NASA Gemini 5 crew Gordon Cooper and Pete Conrad

Gemini 5 astronauts L. Gordon Cooper and Charles “Pete” Conrad began their flight on August 21, 1965.  This was the first long-duration flight for the Gemini spacecraft: Cooper and Conrad were supposed to spend 8 days in space.  Eight days in space was an important milestone, because that is how long a trip to the Moon and back would take. Other mission objectives included evaluating the rendezvous guidance and navigation system, test a fuel cell electrical power system in flight, and determine the ability of an astronaut to maneuver his spacecraft in close proximity to another object in space.

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Written by Greg Kennedy on August 18th, 2013 , Space History

This week saw some good news for (and from) NASA’s Flight Opportunities Program, which funds flights for payloads on various commercial platforms including microgravity aircraft and suborbital spacecraft.

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Written by Astro1 on August 1st, 2013 , Commercial Space (General), Space Policy and Management

NASA Space Launch System

Dan Dumbacher of NASA and John Strickland of the National Space Society are having an argument over the Space Launch System. Unfortunately, both gentlemen are missing the point when it comes to space transportation.

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Written by Astro1 on July 30th, 2013 , Space Policy and Management

Skylab 3 began at 7:11 AM EDT on Saturday, July 28, 1973. One of the major objectives of the flight, which was crewed by Alan L. Bean, Owen K. Garriott, and Jack R. Lousma, was to double the duration of the previous mission. The flight nearly came to an early end, however. During the maneuvers to link up with the orbiting station, Bean reported seeing “some sort of sparklers” out of his window. At the same time, Mission Control noticed a pressure drop in one of the assemblies of maneuvering rockets on the Service Module. Flight controllers quickly decided the rocket assembly was leaking propellant and told the astronauts to shut it down. Skylab 3 continued and successfully docked using the remaining maneuvering rockets.

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Written by Greg Kennedy on July 23rd, 2013 , Space History

The NASA Administrator will remain accountable to elected officials (and, indirectly, the American people), thanks to a bipartisan vote of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology.

Space News reports that the committee voted 20-19 to accept an amendment offered by Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX), which removed language making the NASA Administrator a six-year appointed position. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), James Sensenbrenner (R-WI), and Stephen Stockman (R-TX) joining with 17 Democrats to pass the amendment.

A fixed, six-year term would make it impossible for a President to remove a NASA Administrator for policy reasons. The language was introduced by Republican members who were angry over NASA attempts to cancel the Orion capsule and Space Launch System (née Ares V). It was intended to create greater “stability” by making it harder to cancel NASA programs.

Written by Astro1 on July 22nd, 2013 , Space Policy and Management

Zac Manchester with KickSat sprite satellite prototype

Make magazine has an article on 10 Maker Jobs That Didn’t Exist 10 Years Ago.

Only one of the jobs comes from space exploration / space development, and it isn’t from any of NASA’s megaprojects like Orion, SLS, or the James Webb Space Telescope.

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Written by Astro1 on July 6th, 2013 , Innovation, Space Policy and Management

A Russian Proton rocket carrying three Glonass navigation satellites failed quite dramatically on Monday:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7piHsxLs7Ss&w=700]

The Russian space program has had quite a few failures recently. Nevertheless, the United States Congress seems more inclined to trust NASA’s astronauts to Roscosmos than to US companies like SpaceX, Sierra Nevada, and Boeing which have no experience in human spaceflight (unless you count the Space Shuttle, Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, the X-15, and US portions of the International Space Station — all of which were built by Boeing or heritage companies acquired by Boeing).

Congress has used safety concerns as an excuse to slow-march the Dragon, DreamChaser, and CST-100 programs. The Russian space program, however, is exempt from the requirements being imposed on US companies. The reasoning behind this double standard dis inexplicable.

Written by Astro1 on July 2nd, 2013 , Space Policy and Management

US military equipment in Iraq

The US military is scrapping $7 billion of equipment in Iraq because the cost of bringing it home exceeds the equipment’s value.

This should be a lesson for space development. A resource is not a resource unless you can afford to extract it and move it where it needs to go.

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Written by Astro1 on June 27th, 2013 , Space Policy and Management

Mercury, America’s first manned spacecraft, had a solid-fuel rocket motor on a tower attached to the capsule’s nose for launch escape.  If the booster rocket malfunctioned the solid fuel motor would pull the spacecraft and its occupant to safety.  Before Mercury carried a human pilot into space, the launch escape system had to be thoroughly tested under the most extreme conditions anticipated.

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Written by Greg Kennedy on June 25th, 2013 , Space History

US Air Force C-17 Globemaster III

Jim Hillhouse, the founder and editor of the Americaspace blog wrote:

We have a gov’t owned rocket rather than a commercial rocket for the same reason we don’t have United Airlines or FedEx as a replacement for the Air Mobility Command. It’s bad policy to hinge a national goal, in this case beyond Earth exploration, on the whims of commercial companies whose loyalties are to its shareholders, not the American people. You say that’s a problem. I disagree.

As it turns out, Mr. Hillhouse is ill-informed. The great bulk of US military logistics (over 80%) is performed by commercial carriers. The military even maintains a Civil Reserve Air Fleet program under which it can commandeer commercial aircraft in case of a national emergency. There are over 1300 airplanes in the CRAF.

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Written by Astro1 on June 17th, 2013 , Space Policy and Management

Much is being made of Wang Yaping, who is described as “China’s first teacher in space.”

The Chinese space program is all about public relations and scoring “firsts.” Yet, no one seems to ask if this claim is accurate.

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Written by Astro1 on June 16th, 2013 , Education, Space Exploration (General)

On June 3, 1965, Edward H. White II became the first American astronaut to “walk in space” when he opened the hatch of Gemini 4 and floated alongside the spacecraft for 22 minutes. For the first time, an American was protected from the harsh environment of space by only a few layers of fabric. Extravehicular activity (EVA), or walking in space, was one of the major objectives for the two-man Gemini flights. White wore a space suit produced by the David Clark Company in Worcester, MA.

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Written by Greg Kennedy on June 9th, 2013 , Space History

Lt. Col. Dan Ward (USAF) has written an article on Lessons Defense Could Learn From NASA (specifically, the Faster, Better, Cheaper missions of he Goldin era).

NASA could also learn some lessons from itself.

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Written by Astro1 on June 7th, 2013 , Space Policy and Management

NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver

NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver surprised attendees (including some NASA employees) during her keynote address to the Next Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference on Monday.

Garver, who addressed the conference via videolink due to travel restrictions, revealed changes to the NASA Flight Opportunities Program which buys rides for payloads on commercial suborbital spacecraft (as well as sounding rockets, balloons, and parabolic aircraft).

At present, the Flight Opportunities Program (run by the Office of the Chief Technologist) is limited to technology experiments, leaving science payloads out in the cold. Garver acknowledged that NASA “could do more” and promised a new joint solicitation, from the Space Technology Mission Directorate and Science Mission Directorate, that would cover both technology and science payloads.

Garver said NASA would hold a workshop at the Smallsat Conference in August to start educating the scientific community about opportunities to fly science payloads on suborbital flights.

The big surprise came when Garver said NASA does “not want to rule out paying for research that could be done by an individual spaceflight participant — a researcher or payload specialist — on these [suborbital] vehicles in the future.”

Until now, NASA has had a strict policy which prohibited the Flight Opportunities Program from paying for human-tended experiments on suborbital flights. This policy has frustrated many researchers who want to fly payloads on crewed vehicles such as the Virgin Galactic SpaceShip Two and XCOR Lynx.

The exact interpretation of Garver’s words is still a mystery. Not ruling something out does not necessarily imply that it will be allowed. “In the future” is a vague timeframe. There’s also the question of whether “paying for research… done by an individual spaceflight participant” includes paying to fly the individual’s ride as well. The NASA Flight Opportunities people were as surprised and confused as anyone, since they were not briefed on the policy change or Garver’s remarks beforehand. There was cautious optimism, however, among conference attendees.

Written by Astro1 on June 6th, 2013 , Space Exploration (General), Space Policy and Management

Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) Red Dragon capsule landing on Mars

Last year, there were rumors that Space Exploration Technologies would soon conduct an initial public stock offering (IPO). If there was any truth to those rumors, those plans have apparently been put on the shelf. Any IPO plans are long-term and tied to Mars settlement, according to today’s tweet from SpaceX founder Elon Musk:

No near term plans to IPO SpaceX. Only possible in very long term when Mars Colonial Transporter is flying regularly.

Written by Astro1 on June 6th, 2013 , Space Settlement, SpaceX

Claude Frédéric Bastiat (left) and the Moon (right)

In his pamphlet The Law, French political theorist Claude Frédéric Bastiat wrote:

Socialism, like the ancient ideas from which it springs, confuses the distinction between government and society. As a result of this, every time we object to a thing being done by government, the socialists conclude that we object to its being done at all. We disapprove of state education. Then the socialists say that we are opposed to any education. We object to a state religion. Then the socialists say that we want no religion at all. We object to a state-enforced equality. Then they say that we are against equality. And so on, and so on. It is as if the socialists were to accuse us of not wanting persons to eat because we do not want the state to raise grain.

Those words, written in 1850, could easily describe the space-policy debates of today.

When NASA says it isn’t going to build a mining settlement on the Moon, members of Congress (and the media) conclude that NASA is against anyone going to the Moon.

When NASA tried to cancel the Ares V Space Launch System, they said NASA was against any space-launch capability.

If anything is to be done in space, they think it must be done by government.

Written by Astro1 on May 31st, 2013 , Space Policy and Management

NASA Gemini 6 and 7 rendezvous in Earth orbit

Flying the Gusmobile is a great article on the Gemini capsule, published by Air and Space Smithsonian.

The Gemini capsule was fondly known as the Gus mobile in honor of Gus Grissom, who played a major role in its design. Gemini was actually sized for Gus Grissom, who was the shortest astronaut at the time. As a result, many of the other astronauts found it a tight fit. Nevertheless, Gemini was the astronaut’s favorite capsule. Apollo, by contrast, was considered something of a lemon.

Contrary to popular belief, Gemini was not designed solely for missions in Low Earth Orbit. Jim Chamberlin, the chief designer for Gemini, intended for the capsule to go to the Moon. Unfortunately, NASA management would not allow that. Instead, it pushed forward with the defective Apollo capsule, which resulted in the deaths of three astronauts in the Apollo I fire.

In 2004, President George W. Bush announced that NASA would return to the Moon. This was to be done using a replica space capsule — “the first of its kind since Apollo.” The replica capsule, which NASA Administrator Mike Griffin dubbed “Apollo on steroids,” was later named Orion. The Gemini design, whose relative merits were well known to astronauts in the 1960’s, was not even considered.

That’s what happens when politicians run your space program.

Written by Astro1 on May 27th, 2013 , Space History

California State Senator Steven Knight (the son of X-15 pilot Pete Knight) has introduced a bill that grants a sales-tax exemption for spaceflight equipment and materials.

Senate Bill 19, the Space Flight Sales Tax Exemption Act, provides an exemption for “the gross receipts from the sale of, and the storage, use, or other consumption of, qualified property for use in space flight.”

The exemption also includes “equipment and materials used to construct, reconstruct, or improve new or existing facilities designed to operate, launch, manufacture, fabricate, assemble, or process equipment that facilitates the renovation, rehabilitation, or reconstruction of commercial space launch sites.”

The bill, which has been endorsed by the American Insitute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, is intended to improve California’s business requirement, which has caused companies such as Raytheon Space and Airborne Systems and XCOR Aerospace to leave California. Whether it will be sufficient remains to be seen.

Written by Astro1 on May 26th, 2013 , Space Policy and Management, Spaceports

U.S. Air Force 920th Rescue Wing in NASA Orion space capsule recovery exercise

Jeff Foust just tweeted this from the International Space Development Conference in San Diego:

Aldrin on capsule splashdowns: just because Elon loves salt water doesn’t mean thats’s the way spacecraft should return from space.

That is a bit unfair, since Elon Musk is developing technology to land future versions of his Dragon capsule on land — perhaps because of his experience with salt water. We suspect that Aldrin was twitting Musk and trying to draw a rise out of the audience.

Yet, he does have a point, as the United States government continues to spend billions of dollars to develop the Orion capsule, duplicating capabilities NASA had in the 1960’s. Meanwhile, the Dream Chaser spaceplane, based on 30 years of NASA and Soviet research, is in danger of cancelation even as it continues to advance toward flight test. It’s as if the Congress is determined to freeze the development of human spaceflight capabilities at 1960’s levels.

Every member of Congress who has a NASA center in his district seems to think that makes him an expert on space technology. Fortunately, their opinions may not be relevant much longer. The sooner we take human spaceflight out of the hands of politicians, the better.

Written by Astro1 on May 25th, 2013 , Space Policy and Management

Reuters reports that DoD’s costs for Delta and Atlas launches, purchased under the Enhanced Expendable Launch Vehicle or EELV program, will more than double. That figure is somewhat misleading. As the article notes, the number of planned launches is increasing, from 91 to 151 (an increase of 66%).

Nevertheless, the cost per launch is increasing, even if the increase is not as dramatic as the headline implies. This is problematic, given the flat or shrinking military budgets expected in future years.

The Clinton-era policy of forced defense consolidation, which resulted in Delta and Atlas being marketed by a single organization, United Launch Alliance, has backfired. To the surprise of many in Washington DC, and no one outside the Beltway, creating a monopoly did not reduce costs.

Faced with this problem, the US Air Force (which manages military space programs) has created Orbital/Suborbital Program 3 (OSP-3) to certify additional launchers, such as Lockheed’s Athena, Orbital’s Antares and Minotaur, and SpaceX’s Falcon, for military launches. Of these rockets, only Falcon has a growth path that would allow it to compete with Atlas and Delta for the largest military payloads. SpaceX recently qualified for two launches under OSP-3, but the military’s approach to new launchers remains highly conservative, due to understandable concerns about the unproven reliability of new rockets as political pressure to protect existing contractors. As a result, Delta and Atlas are expected to carry the bulk of DoD launches for years to come.

Written by Astro1 on May 24th, 2013 , Military Space

(Cont’d from Part 1)

On May 14, 1073, NASA launched Skylab 1, America’s first space station using a Saturn V rocket.  The Orbital Workshop, or OWS, as it was called, was unoccupied at launch; the first crew, comprising Pete Conrad, Paul Weitz, and James Kerwin, was to follow the next day in an Apollo Command and Service Module (CSM) launched by a Saturn IB rocket.  About 63 seconds after the OWS lifted off, a solar and micrometeoroid shield wrapped around the station tore away, taking one of the two solar panels with it.  The other panel was jammed shut by debris. When Skylab reached orbit, the sun’s rays beat mercilessly on the OWS and temperatures inside the station soared.

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Written by Greg Kennedy on May 23rd, 2013 , Space History

Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) Red Dragon capsule landing on Mars

Statements made at the Space Tech Expo in Long Beach raise new questions about the Mars One project.

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Written by Astro1 on May 23rd, 2013 , Space Settlement

Spiderfab 3D printers creating large in-space antenna structure

Tethers Unlimited of Bothell, Washington is developing a system to fabricate solar arrays in space, using a combination of 3D printing and automated composite layup. The system, which Tethers Unlimited calls Trusselator, is based on the Spiderfab technology which Tethers Unlimited has been developing under funding from DARPA and NASA’s Innovative Advanced Concepts Program. The Trusselator system will enable the deployment of large solar arrays providing many tens or hundreds of kilowatts for solar-electric propulsion missions and space solar power systems.

Trusselator is one of four projects being funded under NASA Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contracts signed by Tethers Unlimited this week.

Another funded project is SWIFT-NanoLV, which will develop a suite of low-cost, lightweight, compact, and reliable avionics for small launch vehicles. Last year, NASA said that there is a “technology gap” in small-launch-vehicle avionics, which it cited as the reason for canceling the Nano-Satellite Launch Challenge before the competition even began.

Also funded are SWIFT-HPX, which will develop a Ka-band transceiver to provide high-speed (100 megabit-per-second) cross-links and downlinks for nanosatellites, and SPIDER (Sensing and Positioning on Inclines and Deep Environments with Retrieval), which will develop robotic technologies to traverse craters, ravines, and other difficult terrain on asteroids and planetary bodies using anchored tethers.

Written by Astro1 on May 22nd, 2013 , Innovation

The failure of multiple experiments on the Russian Bion M biosatellite mission shows the limitations of automation.

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Written by Astro1 on May 21st, 2013 , Astrobiology, Space Policy and Management Tags: