R.I.P. U.S. Space Program

TW: I saw a quote somewhere that Brian Williams at NBC quipped the other day that he could not be POTUS because he would spend all of our money on the space program since he like me is a space junkie. Alas our actual POTUS despite being of the right age to have caught the space virus, apparently missed it entirely (probably too much time in madrassas, worshiping allah, he is not really American anyway etc.).

My guy's budget this week takes a severe axe to the space program. The space program is not dead but it will for the foreseeable future be reined in. I understand the current fiscal environment is horrible for the space program. But at some point in the future when a Chinese (or perhaps Indian) becomes the next person to set foot on the moon the shrieking and moaning about the decline of the U.S. will be deafening. And probably loudest from those who today are not raising a finger to support our space program (yeah that is you Ms. Teabagger and Mr. Bleeding Heart Lets End Poverty Before Seeking New Worlds).

From CNN:
"American astronauts will not return to the moon as planned if Congress passes President Obama's proposed budget.

Obama's budget -- which aims to tighten the nation's purse strings in certain areas while increasing money used to create jobs -- would cancel NASA's Constellation Program, which had sought to send astronauts back to the moon by 2020.

Constellation also intended to study the idea of establishing a moon colony. The program was set to follow the U.S. space agency's shuttle missions, which are due to end in September..."
http://www.cnn.com/2010/TECH/space/02/01/nasa.budget.moon/?hpt=T1

Amazing

(click on image to enlarge)

From Boston Globe's Big Picture blog:
"This is called the Hubble Ultra Deep Field. Starting in late 2003, astronomers pointed Hubble at a tiny, relatively empty part of our sky (only a few stars from the Milky Way visible), and created an exposure nearly 12 days long over a four-month period. The result is this amazing image, looking back through time at thousands of galaxies that range from 1 to 13 billion light-years away from Earth. Some 10,000 galaxies were observed in this tiny patch of sky (a tenth the size of the full moon) - each galaxy a home to billions of stars."

TW: Our knowledge of the universe is ridiculously limited.

A Successful Launch

TW: This is one of those events which received little notice because it worked. If it had failed (as new rockets frequently do) one would have seen snarky reporting ad nausea. That this was the first time in 30 years that we have launched a new rocket speaks volumes especially since the rocket is in many ways a modified solid rocket booster as used on the Shuttle.

Whether we will actually use this rocket remains to be seen. Ares is meant to become the workhorse U.S. manned space launcher since the Shuttle retires next year. We shall see.

From Chicago Tribune:
"The Ares I-X rocket blasted off Wednesday from Kennedy Space Center in a picture-perfect launch...The entire mission from launch to splashdown took about six minutes and cost $455 million. It was the first time in nearly 30 years that a new rocket took off from Kennedy Space Center. Nearly twice the height of the space shuttle, the experimental rocket carried no passengers or payload...

What is Ares I-X?
It is a test rocket intended to show NASA engineers how a long, thin, solid-fuel rocket flies through the atmosphere. Its first stage is a version of the pencil-like solid-rocket boosters that help power the space shuttle...

Why was it launched?
To see if a single solid-rocket motor can be put directly under a capsule and steered safely as it zooms through the atmosphere. Ares I-X is the first rocket to use a solid-fuel first stage. Previous rockets -- like the shuttle -- used them on the side as boosters to the main liquid-fuel engines.

So why not fly Ares I?
Ares I is not designed yet and will not be ready to fly until March 2015 at the earliest. The idea is to take information gained from this launch to help refine the Ares I design.

...What happens next?
The president's space panel has cast doubt on whether Ares I will be built. Some White House officials say using commercial rockets to fly astronauts to the space station would make Ares I unnecessary."
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-tc-nw-nasa-1028-1029oct29,0,674711.story

NASA: Same Report Different Year

(click to enlarge, sourced from Wikipedia)
TW: The above shows NASA's budget for the past 40+ yrs thru 2006. As the orange line shows spending in real terms plunged as the Apollo program wound down and has basically flat-lined since. Similar graphs for say defense or social spending would show massive real increases. Space spending is one program where spending in absolute real terms has not budged even as our economy has grown greatly over the past 40 years.

The latest "expert" report came out this week on the future of the U.S. manned space program. It was like many of the others, the conclusions could be summarized as:
1) there are many cool things we could do
2) if only we had the money and technology
3) but since we do not lets talk about cool options and oh btw we need to push back the time lines we mentioned last time (so who knows when we will actually have an operational manned space vehicle once the Shuttle stops flying next year)
4) finally yes it would be good idea to keep funding the International Space Station since it is not even finished after all these years but is currently scheduled to tumble into the atmosphere in 2015

See link for ABC's summary (these reports barely receive any coverage anymore even though they are meant to outline our space program's future)
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/AheadoftheCurve/space-program-major-revision-augustine-commission/story?id=8892321

We Have No Space Strategy

TW: As a spaceophile this NYT piece is thoroughly depressing. It attempts to summarize the results of the Augustine panel whose purpose was to lay out recommendation on the future of the U.S. space program. As you will read the prognosis is aimless and in many respects circular (we have goals but not enough money, we have money but not enough to do anything). I suspect the Chinese will be the next to blaze new paths in space. To many Americans this is likely fine, to me it is a great tragedy.

From NYT:
"A blue-ribbon panel said...that a lack of financing has left NASA’s current space program on an “unsustainable trajectory...

With growing federal deficits and bruising battles over health care, it is unclear how much political capital Mr. Obama might spend on expanding the budget for the space agency...

NASA, under its Constellation program, is developing a new rocket called Ares I and a new astronaut capsule called Orion, and the system is to begin carrying astronauts to the International Space Station in March 2015. After that, development of a larger rocket, the Ares V, and a lunar lander was to lead to a return to the moon by 2020.

The panel said that those plans were “reasonable” when they were announced in 2005, but that largely because NASA never received the expected financing, the first manned flight of Ares I would probably be delayed until 2017, and the International Space Station is to be discarded by 2016 under current plans. And the projected financing for NASA would not allow enough money for development of Ares V and the Altair lunar lander.

The panel in fact could find no program that “permits human exploration to continue in any meaningful way” within the $100 billion for human spaceflight over the next decade.

For $30 billion more, the current Constellation program is feasible, but would still not reach the moon until 2025, the panel said.

The panel asserted that it would be “unwise” to throw away the space station in 2015 after only five years of full operation, but that operating the space station would draw away money from the rest of the program.

...Beyond the question of rockets is one of destination. The ultimate goal is Mars, but that is currently not practical, the panel said."
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/09/science/space/09nasa.html

The International Space Station Evolution

TW: Am an avowed space advocate. This link goes to a USA Today flash program outlining the decade plus long process by which the station has been constructed. The ISS is hugely expensive and of dubious value but it sure is cool. (h/t to blogger-in-law)
http://i.usatoday.net/tech/graphics/iss_timeline/flash.htm

Could Have Used Some Of These In College

From NBC:
"In what might embarrass less adventurous souls, astronaut Koichi Wakata is returning to Earth with the underwear he kept on for a solid month during his space station stay and scientists will check them out.

They’re experimental high-tech undies, designed in Japan to be odor free.

...Wakata has been off the planet for 4 1/2 months.

“I haven’t talked about this underwear to my crew members,” Wakata said in an interview with The Associated Press, drawing a big laugh from his six shuttle colleagues. “But I wore them for about a month, and my station crew members never complained for about a month, so I think the experiment went fine.”

The underwear, called J-Wear, is a new type of anti-bacterial, water-absorbent, odor-eliminating clothing designed for space missions. “We’ll see the results after landing,” Wakata said...."

How Would the Modern Media Cover the First Moon Landing

TW: Nice little spoof on how today's sporific media would have covered the first moon landing had it occurred today rather than 40 years ago. It is slightly rough but some angles are spot on and depressing.

Walter Cronkite And the Moon Landing

TW: Obviously tonight's post needs to be the landing on the moon, but it provides a nice mash-up of the landing with the late, very great Walter Cronkite. His reaction (along with ex-astronaut Wally Schirra) is classic. I always like these clips which focus on the actual footage created when the event occurred without post-facto filtering. The "CBS simulations" also reminded that most of the space travel I saw as a child was in fact simulation and imagination.

A World Without Apollo 11

TW: So today is the 40th anniversary of the landing on the moon. Many will ignore it, I suspect some of those younger than me do not particularly appreciate it. The rationale for going to the moon was always a bit precarious and certainly economically dubious. But for the Cold War mentality pushing us to one up the Soviets, there is no way the mission would have occurred.

Today folks still struggle to rationalize our continued investment in manned space flight. My guy, our POTUS, is not a spacenik, somehow despite being the right age he missed the space virus that swept those of his generation. He initiated a review our manned space program with the report due out in August. I strongly suspect the current Ares and Constellation programs (the ones that would take us back to the moon) will be curtailed in favor of less ambitious goals. A HUGE mistake.

The period from November 1963 until through especially the mid 1970's and to a certain degree the early 1980's was a series of negatives for the U.S. Numerous assassinations (oh how history could have been different), social unrest as we went through a series of racial, sexual and youth molting stages, the Vietnam War, Watergate and economic malaise (not to mention several fashion disasters). But there was one American achievement that helped buck up the nation and cement, despite all of the above, America's pre-eminent role in the world. The unique and seminal program to place a man on the moon.

The symbolism of that achievement to this day goes under-appreciated. No one could have done it. And for that reason folks were in awe.

Someone will go back to the moon and then to Mars. Whoever does so will achieve global primacy as the country that can do things no one else can. I suspect the next person on the moon will be Chinese or Indian. When that happens there will be hell to pay in the U.S. as a final nail on the notion of U.S. supremacy will have been delivered. When that happens, I just hope the folks unwilling to pay to retain our space programs (this is a bi-partisan thing, liberals want to solve poverty first-impossible- and conservatives have little vision and would rather build bigger bombers and stuff) keep there mouths shut (but of course they will not, I can see the Drudge headlines already...).

40 Years Ago Today...

TW: Apollo 11 launched. LBJ and then VPOTUS (and future convicted felon) Spiro Agnew were on hand as well as Neil Armstrong's two sons and then wife Jan.

Our Space Program In Limbo

TW: Above are prototypes for our next manned spacecraft. The one on the left is the Ares I in which astronauts would be launched into orbit. The lower stage is a modified space shuttle booster rocket. The astronauts would launch into lower orbit where they would meet up with equipment carried into space by the vehicle on the right, the Ares V. The Ares V being a modified Apollo rocket assisted by a couple of the Shuttle booster rockets.

The Ares I allegedly will fly in 2015. Allegedly because if it did it would be about the first space program to stay on schedule since Apollo. In the meantime we will have no manned space launch vehicles after next year when the Shuttle is meant to be retired.

Jay Barbree has a nice write-up below on the genesis of the Ares.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31496353/ns/technology_and_science-space/

The Ares vehicles are meant to be precursors to an American return to the moon in 2020 or so (again I would emphasize the "or so" part). I strongly believe in the manned space program as it symbolizes technological excellence, leadership and exploration of new frontiers.

Unfortunately our POTUS does not share my enthusiasm. The entire program is up for review with an August report due that is meant to articulate whether Obama et al. will continue with the Ares approach, suggest a new one or greatly scale back our ambitions. We shall see. In the mean time the Chinese and others are quietly readying their own projects which I suspect will soon accelerate past our's.

Reading List

1) Pete Souza was recently named the new official White House photographer. His site has some very cool shots from election night in Grant Park as well as other work from Wrigley etc.
http://www.petesouza.com/index.html
2) A different view of the Gaza war. From Al-jazeera, an alternative view on how the war is covered in the U.S.
http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/war_on_gaza/2009/01/20091585448204690.html
3) An update on the status of a manned space program. For a space advocate like myself, still frustrating to read the convoluted process by which we spend billions yet achieve seemingly little. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/30/science/30spac.html?_r=1&bl&ex=1230786000&en=92a4970e15389382&ei=5087%0A
4) An optimistic case for the economy from a confirmed pessimist. Hopefully he is right. From Conde Nast Portfolio
http://www.portfolio.com/views/columns/economics/2009/01/07/Spotting-Signs-of-Economic-Recovery#page1
5) Continued proof that our society at the end of the day does not allocate capital particularly well. College football assistant coach salaries are skyrocketing, the rest of the economy may be in the crapper but not college football spending.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/28539969?__source=RSS*blog*&par=RSS