The Obama Space Vision for NASA: Massive Paradigm Shifts Ahead

Today is February 1.  That is the day each year that the President’s budget for the federal government is delivered to Congress.  Thus, it is the moment at which the plans – the real plans with money to be spent – are actually known.

The budget for NASA shows some shocking decisions.  The overall plan that NASA had been following, to retire the Space Shuttle and develop the next-generation Constellation spacecraft, comprised of the Ares I and Ares V launchers and the Orion crew capsule, is being tossed into the dustbin.

Yes, the Space Shuttle will still be retired.  There are only five flights left on the schedule – including a launch of Endeavour coming up this Sunday, February 7.  But Constellation is dead – and something new and better is supposed to be invented instead.

The new plan is to find and use private sector creativity.  Brilliant!   And it is also exactly what Red Planet Capital was created to do.

Great coverage over at SpaceRef.com and also at NASAwatch.com.  The budget overview is available here, and the details are here.  You can also get a copy of Administrator Charlie Bolden’s statement on the budget here.

Speculation Based on Speculation

Months and months of speculation finally came to an end on January 27, when Apple shared the iPad with the world.

Regardless of whether you think that the iPad is a game changer (perhaps), a wonderful product (absolutely), or a disappointing flop (are you kidding me???), I am reminded of the wonderful quote from Mark Twain:  ”There are two times in a man’s life when he should not speculate:  when he can’t afford it, and when he can.”

I love this quote because it applied to both forms of speculation, each of which apply to the iPad.

Here are two definitions of speculate:

1. To engage in a course of reasoning often based on inconclusive evidence.
2. To engage in the buying or selling of a commodity with an element of risk on the chance of profit.

I hope I don’t need to review for anyone the months of over-the-top speculation – first in blogs, then in traditional media, and even in day-to-day conversation.  It got to the point that the speculation itself became the news story.  The Vancouver Sun.  The Washington Post.  PC Magazine.  The USA Today.  And on, and on, and on.

NASA’s Safety Panel: Ares I Safer Than COTS

The NASA Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel (ASAP) released it Annual Report for 2009 this week.  One of the findings in the 117-page report was that the Ares I is the best option for NASA to send astronauts to the International Space Station after the Space Shuttle retires.  The primary consideration for this conclusion – the Ares I was designed with crew safety as its primary criteria.  See a concept image of the Ares I here.

The authors of the ASAP Report, in fact, made perfectly clear that they disagree with the conclusions of President Obama’s Augustine Commission regarding the future of manned space flight in the US (see an excellent article on the subject from NewScientist here) that the best way to deliver astronauts and material to low earth orbit was to use commercial spacecraft.

The Augustine Commission had backed commercial systems, and NASA currently has a Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) contract in place with Space X to use the Falcon 9 rocket to send cargo to the ISS, beginning in 2012.

Regardless of whether the ultimate decision is to launch people with commercial systems, the Ares system, or something else — or even to decide to abandon human space flight entirely, it must be very difficult for the brave and loyal people working hard every day at NASA.  Not only does the Agency seem to have no current direction, the policy arguments over the best direction for the future seem to be overly public.