sailboat and a battleship. The resources required to launch a mission to Mars is beyond any endeavor we have attempted.
quote:Originally posted by AvidReader: This is the part that keeps baffling me. Did we throw away the plans for the Apollo? Cause this is something we've already done. How do we not know how to build something we've got sitting outside the visitors' center?
Well, a few things. The Apollo program was both extremely expensive and extremely risky. Also, they want to build landers and equipment that accomplish a lot more than what they did back in the 70's. The payload will be a lot bigger, and the safety standard a lot higher.
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quote:Originally posted by AvidReader: This is the part that keeps baffling me. Did we throw away the plans for the Apollo? Cause this is something we've already done. How do we not know how to build something we've got sitting outside the visitors' center?
Well, a few things. The Apollo program was both extremely expensive and extremely risky. Also, they want to build landers and equipment that accomplish a lot more than what they did back in the 70's. The payload will be a lot bigger, and the safety standard a lot higher.
It's not just that. NASA's been in decay for 20 years. They lost the plans for the Saturn 5 rocket. The one that took us to the moon in the Apollo program. They don't know how to build it anymore - they'd have to reverse engineer it. It's that way with a lot of stuff. They weren't using any of it because they had no funding, no mandate and no mission. Stuff just was lost, or accidentally destroyed. Knowledge was lost when experts retired and no one was trained to replace them. They haven't been seriously pursuing human space flight since the end of the Apollo program. The shuttle was a waste and a monstrosity - designed backwards - from the start. It was just to give them something to spend money on and keep busy with and keep people employed. The ISS was just to keep the Shuttle busy and useful. It's really quite horrifying. But people forgot and stopped caring so the government did too. The government IS the american people after all.
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I disagree that the shuttle was a waste. At the very least, Hubble would never have been operational without it.
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The shuttle was a waste compared to other options. That it had some positive impact does not prevent it from being a waste.
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The ISS can be an awesome tool. It has been under construction until recently, but there is a lot of good research we should be able to do with that. Also, it is a nice international effort.
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
for 20 billion dollars they could reach Mars using current technology and itld be comfortable.
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The shuttle did some good things but those things could have been done cheaper and better with existing rockets or a correctly designed shuttle.
The ISS was a nice international effort and could be a good research tool. But when you look a the price tag... And the time spent constructing it. And then consider what we're going to get out of it. It was a waste of time. The time would have been better spent pushing further and further out in to space or trying to design a truly reusable launch vehicle to bring down launch costs.
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posted
To add on to the "why we can't just re-build Apollo?" question, here's a handful of points.
1) Much of what documentation existed is lost. Consider that the Apollo program was well before the internet and readily available electronic storage, so everything is paper. Paper sitting around unused for decades is liable to be lost, destroyed etc... And even what documentation does exist isn't necessarily in a very usable form (organizationally, etc).
2) Bookkeeping of the program was nowhere near what we expect today. There was a massive amount of important work that was only contained in loose notes, in some expert's head, in some random memo, etc... One of the big pushes in recent years has been to be more diligent about paperwork for current programs, but even now the space industry is a small community, where often a "well, Rick knows how to make that" is the extent of the information on how to do things (and it would have been far more prevalent back in the Apollo era).
3) As mentioned above, safety margins and assorted other requirements are vastly different now than they were back then. The Apollo program was largely boot-strapped together and was executed with mission success as far and away more important than cost or even safety (not that they didn't consider safety, but...). Even if we could re-create Apollo right now, where is no way we'd be allowed to launch it.
4) Industry isn't there to support the effort. One of the reasons I was tentatively supportive of the Bush plan (I have almost no interest in going back to the moon as stated in the plan) was that it would at least keep the manned space exploration industry going. We are in a position where not only are many of the great minds that got us there retired or dying, but so is much of the support industry. When you're at a place where 1-2 parts are made per year of highly specialized equipment, you quickly lose the expertise to do it. If we expect to keep advancing (to Mars and beyond) we need to keep the industry going if only so that the industry exists when we need it...
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posted
I think that also ignores the fact that a Saturn V rocket couldn't provide nearly enough power to lift the type of weights we'd demand of it into space.
NPR spent a lot of time talking about the new NASA plan on Science Friday, along with other science and technology related issues in Obama's budget (all of which was pretty interesting by the way).
What they focused on was that Constellation wasn't necessarily a bad idea, and it was well managed, but dramatically underfunded. So why not just give them the money they need to achieve the plan they have in place? Well, it remains to be seen if Congress would be willing to support a large increase in NASA funding. Personally I really like the idea of more money for research and development, as well as more money for unmanned space probes of various types and missions. Could they increase funding enough to both support this, and a fully funded Constellation program? Sounds like a lot of money.
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quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: I think that also ignores the fact that a Saturn V rocket couldn't provide nearly enough power to lift the type of weights we'd demand of it into space.
NPR spent a lot of time talking about the new NASA plan on Science Friday, along with other science and technology related issues in Obama's budget (all of which was pretty interesting by the way).
What they focused on was that Constellation wasn't necessarily a bad idea, and it was well managed, but dramatically underfunded. So why not just give them the money they need to achieve the plan they have in place? Well, it remains to be seen if Congress would be willing to support a large increase in NASA funding. Personally I really like the idea of more money for research and development, as well as more money for unmanned space probes of various types and missions. Could they increase funding enough to both support this, and a fully funded Constellation program? Sounds like a lot of money.
Because we don't have that money. And if we aren't gonna be able to give them the money they really need, then there's no point in pretending they're accomplishing stuff. We can get MUCH more bang for our buck if we focus the money on new technologies that will dramatically increase our ability to do human space exploration in the future. Think VASIMR (Plasma engine), solar sails, magnetic sails and fusion here. If NASA can really focus on building the base required to perform human space flight - then when we have more money to throw their way we can revamp Constellation and do it with proper funding and a better technology base.
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But that's an argument you're going to hear from Congress, even as Congress refuses to increase their budget.
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quote:Originally posted by TheGrimace: To add on to the "why we can't just re-build Apollo?" question, here's a handful of points.
1) Much of what documentation existed is lost.
2) Bookkeeping of the program was nowhere near what we expect today.
3) As mentioned above, safety margins and assorted other requirements are vastly different now than they were back then.
4) Industry isn't there to support the effort.
That makes a lot of sense to me. I thought it was supposed to be easier to upgrade the engineering side of things than to come up with the R&D in the first place. If we lost the R&D, though, we can't very well go back and figure out how to upgrade the old stuff with the new stuff.
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He's touting robotic exploration, in the form of money for more Mars rovers, and unmanned missions throughout the solar system, most notably for the sun's atmosphere. He also noted more funding for the James Webb, which many fear will fall too far behind to replace Hubble in time. He also pushes the fact that the ISS will be extended by half a decade under the new budget to actually allow it time to conduct research.
Obama offered a time line, that while still somewhat vague, was really no more vague than Bush's space plan, or for that matter, Kennedy's. Obama called for NASA to land a man on an asteroid in the next decade, to have a new deep space exploration spacecraft designed by 2025, and by the mid-2030s, to have a man orbiting Mars, with a landing to follow. Really, that time line doesn't diverge much from what the Augustine Commission Report said Bush's Constellation program would have met. With the underfunding NASA suffered from the Constellation program, men would have been landing on the moon under Bush only a year or two before they'll be orbiting Mars under Obama.
Obama also revised the plan to allow for continued development of the Orion crew capsule as an emergency escape craft for the ISS, which makes some sense given the lack of options for getting there until commercial spacecraft make LEO travel a reality again.
I'm on board. People can complain about Constellation being canceled, but looking at the prospective time lines, I don't see what the fuss is about, and I don't see what the fuss is about for commercializing LEO launches. LEO is boring, and it's not like we're stopping it, we're just handing it off. Deep space is the new frontier.
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posted
Well, in Houston, the complaint is that the jobs are going to Colorado and Florida and away from us. Also, Orion Lite is a waste of money. Just about everyone agrees that the Soyuz is capable of performing that role as effectively for cheaper. So, why are we spending money on it- other than as a way to toss some money/jobs to Colorado?
If SpaceX is giving an accurate projection of costs and development times, I agree with the people who question why we don't extend the space shuttle until 2013 and then use Dragon. Houstonians don't particularly like that plan either, but I think it makes a lot of sense. If Dragon was ready now, that would be great, but it isn't yet, so why not give a little longer to the shuttles (since most people talking to the press at nasa say the shuttles should be good for that long)?
Honestly, I think that the biggest problem is that Obama really hasn't succeeded in sharing his vision. It has been vague and still is. The gaps annoy people and make them think Obama is not a fan of NASA (that and the long time it took to get a new director). That and not mentioning JSC ever really upsets Texans.
I did hear the greatest comment about Houston and Obama though. It doesn't matter what he says, we'll still disagree. It's Houston's own special form of Tourette's Syndrome (hope that doesn't mock those with Tourettes). You say obama, we say EVIL!
ETA- most people agree Constellation was flawed, but it was a vision. NASA folks are frustrated with every new administration being a new vision and a new plan. They just want to get one plan and stick with it to completion, regardless of politics.
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posted
Canceling the space shutting was a decision made five or six years ago. As far as I remember, Obama already extended its life by several missions this year. But I think politically, a lot of people are afraid that pushing the shuttle program for a few more years will lead to another shuttle disaster that leads people to question why the craft were pushed so hard. I find it hard to believe that after Columbia, NASA would let that happen, but I don't know quite as much about shuttle readiness.
Honestly, I question whether Obama ever really was a big fan of NASA, but, that's hardly new in presidential history. Historically, presidents before they were president have railed against wasteful government spending on things like NASA, but when they become president they don't dare threaten NASA funding for political reasons. We might have a case of that now. You should see the things that Kennedy said about NASA before becoming president, but he oversaw the most ambitious and expensive program in NASA's history.
The details will get worked out over the next year in concert with Congress' science and technology subcommittees.
ETA:
quote:ETA- most people agree Constellation was flawed, but it was a vision. NASA folks are frustrated with every new administration being a new vision and a new plan. They just want to get one plan and stick with it to completion, regardless of politics.
I agree. Continuity is very important. I don't think that's a convincing argument for sticking to a bad plan, but I certainly see the need for a long-term plan that actually has time to come to fruition. I think Obama is laying out a new vision, but it's maybe not as simple or direct as Bush's was. It has a lot more components to it.
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posted
I am actually not opposed to the new vision, though I think it is a hard one to get behind. It is not as simple as Mars 2025 or whatever- no easy slogan. I think that when disregarding the old vision, it should have been key to making sure everyone could see how this vision was better, not just abandonment.
The problem with the shuttle going away is that Bush set it up to expire after he was gone, leaving the political problem for the next guy (He also severely underfunded his vision and had ISS set up to expire before the most useful phase- but also after he was out of office). Smart of Bush, but leaves Obama in a hard place.
However, with Dragon so close to completion, it seems like a limited extension of a few flights would be a really good idea. And it shows people Obama isn't abandoning the US in space. Also, if Obama specifically mentioned a company or two, letting people know what is going on out there, that would also help to calm fears. Saying flat out, Dragon is projected to cost one tenth of the cost of Constellation per astronaut, it is really hard to keep arguing for constellation.
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Now, Obama wants to end the Constellation program. He agrees with the detractors that it is a waste of time and money. Many critics also note that the money being spent on the Constellation is seriously cutting into basic scientific R&D, as well as unmanned robotic exploratory missions of the solar system. Obama's plan would increase NASA's funding in 2011 by almost a billion dollars, would end the Constellation program, and would basically hand off resupply missions of the International Space Station to private aerospace companies. NASA's new mission? Technology. Obama wants to spend billions of dollars for NASA to develop the next generation of space exploration technology. NASA's Administrator, Charles Bolden, seems pretty excited about the idea. He's mentioned the fact that, with new propulsion technologies, the US might actually return to the moon, or even Mars, well before the 2020 deadline under Constellation, and especially the 2028 date that the critics say Constellation was actually on task to hit.
He's not kidding, I think. The one thing NASA is historically good at is working on a problem with a broad number of possible solutions. That's how they got to the moon in 9 years. The Bush administration's idea of a) cutting the budget, and b) sinking the rest of the money into developing new conventional rockets, at a whopping loss as they would likely fail to generate economic growth as the originals did from offshoot technology, was totally stupid. Spend a billion dollars to do the job badly in 20 years, maybe, or spend two billion to do the job really well, and get a bunch of added benefit from it.
There was never any point in going to moon except that doing so gave an excellent incentive for technological development. Bush just wanted to give his buddies money. Pathetic.
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