No more American manned spaceflights

[ShadoWarrior]

I very much applaud the above posts calling for the internationalisation of space and the sharing of space resources but I'm surpised such views are being openly expressed on this forum.

"Internationalization" of space has been a reality for many years. The ISS is just one example. But you're making a serious mistake in thinking that internationalization automatically equates to UN involvement or that it requires the UN to happen. It doesn't. Nor should it.

In the not-so-distant past there have been shrill posts decrying UN. I had the impression that many (a significant minority or maybe even a majority) of Americans think the UN is an evil organisation intent on imposing a world government and stealing away Americans' hard won freedoms.

It's not evil. It's inept. The rest of your assertion is essentially correct.

Personally I'm a great supporter of the UN (although I think it is perpetually hamstrung by the veto powers of the permanent Security Council members)

It's that power that blocks the UN from being truly abused by nations with nasty agendas. It helped check the USSR during the Cold War, and it's kept the US from being even more overbearing than it was while Bushes were in office. The problem with the SC isn't the veto power. It's non-democratic regimes having the veto power.

and I'd love to see the UN used as a means to help all of humanity benefit from the bounties of space. Luna would be just a start. The asteroid belt contains absolutely vast mineral riches. The atmosphere of the gas giants could be mined for almost limitless amounts of Helium-3.

It's precisely the UN why there isn't more commercial development of space. A certain treaty destroys any incentive because individual nations, much less private concerns, cannot lay claim to anything beyond Earth's atmosphere. This is not necessarily a bad thing, as it prevented a massive "land grab" years ago. But now that technology, and commercial interest, has advanced to the point where it's feasible to begin tapping the wealth in the rest of the solar system there's no framework that permits it. It's been under discussion in the UN for well over a decade and there's little hope that any agreement will be coming out of the UN anytime in the next decade.

[RN7]

I'm afraid that there is a bit of erroneous info in your post.

One of the rumored UFOs that are occasionally sighted is attributed to the much-discussed, never-acknowledged "Aurora" hypervelocity aircraft. Alleged successor to the SR-71.

Undoubtably Aurora has been one of the aircraft detected over UK airspace, and thats no suprise given the close relations between the US and British militaries and the fact that SR-71s have been frequently based in England, and Aurora and her sonic booms and contrails have been sighted, tracked and detected across the western US since the late 80's. But Blackstar seems to be a different type of aircraft that seems to be specificaly focused on orbital operations, possibly manned but more likely unmanned.

[RN7]

American astronauts have been in Russian rockets since the 90s too.

And they have been on Russian spacecraft since 1975, but the point is that America has had its own space launchers, now they dont have any and have to rely on its traditional competitor in space until a successer to the Space Shuttle is determined. Do you not see the irony of it all

I'd realy love to know what the surviving Mercury, Gemini and Apollo astronauts realy think of all this.

[Fusilier]

Not even close to it. None of the shuttles is past 40% of their life expectancy based on number of flights per.

Afraid so. It isn't just a matter of counting up the flight time. They're nearly falling apart. There's only so many times they can be refurbished and the parts replaced. The OVs are in bad shape, leading to disproportionate maintenance costs and safety issues. Just look at the budgeting figures, the maintenance costs keep rising as do the failures. It takes on average now no less than 3 months to get a shuttle capable of a subsequent launch. Even NASA stopped defending the STS and sees them as a money pit.

They need to be replaced with a new model with a different mission design. IMO, NASA should takes some lessons from the Europeans. Their agency launches more rockets and with a better success rate and cost than anyone. It costs the space shuttle 5000$/per kilo of cargo... it costs their European competitors only about 2-3000$/ per kilo of cargo.

Old age and an expensive cost killed the STS.

I've seen nothing said differently in any journal, but if you have something that shows that they aren't past their time, I'd like to read it.

[Fusilier]

And they have been on Russian spacecraft since 1975, but the point is that America has had its own space launchers, now they dont have any and have to rely on its traditional competitor in space until a successer to the Space Shuttle is determined. Do you not see the irony of it all

I know what you are getting at, but I disagree to the point that future progress in space is going to require such cooperation and a merging of space programs. That's all.

[Raellus]

One possible near-future route back into space is for NASA to team up with private companies like this one:

http://www.spacex.com/

Apparently, this company can launch 3 Falcon X (or Heavy) rockets for less that it would take NASA to launch one Saturn V rocket (in today's dollars). It would take 3 Falcon's though, to carry the payload of a Saturn V. This according to the author I mentioned earlier.

[RN7]

Heard an interview with an author (I'll look up his name later) on NPR last Friday who pointed out that NASA is wasting literally billions of dollars on nonsensical programs. The example that jumps to mind is the huge sum being spent to refurbish the shuttle launch transporter caterpillar (which, with the retirement of the shuttle fleet, is entirely unnecessary).

He said that if all that money was redirected, a manned Mars mission would be plausible.

This is probably the reason why Obama cancelled the Orion programe, the absolute wastage of resources by NASA. NASA's budget is three times the size of the combined official Russian and Chinese space programe, yet both Russia and China have successful and operational launchers for manned space missions which are cheaper than the Space Shuttle.

Although it has to be stated that there is less distinction between the civilian and military space programmes of Russia and China than the US, and American military space launching capabilities has not been effected as its essentially unmanned (officially), NASA seems to have been punished for bad management and the squandering its resources by the politicians and bureaucracy that runs it, at the expense of its highly capable scientists, engineers and astronauts.

[RN7]

I know what you are getting at, but I disagree to the point that future progress in space is going to require such cooperation and a merging of space programs. That's all.

Well that might depend on the project. A Mars mission might be one a project that requires international cooperation, but it also depends on the country and what its relative technical resources are. Cooperation might work well with the Europeans or smaller space powers, but the US, Russia and China prefer to do things independently or at least have a leadership role.

[Fusilier]

Cooperation might work well with the Europeans or smaller space powers, but the US, Russia and China prefer to do things independently or at least have a leadership role.

My point is that maybe they should, since nobody has stepped foot on any non-Earth object in nearly 40 years.

In fact, it's been nearly 40 years since any human has been beyond Earth's low orbit.

[RN7]

They need to be replaced with a new model with a different mission design. IMO, NASA should takes some lessons from the Europeans. Their agency launches more rockets and with a better success rate and cost than anyone. It costs the space shuttle 5000$/per kilo of cargo... it costs their European competitors only about 2-3000$/ per kilo of cargo

This essentially part of the problem with NASA. They had nearly 30 years to come up with a successor or cheaper alternative to the Space Shuttle, and what they came up with was the Orion/Constellation project which was only formulated in 2005 right towards the end of the Shuttle's life span, and was a hugely ambitious and vastly expensive programe to replace the Space Shuttle with what the Space Shuttle had originally been designed to replace in the first place. The Ares V rocket which was the ultimate launch system of the whole project for a manned moon shot was designed to have a maximum payload capacity of 188 tons to LEO and 71 tons to the Moon, and has variably been described as a Saturn V on steroids.

[Fusilier]

This essentially part of the problem with NASA. They had nearly 30 years to come up with a successor or cheaper alternative to the Space Shuttle, and what they came up with was the Orion/Constellation project which was only formulated in 2005 right towards the end of the Shuttle's life span, and was a hugely ambitious and vastly expensive programe to replace the Space Shuttle with what the Space Shuttle had originally been designed to replace in the first place. The Ares V rocket which was the ultimate launch system of the whole project for a manned moon shot was designed to have a maximum payload capacity of 188 tons to LEO and 71 tons to the Moon, and has variably been described as a Saturn V on steroids.

I agree.

[Matt Wiser]

Has anyone here read the Augustine Commission report It's available at nasa.gov (just google it and you'll get the link). They pointed out the painful truth that NASA couldn't do two things at once: operate shuttle and build the successor system. Then there was the problem with the Constellation program: behind schedule, over budget, and underfunded each year by a third, with launch dates slipping, the crew launcher (Ares I) eating up so much money that there wasn't any for either Ares V (heavy-lift) or the lunar lander and surface systems. No lunar landing was felt possible by 2040 with Constellation. Now, NASA leadership under Mike Griffin is responsible for charging ahead, assuming the money would be there when it wasn't, being overoptimistic about milestones and deadlines, and so on.

Augustine rejected the Mars first approach: too many unknowns as yet, more technology R&D needed for things like advanced propulsion systems, closed-loop life support, radiation protection, human biomedical research, etc. They also rejected the Moon first: namely because the other problem with Constellation was that you had to develop everything at once: crew vehicle, crew launcher, heavy-lift, and the lander/surface systems. And delays on one (or more) drive up the costs for all. They offered instead what MIT Professor Ed Crawley offers as the "Flexible Path" (I was a Moon first person myself, but he did a presentation at the Cape last year-try finding it on NASA's youtube channel and sold me on it when I saw the youtube video) in which he outlines a human exploration program based on two things: build things only when you need them, and there's only a handful of objects in the inner solar system that you can land on anyway (Moon, Mars, Mars' moons, and several of the larger asteroids). His approach is this: build the heavy-lift vehicle, build the crew module, and start going places. Get some basic exploration done, such as lunar orbit, Lagrange Points (both Earth-Moon and Earth-Sun), go to an asteroid like a NEO (Near Earth Object) and meet up with it-you would likely EVA over to it instead of landing-coupled with a Venus flyby to get home, and while we're doing that, develop the lunar stuff like the lander and surface systems (rover, spacesuits, etc.) so that in the late 2020s, we're ready to go back. And while lunar exploration is going, keep flying the deep space missions, because we'll need both to prep for a Mars mission. First, do a Mars flyby. Then go into Martian orbit, and land on one of Mars' moons: things like operating a Mars rover from orbit would be possible-and do it in conjunction with sample return. Finally, shoot for the big prize: a human Mars landing. By 2040.

As for LEO (Low Earth Orbit): turn the mission of supporting the ISS (crew rotation and cargo delivery) to the private sector (this was pre-Augustine: the Bush Administration got this going in '06). Every NASA spacecraft launched was designed and built by the private sector with NASA oversight, but NASA was the end user. Instead, let NASA buy seats on a commercially operated vehicle, but with NASA in charge of safety. This would enable a commercial space industry to grow-similar to the government turning air mail over to commercial air carriers back in the 1920s instead of relying on the U.S. Army Air Service-and attract not only government space agencies (ESA, JAXA, Canadian Space Agency), but research institutions, and other countries that would like to fly astronauts, but can't afford a space program of their own. It would also foster space tourism. The three leading companies for this contract are Boeing, Orbital Science, and Space X. NASA would like to choose multiple providers, so that if one runs into trouble and has to stand down (after an accident, say), the other two can pick up the slack. NASA can either handle the LEO mission or the BEO mission: it doesn't have the budget to do both. Handing the LEO mission to contractors frees up NASA resources and funds to go into exploration (that's $2 Billion a year added to the exploration side). Commercial could also support exploration with things like On-orbit propellant depots, where a rocket launched with a big payload could refuel in orbit before going to its final destination (NASA or the other agencies-DOD, the Intelligence community, ESA, JAXA, etc. would be customers: the contractor would own the facility and be responsible for restocking it).

Congress is skeptical of the Commercial sector, and Elon Musk, the CEO of Space X, is his own worst enemy: he's shot his mouth off about "retiring on Mars" and other such nonsense. He comes off as a "Rocket Boy" or "Space Hobbyist" to many. The Commercial Space Foundation last year had a symposium which said in a nutshell: "To silence the skeptics (Congressional and otherwise-count Neil Armstrong, Gene Cernan, and Jim Lovell among the latter), we need to stop talking and start flying. Repeatedly." Only flying a crew and returning them home will convince the doubters (and I'm one of them-do I think they can handle the mission Yes. But they need to prove it). Pencil in 2014 or early 2015 for the first commercial crew rotation flight to ISS.

NASA's about to announce their Heavy-Lift vehicle (the Orion capsule from Constellation was announced as the basis for their crew vehicle) in a few days. Pencil in late 2016-early 2017 for first BEO mission.

It'll be a painful few years, but there will be good times coming.

[RN7]

A manned Mars mission or even a Moon shot is unviable at the moment due to the economic problems effecting most of the world. Currently only Russia could send anyone to the Moon and it couldn't even think of affording it, while China has the money and ambition but not the technology.

America with an injection of funding has the technology to develop both Lunar and Mars capable launchers and spacecraft, but the US civilan space programe has been so badly managed that no US administration is going to fund it.

I think a Mars mission is probably a generation away and we are looking at mid 21st century at the very least. By that time its likely that the political and technological field will have changed. I can still see America as one of the leaders, but China may be the main competitor as others fall off or realign themselves. A Joint mission may be on the cards, we might even see two missions with America and China each leading a rival consortium of nations.

[ShadoWarrior]

Afraid so.

'Fraid not.

They're nearly falling apart. There's only so many times they can be refurbished and the parts replaced. The OVs are in bad shape, leading to disproportionate maintenance costs and safety issues.

You live in Bangkok. I live 20 miles from the shuttle launch pads at Kennedy Space Center. My neighbors and I work at KSC. You seem to know things that those of us who actually work on them don't. The orbiters are no more "falling apart" than commercial airliners with similar flight hours and frame stresses are. And commercial airliners fly for decades, thanks to similar maintenance and periodic refurbishments as the shuttles go through. Actually, a better comparison would be military cargo transports.

BTW, look up when the last B-52 rolled off the assembly line.

It takes on average now no less than 3 months to get a shuttle capable of a subsequent launch.

That's mostly due to red tape and massively redundant safety checks in the wake of two disasters. The actual work only takes a couple of weeks.

Even NASA stopped defending the STS and sees them as a money pit.

They've always been a money pit. It was a bad design from the get-go.

It costs the space shuttle 5000$/per kilo of cargo... it costs their European competitors only about 2-3000$/ per kilo of cargo.

You should compare apples to apples. Such as cost to LEO of the Delta or Atlas models comparable to the ESA launchers. The STS is not used to haul commercial sats into space, and the ESA has no booster that can lift the loads the shuttle's been lifting. Hell, there is no in-production booster that can. If there was the shuttle would have been retired years ago.

Old age and an expensive cost killed the STS.

No. Bad design, a penny-pinching pound-foolish Congress, bad PR by NASA, and bad program management by NASA (leading to two major disasters) killed the STS.

[RN7]

Matt I think Ed Crawley "Flexible Path" would be the way to go for America's space programe, however I think the US civilian space programe would become a bit chaotic if an unregulated commercial sector started taking charge or having a dominant role in it, not that NASA's hitherto management of it could be called anything but chaotic. The Russian and Chinese space programes, and in fact the US military programe seems far more ordered and practical. Maybe if you put the USAF in charge of NASA's budget and then invited the commercial sector to take a greater role and attracted foreign space agencies to participate it might work.