[FPSPACE] Fear and loathing on the launchpad

[David Portree]

Morris:

 

There are, alas, still some space buffs who haven't worked out that Constellation never stood a chance. Most of the fear and loathing comes from them. The rest of us were quietly waiting for the change of Administration and inevitable change in NASA's direction.

 

If Bush had made his announcement soon after taking power and had put real money toward making it happen, it would have been something other than nonsense. Republicans make their big space speeches in election years and then mostly forget them. Bush's dad was the exception.

 

What will happen is what I predicted would happen soon after Bush did the obligatory JFK thing in January 2004.

 

Orion will be built in some form. The U.S. will not abandon human spaceflight, since no President wants to be the one who kills U.S. piloted spaceflight. 

 

Altair and Ares V will not be built. There is no reason obvious to a politician to return to the moon at this time. 

 

Exactly what U.S. astronauts will do in Earth orbit is almost beside the point. 

 

The good news is that Orion leaves the door open a crack. As I said five years ago, we should all be working now to ensure that it is not built in such a way as to preclude its use in future ambitious missions. 


David S. F. Portree

dsfportree at hotmail.com
dportree at usgs.gov
 
http://robotexplorers.blogspot.com/
http://beyondapollo.blogspot.com/
http://portreeland.blogspot.com/
 
http://astrogeology.usgs.gov/About/People/DavidPortree/
 



 


From: morrisjones at hotmail.com
To: fpspace at friends-partners.org
Date: Mon, 27 Apr 2009 02:15:08 +0000
Subject: [FPSPACE] Fear and loathing on the launchpad



Dear FPSers,

We have linked to press clippings and discussed Constellation in passing.

But I think we need to confront the bigger picture and ask just what the real
future of US manned spaceflight will be.

There's a lot of fear and loathing about, which seems to colour and cloud the debate among the space community. 

So what do we all think will really happen? 

It seems beyond doubt that the Shuttle will be mothballed in 2010, and Orion will not be ready for crews (reduced!) until 2016. 

Will NASA sit happily as a passenger on Soyuz in the meantime? Will Dragon be pressed into service for crews at some point in the gap? Is anything else possible? 

Most importantly, will NASA abandon ISS in 2015, thus reducing the need to rush Orion into flight?

Morris Jones
Sydney, Australia





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