Bolden Vs Armstrong and Cernan: Clash of the Titans Round 2

This should be good. I really hope they look at re-organizing NASA. Economically we cannot keep up 10 centers and do the things we want to do do.

Will Mike be coaching from the sidelines again?

Tom Young is no fan of CxP. Maybe we will get a chance at a true SD HLV.

VR
RS327

Tom Young opposes any and all changes to traditional NASA methods. He calls all changes “miracle solutions." With him replacing Norm Augustine, this panel is totally stacked against Bolden. Without Augustine or Holdren, Bolden will be the only voice speaking reality in the room.

Past experience at closing up "excess" military bases and space-related sites (e.g., Rockwell International's Rocketdyne Santa Susana Facility here in Los Angeles County) suggests that clean up operations run for four-five years at a minimum (often longer) for several billion bucks a pop.

Closing NASA centers will not save money in the short term, will not leave current neighbors feeling wonderously pleased with NASA in the long term, and will not make friends with Congressmen representing affected districts. It probably would lead to a permanently smaller NASA, if that's your desire.

Are you real sure this is the can of worms you want to open?

Quote, "I really hope they look at re-organizing NASA. Economically we cannot keep up 10 centers and do the things we want to do do."

You are exactly correct, but for the past 40 years, after the big moon race was won, there has been a need to reduce NASA's size and it's Centers. Many have tried and none have succeeded because each Center closure involves loss of jobs in locations that have 2 Senators and several Congressmen with a strong focus on getting re-elected.

This is a good reason to support President Obama's Space Plan which encourages more Commercial Space activity. And its a good reason that many Senators and Congressmen will fight tooth and nail to defeat, or delay, the President's Space Plan - especially during an election year!

Wow, three anti-FY2011 witnesses and the NASA Administrator? It certainly seems like somebody's thumb is on the scale.

This whole affair seems like a train wreck compared to the roll out of the Vision for Space Exploration in 2004 and 2005. Obama at least deserves credit for trying to save American human spaceflight from NASA's death-grip. Now that the hard policy decisions of VSE are being implemented (retire the Shuttle, continue flying Station) Congress can't come to grips with the consequences of Constellation's fiscal unsustainablility, so they choose to just keep workers busy instead.

"Wow, three anti-FY2011 witnesses and the NASA Administrator? It certainly seems like somebody's thumb is on the scale."

I wonder when Lori Garver will be testifying?

If the Obama plan is so great as they wish us to think, it should easily survive critical examination shouldn't it?

It should have won over people like Armstrong and Cernan at some point.

It didn't. Some of you need to start asking why beyond the usual excuses for it.

Since it was developed with no transparency, it's going to get some serious critical looks now.

That is Obama's fault, nobody is "stacking" anything against Bolden. Obama created this entire situation.

Obama deserves NO credit for trying to "save" anything. He has bungled this from the beginning.

Bolden is in the big chair now, if he supports this plan, he should be able to handle that.

CessnaDriver,
You state "If the Obama plan is so great as they wish us to think, it should easily survive critical examination shouldn't it?

It should have won over people like Armstrong and Cernan at some point."

Well, Buzz Aldrin and Rusty Schweickart are for the president's program.

The nice thing about all these people is they are mature adults with differing opinions, just like congress and senate, and they can disagree on what is best unless you are saying Buzz and Rusty are wrong.

Congress has really had enough of the administration on this issue! Nixon crippled NASA over the last 38 years by terminating beyond LEO activities and starting NASA's mission to LEO. And now Obama wants to put NASA out of its misery with his mission to nowhere.

Obama has caved into the anti-NASA wing of the Democratic Party which has been hostile to manned spaceflight (the we should be spending that money to help the poor group)even during the days of Apollo and he's put Democrats in Florida and Texas in a position where they have no choice but to oppose the administration in order to save their political careers.

There's no way Congress is going to approve spending $300 billion of the tax payer's money over the next 25 years with no Moon base, no Mars base, or even an artificial gravity space station to show for it!

Marcel F. Williams

I am SO excited that cooler heads are prevailing in this whole stupid fy2011 budget! I think that turning this country into a welfare state, and killing off the one inspiring thing we still do well, is not the way people wanted when they voted for change. Or is it? I think that would be even more sad. Comments?

The Obama plan has support of only a small handful of famous space names.

We have seen the lengthy lists of famous names against on several publicly made letters. It's overwhelming to see that many of those high profile NASA names sign anything together and make such a huge public statement on space policy.

Do you recall anything like that before?

The support for it is far from even luke warm.
What Obama has managed to do is start a space policy civil war that has brought out even Neil Armstrong in a huge public way on the matter.

I've read what Aldrin and Schweickart have said and they convinced me of very little.
Aldrin also seems to support a lot of things totally outside of the Obama plan. He seems more looking to get his foot in the door for his ideas.

I wish that all parties would get their stories straight for this session so they know what they are advocating for or against. Armstrong and Cernan both appeared a bit confused in their first appearances last week.

A brief summary of space architecture summaries:

1988
NASA Exploration Office
Four case studies
(1) an expedition to Phobos,
(2) expedition to Mars
(3) construction of a man-tended lunar observatory
(4) construction of a lunar outpost as a precursor for a Mars outpost

1989
NASA Exploration Initiative 90 Day Study
Space Station Technology as an enabler of Lunar Outposts and Mars travel

1990
NASA Synthesis Report sought public input on future exploration paths

1993
NASA Exploration Office First Lunar Outpost; cited need for Heavy Lift and minimizing in-space construction, based on public input

1996
NASA Human Lunar Return, using Delta launch vehicles

1998-99
NASA Mars Design Reference Missions
Defined need for Mars Nuclear Electric Propulsion and Heavy Lift Launch Vehicle

2002-2004
Decadal Planning and NASA Exploration
Defined the 'Vision', to include commercial participation, human-robotic partnership, L1 Lagrangian Point mission 'gateway'

2004
Concept Exploration Studies
13 contractors submitted their proposals which included fly-back CEV, lifting bodies, capsules, heavy lift launch vehicle, fuel depots and ISRU. Lockheed recommended a fly-back vehicle and not capsules

2004-2005
Exploration Office under Steidle
Centennial Challenges workshops to encourage entrepreneurs and risk-takers to undertake major space missions including private orbital human space flight capability.

2004
Planetary Society Garriott-Griffin Study
Stage 1: CEV development and Shuttle retirement
Stage 2: Heavy Lift Launch vehicle development; enhancement of CEV; development of a Habitation Module; consideration of an SRB-based CEV booster or other boosters such as EELVs or foreign boosters; deep space missions to Lagrangian Points, NEOs, Moon and Mars orbits; CEV and SRB booster would be available by 2010.

2005
NASA-Griffin 90-Day ESAS, with resulting plan for 'Apollo on Steroids'
with CEV cargo and crew vehicles (Orion), to carry
6 to ISS and 4 to moon; 5.5 M dia, 3X Apollo CM volume
SRB based CEV booster (Ares 1)
Shuttle-based Heavy Lift (Ares 5)
Lunar landing Mdoule (Altair)
Lunar outpost development

2009
Augustine Committee

The point is-the idea that we have to do lunar landing missions first was something that became quite important only in the 2005 ESAS study. Every other study seems to recognize the need for HLVs and a vehicle for planetary class missions. The idea that CEV had to be a capsule originated in ESAS.

General Bolden isn't well served by another match-up between him and Armstrong.I fail to see what new insights are likely to be gained by this second round of finger pointing. What's Gene Cernan gonna say that he didn't tell the Senate? This is just political theater full of sound and fury ....

Maybe the "younger" people who are truly knowledgeable about the field are in hiding. Or maybe there are just not that many.

I'm surprised that my question at nasa space flight, http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=21549.0, was not answered. Not sure what to make of it.

BTW Keith, I do believe some of your comments (or attitudes) about the DIRECT team are valid.

I assume these hearings are just distractions for angry constituents. By doing this the politicians in opposition states won't get blamed when the plan passes, and they also won't have to seriously oppose the president. These hearings are toothless stinks.

If Congress wants more input from the public regarding the President's space program, then it should sponsor some Congressional Space Summits around the country. Aside from hearing from the above 60 crowd, the Congress gets a chance to hear from the young people who will actually work in space. I doubt this will happen.

Keith -- "when is Congress going to call upon people to testify who will actually spend their future career living and working in the space program that is being discussed? Why is it that we only seem to hear from 60-,70-, 80-year olds talking about someone else's future?"

Answer I - we're hearing from old-timers because they're the ones with the famous names. Congress is "debating" the issue by tossing competing talking heads at each other, rather than by peering at technical documents and financial projections. This doesn't speak well for the American style of government, but ...

Answer II -- underlying the above, I think Congress is unwilling or unable to re-consider space policy from scratch. "Do what the President wants" or "Do what we were already doing" are the only options that most Congressmen can see or are willing to deal with.

It's difficult to come up with alternatives unless you're engrossed by this space stuff, which isn't true for most Congresspeople. It's near impossible to find witnesses and experts who will testify in favor of alternatives. It's probably totally impossible to come with horses to trade to other Congresspeople to get them to support the alternatives you want to propose. And there is NO gain in proposing alternative space policies, given that 99% of the public is totally clueless about the issues involved -- it will only upset the White House, OMB, the State Department, the Defense Department, people in your party, people in the other party, people in your home district, TV newsmen and reporters and bloggers.

What it would take to get Congress to rework policy from scratch is probably the same sort of Sputnik-style shock that got NASA established in the first place. And that isn't likely in the near future.

I think the young people are scared to speak out because they too are critical of the Obama plan.

Fact is that in very general terms the Obama plan is really not a bad idea. But its missing the roadmap, the real plan. And there are a few specifics that make little to no sense:

What is the real rationale for the Orion emergency return vehicle?

Why defer the heavy lift vehicle?

Why not add how ever many Shuttle flights can be supported with existing hardware?

On the NASA side there does not seem to be a genuine architect mapping out the strategy.

With all due respect, what does Armstrong REALLY know about the cost, schedule and technical problems associated with CxP? He has been out of the space program for decades. Then suddenly he shows up at a congressional hearing mouthing what opponents of the Obama Admin. have probably fed him. They are trading on his name and he is being used...

Thirty years ago, nobody asked me what I thought about the future of human space flight. Why should they begin to ask now? And what great insights of wisdom do you think young engineers can give?

"but when is Congress going to call upon people to testify who will actually spend their future career living and working in the space program that is being discussed? Why is it that we only seem to hear from 60-,70-, 80-year olds talking about someone else's future?"

I was asked to be a witness before the Senate Science and Space Subcommittee on February 24, 2010. I'm 36 years old. I also believe Keith was there if I'm not mistaken.

Here is a link to my written statement:

http://legislative.nasa.gov/hearings/2-24-10%20Snyder.pdf

Perhaps the main reason why so many are against this? No one has told us "how" any of this is supposed to happen. For example:

1. How do we, the skilled and experienced workforce, help make this proposal work?
2. How do we continue to support ISS and fully utilize it?
2. How do we transition from where we are at now to where we are to go?
3. How does the private/public partnership work with respect to commercial spaceflight? What requirements will be levied? How much will NASA contribute on a yearly basis in order to sustain each of these companies if the market to support them is not there still? How much will this cost?
4. If we don't fully utilize ISS, it begins to degrade, etc, how do we ensure the private companies will be willing to invest their own capital money, whatever that agreement turns out to be, if ISS is to be the "anchor tenant" and we do not have a "snow-ball" situation?
5. How do these "game-changing" technologies translate to going anywhere, and anywhere sometime soon?
6. How do we turn KSC into a "21st century launch complex" when we don't even know what vehicle(s) will be launching from it? How do we design that infrastructure? Do we force every vehicle to then conform to it?

The list could go on....if they want support it is more than past time to give the real details. After all, the plan should have somewhat been there as far back as Feb 1 since they were somehow able to derive a budget to support it.

Editor's note: as far as I can tell you are the lone, shining example of what I am talking about. Everyone else is a generation or more removed from having any real personal stake in where today's policy will lead us.

And by the way, with all due respect for the accomplishments of all of these who have or will testify, but when is Congress going to call upon people to testify who will actually spend their future career living and working in the space program that is being discussed? Why is it that we only seem to hear from 60-,70-, 80-year olds talking about someone else's future?

I remember in 1990 when I was one of the young college students who stood up in front of the NASA big wigs who were already old then to ask them why they were wasting so much time not doing anything. There is still a mention of my rant in the Space Summit closing remarks by the NASA leadership.

NASA has never listened to the younger generation. There is a great quote by Max Plank, the famous physicist when talking about progress in physics.

Science Advances One Funeral at a Time

It looks like there is a similar statement in aerospace today.

Rocket Science Advances on Funeral at a Time

We had direct evidence of this with the Augustine II commission. One of the younger members of that commission shares a common interest in changing the parameters of lunar exploration to include a robust ISRU capability. I was told that Augustine just absolutely did not believe that it was possible and that he would not allow anything substantial to be written into the report about it.

If you eliminate substantial ISRU, you must have these monster heavy lift vehicles that are completely irrelevant to a sustainable exploration effort if you have access to off planet resources. With the confirmation of what Spudis, myself, and others have believed for years about lunar water, it is no longer tenable to say that we have "Been there and done that" about the Moon.

The Apollo guys are like Mr. Incredible in the animated movie the incredibles, still pining for the glory years and not understanding that we are so beyond Apollo today. I have an incredible interest in technoarcheology but it is just that, the study of dead technology. While an understanding of history is required so that we know where we have been, that understanding includes knowing what we don't need from before and that what we have today can be so much better than what we had a generation ago in space.

Rocket Science Advances on Funeral at a Time

Yes, but the problem is that mental aging is not necessarily correlated with chronological aging.

The so-called "new direction" proposed in the new budget doesn't incorporate ISRU of the Moon, reusable spacecraft or any other "new" approach to spaceflight. We still launch all that we need from the surface of the Earth in a big mega-booster (after we study it for five years to decide which one we want to build.) We exchange one group of "greedy" aerospace contractors for another. We do one-off, pointless PR stunt missions to "new destinations" (e.g., missions to NEO's and Phobos), none of which leave any lasting technological capabilities or permanent space faring infrastructure.

The "new path" in space is the same as the "old path" -- find a destination far off enough in space and time so that nobody notices if you ever get there or not, build a big rocket with enough contractors in enough Congressional districts so that your plan gets passed, visit the new place to plant a flag and leave a few footprints, and then whine for next couple of decades about not having enough money in the budget to do the next big project.

Oh, and as far as the idea of "old people" not being entitled to an opinion on the great "new way of doing business," I suppose that we are entitled to help pay for it. So shut up and sign that check, Mr. Armstrong and Mr. Cernan.

The point is-the idea that we have to do lunar landing missions first was something that became quite important only in the 2005 ESAS study.

Not true. Lunar surface return studies began the moment the Apollo program ended, and for all the reasons that we've come to know and love. Lunar Base architecture studies began in earnest in the early eighties at JSC, when Mike Duke and Wendell Mendell realized that an Orbital Transfer Vehicle (OTV) planned for Space Station Freedom and designed to routinely access GEO for satellite servicing had the ability to go to lunar orbit as well. This led to the creation of an office at JSC in 1984 (headed by Barney Roberts) that studied a variety of scenarios for future human travel beyond LEO, all focusing on lunar surface return to various degrees.

Many of the study efforts you list were primarily focused on lunar surface return; as an example, take Synthesis Group (the Stafford report of 1991). That study not only accepted "public input," but also detailed technical input from industry and other federal agencies (e.g., DoD.) But all "input" was about how to implement President George H. W. Bush's Space Exploration Initiative, a.k.a. "Moon-Mars" (in that order). During Synthesis, many different lunar return scenarios were examined in some detail, including one in which resource processing was the principal mission objective (the "waypoints" studies in the Stafford report).

For the past 25 years, almost all studies of future human missions beyond LEO included lunar surface operations as the objective -- critical and in the path or as an enhancing option. The idea of by-passing the Moon completely is a late addition and comes only from certain Mars-centric segments of the space community.

Keith,

You are probably aware of it but in answer to your question about why they select only the astronauts and scientists out there that are against the Obama plan, it is obvious these hearings are primarily setup by the congressmen from the space states who want to continue the status quo primarily to continue the flow of money to their districts and states. The congressmen who aren't from these states don't set up hearings as they really don't have much of an interest in it overall. They will however vote when the time comes but if these space state congressmen can sneak into the bill a way to feed pork to their districts they will. Rockefeller's comments were interesting and it will be interesting to see how this all plays out in the end but that is likely not to happen until early next year the way are congress works these days. I do agree if you are going to bring in "experts" then a reasonable assumption would be to bring in these people from both sides of the discussion. However that makes it less likely that you can continue to get the pork.

the witness list should tell everyone how opposed to the plan Congress is. The administration's continued arrogance will shift the managing of NASA's budget from the White House to Congress. Just watch.....

Everyone else is a generation or more removed from having any real personal stake in where today's policy will lead us. -- Keith

Using that logic, if Wernher Von Braun were alive, his thoughts would be specious and unworthy of taking counsel from?

One difference between the older generation and the younger one is that the older one actually has some real-world experience in ground-up MSF implementation. Their knowledge and experience of what actually works and what doesn't is invaluable.

Perhaps Buzz was busy hosting wrestling events and figuring out his next reality show appearance to make a showing before Congress.

What many don't understand is that this is really the termination of NASA human space flight and probably US human space flight.

Why put off a decision for heavy lift till 2015? This just punts the decision down the road when the present workforce and infrastructure is long gone.

I'm betting the that to make KSC a 21st century launch complex requires razing the OPF's, VAB, launch control rooms (that were modernized only 2 years ago) and Pads 39A and B.

Orion CEV is a bone tossed to LockMart to keep them at least neutral in this fight.

There is a third way and the Boeing proposal is a good start in that direction.

Congressional Hearings are political theater for the COngressman. The witnesses are just props for the members to use to show how great and knowledgable they are. Congress won't invite younger people because unless they are famous the hearing won't get any media attention which is the primary goal of the meeting.

Last very few young people active with spaceflight community have the free time (they are after all working)to testify nor the inclination given the industries willingness to black list perceived trouble makers.

Hmmmm...gee Keith, how many hearings have been held where Bolden is the Obama advocate? In fact, how many hearings have been held on the Obama plan?

This thread of comments seems to have devolved into 1) an argument about age (every path forward must have a mix of experience and new ideas, with the wisdom to choose well). Talking in generational terms ignores what is known. 2) The second second comment by Mike Snyder above is the most important thing to consider. Many of his other questions have been studied (I took part in several) and those studies have identified paths that have either been ignored or filed away in a quiet corner somewhere, never to be seen again. I appreciate the timeline by BrianM, but it's incomplete. When you look at space policy statements starting with President Carter, there is a clear sense of continuation in them, with added stakeholders. The underground book, Mars Wars, is a pretty good description of the first Bush administration's attempt to appear different and fresh, but it points out how often this has happened in the history of space flight (just ask a NASA person older than 40 and he or she may have a copy). 3) The studies that are mentioned are important precursors that seem to escape the notice of knowledge capture and people involved in planning. The Lessons Learned Information System (LLIS) is open to the public. How many commercial providers are even aware of it? What about John Commonsense?

Let me add 3) The failure of Constellation was foreseeable, based on its lack of funding at the integration level. Developing standards for integration of people, hardware and information should be the first things on an even more ambitious path that involves unknowable future systems. There should be concern about the ballooning costs of support equipment as multiple systems converge on limited launch sites. Duplication of functions and unclear organizational boundaries are almost a certainty without front end integration planning. Desired and required capabilities should be prioritized and flowed into infrastructure plans and acquisitions. Operations integration should be modeled and trades compared, just like any other system. Multi-criteria optimization is not easy, but it has to be applied to any system integration, or resource needs will overcome the systems development over time. Technology maturity measurement, technology insertion, commonality needs, capability statements, information needs, priorities for development...these should be first in line in the new path. Otherwise, we'll play "bring me a rock" for three years while spending continues to grow (for the uninitiated, the rock will always be wrong...shape, color, weight, size, etc., causing you to go find a new rock).

Using that logic, if Wernher Von Braun were alive, his thoughts would be specious and unworthy of taking counsel from?

that is about right.

If a reborn Von Braun were to return to us today and offer suggestions of a technical nature, sadly given the state of the art, he probably would still be on the cutting edge.

But policy has moved on. The entire set of circumstances that spawned Apollo no longer exist, and yet a lot of people still act as if we are in a space race that is a substitute for armed combat.

We are not

Robert G. Oler

I find it is disappointing that Mr. Armstrong and Capt. Cernan are supporting the Constellation project. They should have known better since Constellation is also known as "Apollo on Steroid" and Apollo was canceled. They are very expensive projects and narrowly focused. They both did not get the human race out of Earth's gravity field.

Dr. Spudis, I think advocates for establishing permanent bases on the Moon need to consistently make the important connection between space depots on the lunar surface and at the Lagrange points and resupplying these depots with oxygen and hydrogen extracted from the lunar poles rather than from Earth.

Such lunar resources could dramatically reduce the cost of space travel in cislunar space and could make a reusable Altair LOX/LH2 stage and reusable ACES orbital transfer vehicles economically attractive even for the emerging private manned spaceflight industry.

I think its obvious that over the next 20 or 30 years that there is going to be a lot more manned spaceflight traffic from space tourism than there will be from government funded missions. So such reusable vehicles could give private manned spaceflight companies an affordable and convenient way to take wealthy tourist and space lotto winners from LEO to commercial facilities on the lunar surface.

And polls that I have taken show the Moon as the preferred destination for space tourist!

Marcel F. Williams

I agree! The Boeing proposals that utilize an inline core vehicle for heavy lift and the core vehicle without the SRBs for shuttling people into orbit looks like a concept that would be attractive for NASA's beyond LEO missions and for the private commercial manned spaceflight companies that simply want to get people to LEO.

Marcel F. Williams

To CessnaDriver,
I am a young person supporting the Obama plan and I know many who do. Why don't we respond? Two main reasons, first, yes, we are afraid for our jobs because if we go against what the "old people" aka our bosses think, then we can loose our jobs, not high on my priority list.
Second, people like you then tell us we have not been around long enough to know what we are talking about. I may only be 33, but I have been involved in the space arena myself for 11 years and through family going back into the 60s.
My boss worked at KSC since '78 and is now at my center. My father was an SES for a decade, he actually helped write the SEI, and he is for Obama's Plan.

Yes, Obama's plan is not perfect, but has there ever been a perfect plan? NO. While Obama's plan does lack a definite goal of being at a specific location on a specific date, it is milestone driven.
The plan says, we know these are the challenges and obstacles, so we are going to overcome them, then go out into space. This is how research works!
Research and development is done by addressing a problem and working it until you have a solution. In real research, you cannot say, "Here is our problem, we will find a solution in the next 2 weeks." If you don't have a solution in 2 weeks, then is it a failure? NO. What if it takes 16 days, is it still a failure?

NASA is a research agency, we do our research in may ways, partly by exploring.

YES, JFK did say that we are going to go to the moon by a set date, but that was a politically driven reason, the only other reason NASA sets dates is for launch windows and such.

NASA as a research organization needs to focus on that challenges and problems and overcome them, once they are overcome, then we can go to the Moon, Mars, and Asteroids.

Under the Bush plan, we said, we are going to the moon, we know it will be tough and there will be challenges and when we get there, we are going to address the challenges and try to fix them. In other words, we were putting the cart before the horse.

Under Obama, we are saying, the challenges are identified, let us research a solution and overcome those challenges then go there in a safe manner.

Like I said in the beginning, I do support the Obama plan, but it is not perfect and no plan ever will be.

I'll weigh in with a cultural comment. Mike Griffin, to his credit, in his first speech as NASA Administrator back in 2005, said he did not understand the cultural observations of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board because of a lack of knowledge of human psychology. That surprised me because I knew, among his other degrees, was an MBA. Some asking around and reading led me to the discovery that it is possible -- even likely -- for a human to get through business school without learning much of the social arts and sciences.

I'm rather rare in tech fields. I did get a degree in physics way back when. In my second year of grad work in the field, I decided to change careers. Into IT? Eventually. But before taking that direction, I actually did grad work in social psychology. Along the way I also became a decent writer and photographer.

OK, now you know some of my credentials.

The NASA we have had to live with for the past half century has what we call an authoritarian culture. Decisions are made on high. There is too little listening to people lower in the ranks. There is even less listening to outsiders. Communications with the general public are almost always one direction -- outwards. Too few people in NASA do that much listening to outsiders either for new ideas or for seeing problems that NASA could help with.

NASA's predecessor, NACA, appears to be more oriented to helping build aviation technology in general. Companies were more diverse. Remember when Lockheed, Martin, Northrop and Grumman were separate companies? Before Boeing, McDonnell, Douglas became just Boeing?

I am not an insider at NASA presently. Some insiders could be quite angry with me for saying we need reforms to lead the industry in a more democratic, less authoritarian direction.

What is going on now could be the result of trying to change an extremely authoritarian culture. It could also be the kind of infighting that arises when authoritarian cultures are in major decline.

I do not think the past half century is sustainable any more. For one thing, young people seem rather adverse to careers in such institutions -- particularly given the quite evident to even outsiders problems.

Evident to outsiders? I know Ed through a running group. Ed is the kind of person we all want in the diplomatic corps (part of the State Department). He's quietly friendly, intelligent, well educated, etc. Back in 2004 Ed remarked to me, quite out of the blue, "I've read the Columbia report." My question was a simple "Ed, why?" Ed's reply was priceless. He said "Everyone in the State Department is reading the Columbia report to see how screwed up an organization can get."

I hope I have made my point.

Good comments. The problem now is that NASA neither has the ability to be a functional operational agency or a functional R&D one or even a regulatory one. They are in this sort of bad version of that Star Trek the NG episode where the crew was endlessly repeating a time loop with deteriorating results.

It is not a clear mission, that is needed it is a clear agency purpose. Part(s) of the agency have that.

Despite running on almost no money the "A" which is Aeronautics manages to do reasonable research...the "uncrewed" exploration activities seem to be progressing along a coherent path.

But get into human spaceflight...and one finds a group that really knows how to do little but assemble programs and then move on to the next. And does not do that very well, as Ares is testament to.

"Everyone in the State Department is reading the Columbia report to see how screwed up an organization can get." as an FAA designated DER and DE I went to Ok City to finish ISO 9000 safety school about a month after that report came out. During the two month course, that was required reading for the same reason...and the facilitators expressed about the same sentiments.

Robert G. Oler

Chuck-

I think that these are good observations, and accurate.

One aspect you did not point out, but which is significant in how Human Space Flight is no longer functioning, was that until about 15 years ago there were organizations within HSF that housed the resident experts in specific fields of the art, technology and science of space flight. The new engineer came into the organization, worked with those far more senior and experienced, and in time by focusing on a fairly narrow discipline, the new engineer was transformed into an experienced and competent torch carriers for the discipline.

It all went to hell about 15 years ago with the ISS when it was determined that you no longer had to have any expertise in order to be the expert.

Since that time we saw other elements of the organization try to 'take over'. Some like the operations people have done quite well, but only for themselves; in the process they have killed most of the expertise that enabled the orderly conception, design, development and later flight and operations of human carrying space vehicles.

This is as much what we now need to overcome. We need to get back to the idea that you actually have to be educated and gain experience in order to try to manage and lead.

The size and mass of Orion and its mismatch with Ares were a direct result of a lack of the technical expertise having a say in the definition. Just as the Columbia accident was a result of Program Management whose sole experience was in operations, failing to talk to and heed the observations of experienced people from engineering.

By the time of the Columbia accident, the subsystem manager approach had been killed for about 5 years. I recently spoke with an Apollo veteran, and the response was: "no subsystem managers ? who is running the program"

20, 30 or 40 years ago, there were specific experts in particular disciplines who would be called upon when the time was right to come up with a new idea, a new vehicle or a new mission. A major problem today, reacting to the Obama redirection, is that there is no leadership, and no experts to call upon for guidance and direction, so it has become a free-for-all. The NASA management approach seems to be to get a group together and discuss until consensus can be reached.

Unless leadership appears, and decides that they need to find those discipline experts to lead the way, we will be going in circles for a long time.

I agree with Kevin's comments above, and, if I may, I'd like to expand on them just a little bit.

I firmly believe, based on experience, that the milestones being defined is more important than the dates. In an ideal situation, you could know the completion dates, and therefore get your budget and schedule realistic right at the start. But, given the size of the NASA programs that most people seem to favor (very large) this is never going to happen. History, of course, supports this.

However, once you have well-defined milestones, you can then determine the interdependencies between those milestones, and then the program's critical path (the most time-sensitive and interdependent tasks in the overall program). This, as many of you know, is basic program management practice. Failing to plan and execute the program this way means failure of the program, guaranteed; no exceptions.

One reason that Constellation was bound to fail is that the individual projects that make up the program are not being done in a logical order, consistent with a derived critical path, but I won't argue that issue, simply because there is too much room for argument and we'd never all agree.

It is inescapable that if we try to determine a date by which we can reach any off-Earth destination, the date we come up with will be wrong. There are too many unknowns and changing factors -- many of them not technical and totally outside of NASA's control.

As many have pointed out, the Obama space plan was poorly introduced, and still has not been effectively explained to the public (or congress). In other words, although its milestones may have been determined, we the people don't know in any detail what they are, only generalities. Of course, how much detail is enough is a tricky question.

I'm in favor of the Obama plan, but for the wrong reason. If executed properly, an Obama-type plan is sustainable in a yearly-budget-war environment. A mega-project like Constellation isn't. This means, to me, that the Obama plan is the best choice of the two alternatives being offered, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's a good choice. I'd like to see more detail made public about Obama's plan, because, right now, I don't think any of us are making an informed decision. We've been voting more or less emotionally, based on the issues that are personal to each of us.

The extremely expensive and wasteful Obama plan doesn't get us a Moon base, or a Mars base, or even a rotating artificial gravity space station (probably the easiest thing to do).

The Obama plan is simply a workfare program for NASA that develops nothing to go nowhere.

The only good thing about the Obama plan that it at least gives private industry a tiny bit of money to try to get into space themselves.

But the other $19 billion a year is simply wasted pretty much doing what NASA's been doing since the end of Apollo-- except for not having our own rocket vehicle, of course, to get to the ISS.

Marcel F. Williams

I've got ten years on you Kevin, so not that far ahead of you.

I would never say anyone was too young to know what they are talking about as long as they are talking about something they have demonstrated experience and proficiency in.

One of my biggest problems with the Obama plan is the total failure to commit to BEO hardware now.

How about scale back up Orion as it was before so we have a BEO CEV ready for those amazing new rockets he is promising down the road?

Why commit to building that ship now?

That would at least give me trust that he actually thinks Human BEO missions will happen by committing to that hardware right now. Today.

Not in years from now.

I would suggest a challenging goal to meet that has a date. Dates are indeed important. It's part of how we make sure we do things, not necessarily meeting the date. How about return US astronauts to lunar orbit within five years? Not a landing.
Just Apollo 8 type mission.

Wow. Imagine the impact of that kind of national challenge?

Let's face it, if it meant the fate of the human race, we could do that pretty fast.

I want commmittment! I want to see that "ring on the finger" so to speak. LOL

These are politicians afterall.

If we gave up on big efforts because they were behind schedule and over budget, how many of the greatest accomplishments of mankind would never have happened?

In fact, none of us may even be here at all.

Constellation was indeed troubled, but not fatally so and not across the board. There is so much to go forward on from what we have accomplished so far. Return to moon goal should surely not be cast aside as Obama is trying to do. "We've been there before." is not an acceptable reason.

Steve touched on it above, but my concern is with the predictability of future budgets. As BrianM mentions, NASA's been through these major programmatic reviews previously. These occur too frequently and rarely lead to new ideas. Instead, time is wasted while NASA's mission and current programs are undermined.

The current situation is ludicrous. Constellation program managers are forced by Congressional mandate to devote resources to a program which the administration has every intent of canceling. So, I sadly appreciate the irony that a largely budgetary battle is forcing NASA to waste money.

I watched last Thursday's House Science and Technology Committee and was disturbed by Sen. Rockefeller's position on space exploration. He does not share my belief that the future of humanity is in space; rather, Sen. Rockefeller would confine our future to the surface of the Earth. I fear that his opinion is shared by other members of Congress. Also, the future of NASA is too often decided by politics than any reasoned consideration of the future of our nation and race.

Lastly, I'm 23 and a senior engineering student. I was quite surprised when Mr. Augustine said last Thursday that 'the youth' were not excited by a return to the Moon. I and the majority of my space-geek friends are supportive of any path into the future. Unfortunately, I don't think Obama's plan is any better than the VSE. We're trading an underfunded plan for one without any goals. And this nebulous vision of increased technology development is somehow more saleable to the general public and Congress than Moon bases? I think not.

In my view, we need to go to the Moon because its easier, and hence cheaper, than any of the other destinations. I think that only a continuous human lunar presence will lead to the revolution in space operations required to make a Mars mission possible.

Sadly, despite some transparency pledges, Obama & NASA did not seek any public input when devising this plan. Because they did not, elected representatives are having the debate that the space community ought to have had, subjecting the process to the standard political games.

Thanks, Keith, for providing an outlet where debate can occur; let's hope that those who currently have the power learn from their recent blunders.

@Kevin said:

"NASA as a research organization needs to focus on that challenges and problems and overcome them, once they are overcome, then we can go to the Moon, Mars, and Asteroids."

Actually, no we cant, because Obama said we're not going to the Moon, because he doesnt want to go, as I recall "to be blunt, we've been to the Moon, Buzz has been to the moon and there's no reason to go back" or some such gibberish.

Here in a nutshell is the problem with the Obama plan besides the totally screwed up roll out, the blind side to all the centers and center directors and the lack of detail for 3 months and the piddling detail now. He gave up the vision. It's that simple.

I have worked on Orion for over 3 years and you know what, if they said, we think the architecture is unsustainable to meet the vision and unveiled a new architecture for the vision with new goals and milestones that kept the Moon firmly in its sites, I could get on board with that. But that is not what they did. They threw out the vision, they threw out the architecture and they threw it out for reasons that amounted to spite and stupidity. Spite - because Bush announced the VSE and stupidity - because we've been there before. The Moon absolutely must remain the number one priority for any plans to learn how to leave the cradle and settle on another "planet" the arguments for why this is so are ENDLESS. People who post here have written brilliant editorials and articles on why this is so, I suggest you all read them, they do a much better job of explaining it than I will ever do. The arguments for going to an asteroid are good, but you cannot learn about living on a planet by going to an asteroid (and oh, btw, asteroids were always part of the plan anyway, after the moon and before Mars). You also cant learn about living on a planet by doing a flyby of Mars in 30 years. The Moon is here, it is 3 days away and we can launch there every day.

So although I really want Orion to continue, I could live with the compromise of changing the architecture and creating a new launch vehicle and a new or modified crew vehicle to save the actual Vision, (to go to the Moon to stay, to Mars and Beyond) but what we were given preserves neither and nothing.

Also, for all the people who keep saying the new plan is Augsutines Option 5B. The only thing the Obama plan has in common with Option 5B is the word flexible, an eventual NEO and that it goes into space. But the Options 5 (a, b and c) main difference is Ares V lite, versus EELV, versus SDHLV. They all start by orbiting the Moon, going to NEO, eventually going to Mars, orbit, but at same time setting up a permanent base on the moon with 2-3 missions a year to the Moon. So I dont see how a plan that does not use any of these launch vehicles and never goes to the Moon at all and said the Moon is a waste of time has very much in common at all with Option 5B or otherwise.

p.s. - Dennis Wingo, Paul Spudis - keep posting for my sanity - you are beacons in this fog

also Michael Snyder - your testimony to congress was excellent - good job

Rep.Rohrabacher shold be there.He seems fair.He said he toured SpaceX. He still seems to believe in what Pres. Reagan wanted to do.Such as when all the satellites were taken off Shuttle.

@Kevin

I am also a young engineer and I do not support the Obama plan and I know many that don't. If there is something that characterizes the young generation is that we are not afraid to lose our jobs and be independent minded, so sorry Kevin, I don't buy your argument that young people don't speak against the plan because they are too afraid. The mobility of the young generation of workers heavily supports that assertion. By the same logic, we do not shy away because we lack experience, in fact many times we see this as a virtue for thinking outside the box and stop proposing things because they have always been done a certain way.

I am simply against the Obama vision because it lacks substance, there is no development program in sight. I am not against commercial spaceflight, research, or modifying the Constellation architecture - I am against abandoning human spaceflight. The logic simply isn't there. I too like new technologies, but new technologies are inherently more expensive. If we cannot afford Constellation we cannot afford human spaceflight beyond LEO, period.

The new engineer came into the organization, worked with those far more senior and experienced, and in time by focusing on a fairly narrow discipline, the new engineer was transformed into an experienced and competent torch carriers for the discipline.

It all went to hell about 15 years ago with the ISS when it was determined that you no longer had to have any expertise in order to be the expert.

Most excellent points there. Is that true for both Shuttle and ISS at JSC? My understanding is that at KSC at least, the shuttle engineering departments have 1st line management that came up through the system specialist engineering ranks with training and standboards and all that, but maybe I'm misinformed?

Anyway, more fodder for the SpaceX crowd - can anybody really trust or believe in that guy?:

“[Tesla CEO] Elon Musk personally gave me his word that we weren’t being used,” Guerra continued. “Somebody is a very good poker player and I guess that’s how you become a billionaire.”

Guerra said he was told by a Tesla official that Toyota was contributing $50 million to have the Model S plant in Fremont.

Negotiations between Tesla, Downey and land owner Industrial Realty Group advanced to the point where a lease was expected to be signed today.

And as part of a $465 million loan from the U.S. Department of Energy, Tesla submitted plans on how it planned to use existing buildings at the former NASA site. The detailed plans showed precisely where the vehicles would be assembled and even included a timeline for construction.

http://thedowneypatriot.com/bookmark/7559366-Tesla-burns-Downey

ISS does have subsystem managers who come from the engineering directorate so not sure where Brian's comment that it's been killed comes from. I don't have insight into how those people are trained or certified but I will say on the ISS side they tend to be very isolated from what is happening to the vehicle and heavily relient on Boeing.

You are confusing hardware providers with subsystem managers. Subsystem management in ISS is largely in the OB Vehicle organization for most systems, in the OC Ops Integration organization for most GFE and crew equipment, and in OZ for most payload hardware. The MER, which is the engineering arm that supports on-orbit anomalies and anomaly resolution is primarily an OB function.

The subsystem managers are the people who directly own the requirements, the hardware design, provisioning, integration and on-orbit oversight. Through Shuttle development to the late 1980s, this was entirely within the technical organizations like engineering (EA). The program office has essentially no one with in depth knowledge or ownership of the hardware. If you were a subsystem engineer and wanted to make a change, you would need to go to the program for funding, or you would need to go to the program if requirements needed to be changed. Program management used to be just that; requirements and budget. Even safety, for which the program had some overseers in the form of panel chairmen, was primarily manned by the technical line organizations.

The arrangement now eliminates a lot of the responsibility and functionality of the line organizations and does not provide for a check and balance on processes or budget.

The Boeing contractors work directly for the program. Engineering (EA) people may be assigned if ISS has given the specific organization a task agreement but they do not have ownership.

Interesting, in his opening statement, in his opening statement Administrator Bolden workforce transition plans for the Florida coast, but once again, an equivalent effort for JSC and MSFC seems to be "Lost in Space"

Some points. In reverse order:
"A fundamental flaw in the proposed human spaceflight program is a commercial crew initiative which abandons the proven methodology I have described."
Testimony by A. Thomas Young
Leaving aside ULA and Orbital as this is purely a dig at SpaceX; as far as this non rocket scientist can see...
"Experience has shown this is accomplished by test‐as‐you‐fly and flying‐as‐you‐test in combination with independent review and analysis, appropate technical and management debate and experienced leadership" (ibid.)
...is precisely what SpaceX is doing!

"My personal definition of space exploration, in contrast to exploitation, is “going where no man has gone before, doing what has never been done before, doing what others couldn’t do, wouldn’t do, or perhaps were afraid to do.”
Captain Eugene A. Cernan, USN
Yet he wants to go back to the Moon? (In answer to questions.)

As to Armstrong's testimony I would merely correct his history and suggest that there was a considerable "Gap" between Columbus and Jamestown 1607 (or even St. John's) c.1583; i.e. some 86-115 years. And there is a lot less in the way of resources. Despite what others claim.
Alas as I commented at the time, the very fact that as "Luna is less than 2 light seconds away" [I paraphrase.] means that we HUMANS don't need to go there IN PERSON. Perhaps someone should introduce Neil to Robonaut!

But the best bit IMHO:
"Rep. Griffith calls Ares 5 "the soul of America" to the rest of the world." as tweeted by Jeff Foust! Full steam ahead America! From what I have seen, Congress will give you Shuttle extension and Ares I and Ares V and a MoonBase and Bread and Circuses.

It's simple enough. Nelson managed to swing a deal with the President for special treatment for his state. Alabama and Texas obviously didn't have any favours to offer so they are being left to sink or swim.

The British discovered America? Or are you arguing that the right people didn't show up until 1607?

Marcel F. Williams

Classic, the stump the astronuts routine were talking heads today.

what is exploration the scientist Rep asked??? hummm...

Newton and the flu virus takes hold...

There's also some of us "young guys" who aren't sure where to stand. On the one hand, I think we need to bring the Moon's resources to be a part of our economic sphere of influence; if nothing else, building powersats to rid us of the hydrocarbon monkey on our backs ought to be something we could do, given the events of the last month. There are concerns about our economy & passing along the tradecraft of human spaceflight. On the other hand, must it be done in the way that the program of record seems to be going, with costs going up, schedules pushing ever further away, & a general public that doesn't understand why it's being asked to pay for this in hard times?