Tug of War Over Commercial Space Safety?

Call me paranoid, but if NASA is the one to certify the safety of private manned spacecraft, odds better than not no private space agency will be able to fly.

And now ULA jumps into the fray with 'options' ... how nice, and unexpected of them. I bet Augustine and Aldrin are just as surprised as I am. I wonder how long it will take them to start playing the 'safety' card when comparing ULA's case vice the Space-X and the other newbies ...

The FAA does and should have dominion over commercial space flights, but if NASA astronauts are on the flight then NASA should have the final say. The FAA is trying to overstep what seemed like a pretty clear boundary.

If NASA is paying the bill for a launch then NASA has the final say. If the FAA wants to get involved with NASA personnel safety let them pay for the flight. Last time I checked US astronauts work for NASA, not the FAA.

The dogs bark but the caravan moves on...

ULA was an abomination from the day it started - the complete opposite of what the two contractor system was supposed to achieve.

At this point, SpaceX needs to look inwards and concentrate on not dropping the ball, since ULA will pounce on any weakness.

However, if SpaceX carries through, even on the second or third Launch, it will end up carrying the day. But it's going to be oh-so-much-easier for them if this next launch works out.

Here's me crossing my fingers.

Clearly FAA territory, regulation of commercial transport for passenger safety. Is that what NASA wants to be, a regulatory agency? Or do we want to be an R&D agency? I say it should not be NASA astronuats going to ISS for research, it ought to be scientists. We need to downsize the NASA astronaut office from 150 to 30 and have them train for BEO missions and get started on developing that capability. Let commercial space companies operate all aspects of LEO. NASA and other government agencies could buy the research instead of the rides to LEO. There would have to be a transition, of course.

I am not convinced that either one of them is ready for the task.

I would like to hear from people involved that can make a good argument either way. I have been watching this part closely and I don't like it so far.

So we have the FAA which specializes in aviation (translated as "navigation through the air" and involving machines dependent on atmospherics to support its motions), NASA with expertise in spacecraft (but also with issues regarding programmatics), and they both have issues regarding safety (and the technological implementations for that safety).

Part of the problem is that, depending on the reference, Spaceship One is either a privately developed spacecraft or a privately developed aircraft. For SS1 and its follow-on descendents, its the case of a machine designed to "navigate through the air" in order to reach LEO at least, and where interaction with atmospherics is to be avoided while in LEO. So far as the "navigation through the air" part goes, SS1 & follow-ons depend on rocketry-based propulsion systems for motion support "through the air" in getting to LEO, not aerodynamics. Dependance on aerodynamics comes into play on descent or re-entry (until powered re-entry technology becomes realistic).

There's going to be non-NASA/non-Military/non-Government spaceflight & spacecraft, in addition to current & future aircraft, and they're going to occupy the same airspaces.

Ideally, someone kicks various posterior and tells the kids to play nice and shelve the turf wars so we can keep the respective craft safe & lives intact.

Realistically, giving the power to certify/decertify private spacecraft to an agency which could see said spacecraft as competitors is a wee bit like asking a foreign power to help keep the US Government afloat ... no, wait ...

I can't see NASA as being sufficiently independent to be the regulator of commercial spacecraft safety.

They still don't get it, of course. The budget competition isn't between Constellation and the commercial launchers. It's between Constellation and the ISS plus all the rest of NASA that Constellation has already gutted to feed itself. If you continue Constellation within anything like this budget, you have to kill ISS. And if you kill ISS, Constellation has nowhere to go for at least a quarter century.

Their ignorant, petty politics would kill NASA spaceflight for the next generation.

why they have to Fight over the Commercial Safety if one Company should handle this?

Gee, yet another issue I predicted when Obama's "new vision" was announced.

The FAA is trying to overstep what seemed like a pretty clear boundary. If NASA is paying the bill for a launch then NASA has the final say.

FAA is not at all overstepping its boundary. If you go read the FAA's charter, it is primarily to protect the interest of the public (and not just those flying, but those under the flight path). It has nothing to do at all with who is paying the bill, because the FAA does not pay any of the bills of commercial airlines. In fact, the FAA already has jurisdiction over NASA because whenever NASA wants to fly their airplanes, or clear a range for a launch, it is the FAA's jurisdiction of National Air Space that holds sway.

As another poster pointed out, the FAA is charged as a regulatory agency. NASA is not. And I would say anyone who has worked for the FAA or certified with them need only look at NASA's human rating "requirements" to see they are not up to the regulation task, and that the FAA knows how to proceed.

The main thing that is required is a set of spacecraft certification requirements to be placed into CFR Title 14, a la FAR 25 that exists for transport aircraft. Right now, the only regs on space regulate how you open and operate a spaceport. NOTHING AT ALL (yet) on standards for commercial spacecraft.

NASA can and should participate in the regulatory development process. But the FAA needs to be the lead. Anything else would be disastrous, given NASA's political nature. And if you think the FAA has a poor safety record, then why is air travel the safest form of travel on the planet? And why do the large majority of other countries model their aviation regulations after the FAA?

FAA is the ONLY government agency I know of that comes close to doing their job right, and with high quality.

"I can't see NASA as being sufficiently independent to be the regulator of commercial spacecraft safety."

The FAA isn't any better. Just ask the NTSB. They make safety recommendations but the FAA is also responsible for the airlines making money and that conflicts with safety at times.

And all of these new regulations are going to be written and reviewed overnight? That's another reason we're not ready for a commercial only human spaceflight capability yet. In the meantime, Obama's proposal is to stop all US human spaceflight until everything is ready.

> the FAA is charged as a regulatory agency. NASA is not.

I agree, the FAA vs NASA turf war is crap.

FAA regulates human transport, and NASA is one of the experts they consult. That should be that

"The FAA isn't any better. Just ask the NTSB. They make safety recommendations but the FAA is also responsible for the airlines making money and that conflicts with safety at times."

This is true. The FAA does an incredible job overall, but the NTSB keeps them in line as well.

And all of these new regulations are going to be written and reviewed overnight? That's another reason we're not ready for a commercial only human spaceflight capability yet.

Exactly. That was a point I made in another thread several weeks ago. We started in 1999 to try and prompt the FAA to develop regulations for unmanned vehicles flying in the National Air Space, and NASA even had an aviation program (called ACCESS 5) to coordinate such efforts. But here we are 10 years later and still do not have baseline FARs from which we can certify Global Hawk (among others) to fly in the NAS without filing special flight plans and the FAA clearing the subject airspace beforehand.

It is absolutely dumb, and irresponsible, to cancel NASA human spaceflight and start feeding seed money to commercial developers as long as there is no FAR basis for certification of spacecraft. I guarantee that nothing being developed today will meet all regs that will come (someday). And then the FAA will be pressured to grandfather-in existing spacecraft "just because". Safety, indeed!

Folks:

Compromise is always the best solution. Maybe a new agency needs to be created that draws upon the best of both the FAA and NASA but is not beholding to either.

Call it ACSA (American Commercial Space Authority) with "American" specifically chosen to separate it from the two agencies from which it was born.

tinker

Up to 100km(the official demarcation altitude for Space), the FAA; above that altitude, NASA. Obvious and simple so the bureaucrats will try to do something more complex in order to justify their existence: pathetic. As for coordination etc...the left hand MUST ensure the right hand knows not what it is doing! As for the politicians...

The discussions above leave out one aspect of this that will be even harder to reconcile, and take much longer to work out: It's not just American airspace that is involved.

A launch, and more often a reentry can cover other countries' airspace, and who has jurisdiction over LEO, cis-lunar space, etc.?

I suspect that before we're done the aircraft/spacecraft certification process and air/space traffic control operations are going make the FAA vs. NASA issue look trivial.

I have read NASA's human rating requirements. That is NPR 8705.2b. Just 55 pages.It has listing for all of the specs. to follow.It has been around for several years. Updated just last Dec. It covers every thing and I agree with all of it. All NASA has to do is just add some procedures for commercial. Like is the manager NASA or company? The manager runs the show.It should not be less and I do not see how any more could be added. Did you know that the astronauts have to approve? The manager can appeal to the associate admin. and over ride. The Astronauts want to come down on land. Did they say it was all right for Orion to come down on the ocean or were they overridden? I have not heard. Or did NASA not follow its own rules? Chief engineer has approve etc. The actual certificate is in the back and a line is there for all these people to sign off. Please read and see if you can find anything wrong. It is available at nasa.gov. Thanks.

What a stupid comment. If a company such as SpaceX provides the capsule and the pilot, they are the managers. The same as when NASA buys a seat on the Soyuz. End of discussion. Or should the COTS crew just make sure that all documentation and instrumentation is in Russian? NASA can't have different standards for the Russians and U.S. COTS. And don't give me the crap that the Russians have been launching the Soyuz for 40 years. They have had 2 loss of crew accidents, just like the Shuttle. And if you look at the amount of loss of mission flights that they have had due to launch failures, docking failures the reliability goes way down.

I think the WSJ is trying to create controversy to sell papers. I see some of the testimony and no where in there did Mr. O'Connor say that NASA wanted to be the regulatory agency for all human space flight nor have I ever heard anyone at NASA make that statement. Given that current FAA policy for certify commercial spacecraft launches only addresses the safety of non participants on the ground and performs no assessment of crew safety then it wouldn't prudent for NASA to just blindly accept FAA certification and correctly and entirely within their bounds to set higher requirments for the services it wishes to purchase. Note that current FAA approval of human space flight is done under the experimental classification with presumed informed consent of crew and passengers and this was done at the express request of the commercial space flight industry after extensive lobbying on their part so I would hardly call the FAA exactly independent or objective in their regulatory role.

That is idiotic. The roles of the FAA and NASA are not defined by an arbitrary altitude. FAA is a regulatory agency and NASA is not. NASA can define requirements for its own vehicles but as far as the rest of the nation, it is the FAA's job.

Many USA agencies fly, they do not have to be responsive to the FAA, it is helpful to work with the FAA however. The FAA does regulate Flight over the USA for civilian agencies.

NEXGEN anyone?

It seems to me that NASA has gone way overboard on safety, and the human rating requirements are resulting in huge expenditures and bad design tradeoffs for little benefit. For instance, much of the Constellation architecture seems driven by safety, ending up with an unsustainable program subject to cancellation.

Maybe I'm entirely wrong here; do NASA's safety plans seem reasonable to the rest of you?

Most of NASA's regulations do seem reasonable, especially with the threats of program cancellation should loss of life occur.

What safety rules should be relaxed?

I don't think any safety regulations should be relaxed. At least not for craft that NASA personnel will fly. However neither do I think NASA should be the regulatory body. It would just be something they would have to pay for out of their budget instead of putting the money into hardware.

Many USA agencies fly, they do not have to be responsive to the FAA

You wanna bet? There is only one agency that is given an exception to FAA regulations, and then only a select few of them, and that is DOD. Every other agency in the USA is bound by the same FARs that all commercial entities are bound by. The DOD gets special consideration to be able to self-certify their aircraft and maintain airworthiness outside FAA inspection criteria. But even if DOD is operating their aircraft outside designated Military Operating Areas (MOAs), they must obey the FARs regulating airspace operations. Please try and name another agency that does not have to abide by the FARs.

As for NASA's human rating requirements, they are insufficient to be made into formal Federal Regulations (i.e. they are not part of CFR Title 14, only NASA internal procedures). The requirements in NPR 8705.2b are subjective, and left to the interpretation of a single human being (the Program Manager). All you need to do is spend time reading the FARs (which are actually federal law where NPR 8705.2b are not) and then compare them to what NASA has. You will see how different they are. Here is the biggest difference: NPR 8705.2b has a requirement that talks about "requests for waivers and exceptions." (Paragraph 2.2.2). You will never see that in the FARs because the FAA cannot grant waivers and exceptions to existing federal law! The DOD exemptions I mentioned above are actually written into the FARs.

Furthermore, NASA's human rating requirements never invoke something the FAA calls "acceptable means of compliance" which, essentially, tells you which standards, if followed, will be eligible for certification. One area where NASA refuses to tread is invocation of DO-178B (soon to be REV C) for airborne software development standards. The FARs point to all sorts of accepted (as well as proven) industry standards which are acceptable means of compliance. NASA prefers to treat each new program as re-inventing the wheel, which is exactly why NPR 8705.2B is written the way it is, and also why it had to have a "REV B" for changes to make ARES/Orion "easier" to human rate.

I could go on and on and on about why NPR 8705 could never be the basis for federal regulations for spacecraft. And I can guarantee that every single FAA DER working right now would have the same assessment. NASA cannot (and will not) be trusted as the certification authority for commercial spacecraft. I can also guarantee that.

"FAA is not at all overstepping its boundary. If you go read the FAA's charter, it is primarily to protect the interest of the public (and not just those flying, but those under the flight path). It has nothing to do at all with who is paying the bill, because the FAA does not pay any of the bills of commercial airlines. In fact, the FAA already has jurisdiction over NASA because whenever NASA wants to fly their airplanes, or clear a range for a launch, it is the FAA's jurisdiction of National Air Space that holds sway."

You do not get my point. The FAA will determine whether a particular craft is safe to fly from a public safety standpoint. NASA will determine whether the craft is safe to transport any NASA personnel or hardware. The FAA does not decide whether a craft is safe for an individual employed by NASA.

You wanna bet? There is only one agency that is given an exception to FAA regulations, and then only a select few of them, and that is DOD.

Ahhh yep, NASA, NOAA, DHS, FBI, CIA, local police and a host of other can fly as they wish without self-certify their aircraft and maintain airworthiness outside FAA inspection criteria. This is there(agency) responsibility not the FAA.

There is no need to de-mil any DOD aircraft to obtain a FAA Type Cert and any case for most fed and state agencies. Most agencies can also fly out of country aircraft in some US airspace at will.
You cannot fly the public however!

The FAA regulates US airspace for all but the DOD is correct. The do work together on US and world airspace most often.

Ahhh yep, NASA, NOAA, DHS, FBI, CIA, local police and a host of other can fly as they wish without self-certify their aircraft and maintain airworthiness outside FAA inspection criteria. This is there(agency) responsibility not the FAA.

Given the general way in which you worded that, you are incorrect. All aircraft flown by these agencies are certainly registered (i.e. "N" numbers) with the FAA. As a result of requiring FAA registration, these aircraft also fall under FAA airworthiness regulations (as I pointed out, these are laws...and any exemptions must be written into the law). If these agencies elect to use former military aircraft, unmodified, then the law allows them to avoid FAA type certification. However, any other vehicles (example: police rotorcraft) must have an FAA type certificate. Moreover, the issuance of such a type certificate binds the operator to maintain continuing airworthiness in accordance with the Maintenance Review Board requirements for that type design. This is really no different than FAA biennial maintenance requirements for private aircraft owners. While it is true such agencies do not need FAA inspectors, the airworthiness requirements levied on the type designs themselves (and this includes any/all Airworthiness Directives written against them) most certainly do apply.

Where I think you are getting confused is what FAR part governs these agencies flight operations. Clearly, none of these agencies are FAR 121 operators, because they do not fly passengers, which is what FAR 121 governs. However, all of these agencies and their flight operations are most surely regulated by the FAA. Their airmen must be licensed in accordance with the FARs (FAR 61) and their flight operations are governed under FAR 91, as a minimum, and must obey the IFR procedures of FAR 95 and 97.

There is no need to de-mil any DOD aircraft to obtain a FAA Type Cert and any case for most fed and state agencies. Most agencies can also fly out of country aircraft in some US airspace at will.
You cannot fly the public however!

Correct.