Obama's Plan For NASA Revealed

Hopefully someone will ask the administration when the US is likely to be capable of putting humans in space again. My best guess would be 10 years.

First the budget has to be approved. Then requirements generated and an RFP submitted. Then contracts awarded. Then hardware built and qualified, including escape tower type of tests.

This likely requires all new hardware (and software and test equipment). Add in a company's inexperience and that's more time.

So what exactly is the goal other than diverting funds to loosely defined 'future goals'? All I see is a lot of armwaving, just like his State of the Union speech, and no real details other than to cancel Constellation.

I hope someone investigates the links between certain 'commercial human spaceflight' interests and the President's campaign. It's clear to me he had made his decision long before the election and just needed someone to rubber stamp it.

I just can't wait to see Bolden and Lori being shown the door in 2012 before they've had time to turn NASA into a cheesy PR outlet at a cost of $20B/year.

What goes around comes around. Should be fun to see in 2012 what gets cancelled ...

Ding dong
The stick is dead
The stick is dead
The stick is dead...

I sent this to the Obama administration and the senators of Texas, Florida, and Alabama. I recommend you all do the same, speak up or fade away.

Dear Senator,
Obama's new budget essentially guts my future as a software engineer who works at JSC on the new space program. As I went through high school and college I had one desire, and that was to work on taking man into space and return the US to the moon. I got my chance with the new Constellation program and with our PDR completed and development moving forward, despite all the budget setbacks we have had, now Obama has decided to destroy that dream.
His administrations lack of support of the space program is a 180 degree turn from what he told the American people while running for the highest office in our country. I can't fathom how, with his "jobs are number one" approach in his State of the Union, he can stomach the direct attack on the tens of thousands of American jobs his current budget takes.
I can only hope that congress will fight him tooth and nail, and try and salvage what's left of our space program from the edge of the abyss. Otherwise I will go from being a 30 year old software engineer looking forward to great things in humanity's future in regards to our space presence, to just another unemployed American.

Please fight for all of us in the space program,

Michael Wade
Concerned Orion Software Engineer

If I had to summarize my first impressions, especially of Bolden's statement -

"We were doing Flags and Footprints. The President and I don't want to do that. We want to colonize space for real. We're going to do the foundations for that now."

"His administrations lack of support of the space program is a 180 degree turn from what he told the American people while running for the highest office in our country."

Problem is, it's hard to square this with a much bigger budget increase than NASA has had in two decades (if it makes it through congress). While a great unfunded mandate came down from the prior administration, this one has made NASA kinda special (not included in the flat budget) and put money where it's mouth is.

Interesting times. But a straightforward "Obama hates NASA" and "Obama is killing NASA to feed education" seems counter to the fiscal evidence.

All one can say is that Obama was very against the POR for human spaceflight.

Funny, I was thinking of sending them a very different message...something around the lines of how we should not continue a faulty and short-sighted program just to preserve jobs.

I'm losing mine too when the Shuttle ends, and there will be a gap regardless of what vehicle is in place. So, I'm glad a President is finally putting forth the foresight to enact a Space Plan that furthers humanity's long term expansion into space, even if we take a break from launching rockets 24/365.

I hope they pass this as-is. HSF should not be held back or held hostage just to keep people employed.

I kept very close tabs on the Augustine commission. Constellation was doomed to failure because we could not afford it. We weren't going back to the moon, we were just fooling ourselves into thinking we were. It would have been the 2030s until we landed on the moon, if ever. Programs that get drawn out over this length of time just don't survive.

I agree with the president that a major change is needed. We need to foster commercial space for transportation to LEO and develop enabling technologies to make space access affordable and sustainable in the future.

However, I would have like to seen SOME kind of plan for Flexible Path exploration.

From the joint statement: "Put simply, the Constellation program threatened other important parts of NASA’s endeavors and mission, while failing to achieve the trajectory of a program that was sustainable, executable, and ultimately successful. The Augustine Committee reflected on this situation, and found that a root cause of this troubled state was a decades-long, systemic under-investment in new technology and innovation. We essentially were trying to recreate the glories of the past with the technologies of the past, and, not surprisingly, the result was a program anchored in the past. This is not the vision that the President has for NASA, nor is it the best way to move forward on our efforts in space."

Wow. Looks like both the Augustine Committee *and* Aldridge Commission were heard in this White House. Marburger would be proud; this budget is a better approach to "incorporate the Solar System in our economic sphere" than ESAS ever was. Next up to bat: Congress.

I think Constellation and the VSE simply failed to inspire.

I see a broad goal to transition from in-house SE and ownership of LVs and crew capsules, to contractor-based SE and ownership. Obama proposes an increase in the NASA HSF budget at the same time. I think this leads to a transition from civil servant and contractor jobs focused at the Centers to an equal or larger number of jobs at contractor sites. Management by NASA Centers will still be needed, but the technical work substantially moves down the food chain.

There's no question it causes huge uncertainty and dislocation, both for Center employees and for the contractors who already won Constellation work and now have to go win it again -- including my company. There will be gaps where the money disappears one place and doesn't reappear soon enough another place, and people will suffer as a result. But the fact that new funding is committed to move it along, despite tough times, should be taken as a very optimistic sign that the dreams of young space workers are probably still very much alive.

I don't see this as more simplistic than the detail-less VSE initiative -- Bush saying "let's fly higher now" and never speaking of it again. In that sense it's only fair to treat this as a high-level policy decision, the details of which are still to be worked out. Watch for the bouncing $$$ and Obama's level of involvement over the next 2 years before you conclude he's tossing you under the bus. I say he might be doing you a favor.

Totally agree, and besides that, when it came to Orion, whether or not this was an appropriate and affordable design to go with, and I don't think it was, the fact that the program had made so little progress over 5 years meant that it was time to pull the plug.

I think NASA's biggest disease is this perpetual "starting-stopping-starting-stopping-starting-stopping-starting-stopping" nonsense. How many tens of billions of dollars (not to mention the human time and talent) have been wasted over the years on projects that were eventually cancelled?
Even if the project wasn't the very best thing we could have done, it is still better than nothing. I'd rather drive the mediocre car in my driveway than wait forever for a promised Ferrari that keeps getting reconfigured.
I wish NASA would just make one change. Establish a rule that says, "Whatever we start we finish".

I agree that the risk is significant that this "new direction" will eliminate HSF for decades to come. But the truth of the matter is that the current path was going nowhere fast. From the start of Constellation to the first human flight would have been 13-15 years? Maybe more, given normal delays?
At this point, I'd rather try a full reset, than continuing down a path that seemed pretty fruitless.

Unfortunately, this being the U.S. government we are likely to end up with the WORSE of both worlds - some mishmash of the President's new directive and the program of record.
1) Congress will direct NASA to explore more commercial opportunities
2) Congress will direct NASA to continue Constellation/Ares I and abandon Ares V
3) Congress will eliminate all of the $6B increase requested by the President, and possibly even shrink NASA's budget.

The result? Death by political ineptitude.

Robea wrote:


I wish NASA would just make one change. Establish a rule that says, "Whatever we start we finish".


I certainly oppose that wish.

NASA has made a number of huge structural errors in program decisions over the years, starting with continuing Shuttle after it was apparent the budget reality didn't support the required development costs, the first versions of the Space Station program, and Constellation.

If you aren't willing to revisit your program goals and current program success and direction, and sometimes say "you know, this isn't going the direction we need to go, we need to stop throwing money into it", then you're doomed to disaster.

The Military walks away from programs, some of them at the ready-to-deploy stage. Companies do it all the time - sunk costs are gone, if the program moving forwards doesn't work and make sense, walk away.

Treating it as a must-succeed program is a step away from responsible management. Sometimes things have to fail, to succeed in the end.

Seems like NASA has been given a mandate to do research and lots of it.

Michael Wade,

It is clear that the Orion is becoming a mature spacecraft system, and it would be reckless (both financially as well as with regard to human effort and ingenuity) to allow the 3 billion + dollar investment in the Orion's development to gather dust in a NASA vault.

I therefore urge you to speak with those with whom you work, and act together to organize an effort to fully promote the level of accomplishment and maturity in the development of Orion's Integrated Modular Avionics system.

The internet is a very powerful and persuasive platform from which to project the rationale of continuing the funding and development of a "Integrated Modular Spacecraft Architecture".

Integrated modular avionics, are designed to be redeployed as "reusable software components". This must be emphasized, that most of the developed software elements and designs are reusable and therefore directly applicable to any commercial spacecraft.

It is in the best interests of NASA to continue to fund the development of the integrated modular avionics software, as this will allow commercial vehicles to be developed faster, be more reliable, and cost less, than to have each commercial vendor develop replica solutions.

I urge you to investigate the use of "Think Link" and "Dispute Finder" from Intel Research.
http://confront.intel-research.net/Think_Link.html

These are powerful tools with which to defend and promote your position, and places the burden of proof on those who would dispute your "facts".

I wish you and your teammates the very best success in this endeavor.

Michael,

Please also investigate the following budget item.

$20 million per year for research that will enhance
NASA’s ability to verify and validate complex
software-based systems

I find it ironic that the new budget is more in the spirit of VSE than ESAS ever was. In fact, you could almost assume that VSE is continuing along the track first promulgated by Marburger et al. This is a big win for free enterprise and represents a big step away from the Socialist Design Bureau approach instituted by Mike Griffin. Three cheers to U.S. free enterprise, and new markets in the next frontier!

Robea: you've exactly identified why this is a good plan.

Commercial vendors are good at making sustainable business plans and short-term research investments to achieve a continuing profit in the short term. They are affected less by the political wind shifts that make NASA so chaotic when I comes to long term planning.

Commercial vendors suck at doing long term and basic research because they can not see the investment benefiting the bottom line in any reasonable amount of time. NASA excels at basic research. Basic research tends to come in smaller chunks that are defined by the length of the research grant, etc. Spans that should fit within a normal political cycle.

One needs to only look at the aeronautics side of the house to see house the commercial/NASA partnership can succeed in a brilliant fashion.

The HSF side of NASA needs to get back to pushing the envelope, trying out new ideas, exploring new avenues; and then transferring that knowledge to industry so that NASA can continue to use that hard won knowledge as it moves on to the next set of frontiers.

"So what exactly is the goal other than diverting funds to loosely defined 'future goals'?"

Well yeah, ok lets say this budget fly's , which may or may not happen.

Does Bolden and Headquarters have a specific plan on paper?
(What is the schedule for presenting that?)
Even if one throws out the Moon and Mars, there is specific language about support of the ISS.
I know there are vague 'manned' COTS plans for some kind of vehicle but what?
The The SpaceX 'Manned' Dragon ...man I can't see that eventually costing less than the CEV!
For manned spaceflight where's the beef?

Now that NASA has laid the ground work for modular avionics software it is up for a commercial company to take it to the next level, maybe with a grant/SBIR from NASA to help support the new company in the beginning. Commercial vehicle vendors, and others, can then purchase the COTS software. A model for this is NASTRAN, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nastran

The so called "5 year gap' in the Bush VSE between Shuttle retirement and Constellation IOC has been brilliantly eliminated by the Obama Administration.

Yesterday:
Shuttle ------> Constellation

Today:
Shuttle ------>??????????????

I saw Neil Armstrong plant the US flag at Tranquility Base and I have no doubt I will see the Chinese taikonauts replace them in the next decade.

Does anyone seriously think that NASA can maintain a $19 billion a year budget with no goals or commitments to really do anything?

Marcel F. Williams

What becomes of Launch Complex 39AB? The VAB?
Even KSC for that matter.....will it be closed and auctioned off to the highest developer? More succinctly, at what point will we see the ABANDON IN PLACE placards installed at KSC?

What I loved about the teleconference was "Sorry, we don't have any dates for beyond LEO, Constellation gave dates and see where they are. We don't want to promise any dates and then slip them. We just want to study heavy lift technologies for a while"

Blah, Blah, Blah.

Why did Constellation give dates then? Just say we don't know when it will be ready? That seems good enough for today's administration putting forth the new vision.

"Sometime in the future" seems to be a good enough answer.

Why didn't someone in Constellation management think of that sooner? :(

So, basically we already studied what we want to do and where we want to go and came up with technology to DO IT.

But, the new plan is not to do ANYTHING ANYTIME SOON, but start studying for something we might do one day (obviously because there are NO DATES).

So, let's recap, we could do a mission to the moon or flexible path or whatever NOW and have technology to do it. But, instead, let's not actually DO anything until we find a way for a space ship to levetate via bovine excrement. THEN, and ONLY then, when we have found the holy grail of engineering greatness that has eluded us for centuries will we actually put money into going beyond LEO.

Well, that's my take on it anyways...

There has been discussions over the years as to whether NASA should take on a more DARPA-like role. I think this proposed direction (if it gets through Congress) seems to be pushing NASA in this direction.

It is certainly a high-risk, high-reward approach. If truly innovative capabilities are developed, it could transform how we get to space and what we can do there. But the risk is that nothing innovative comes out of it.

I too believe that the government excels at basic research, but only when the budgets are small in scale, like the aeronautics side. There must be rule of thumb that equates a projects success, in regards to schedule and costs, with size and complexity. As to how big government research turns out in terms of schedule and cost, the NIF (National Ignition Facility) comes to mind.

Define goals and commitments. Research is a goal and commitment. Since its inception, NASA has gone from the need to do research to support it's (and others) engineering efforts to the need to do engineering to support it's research efforts. Then came Constellation and they were asked to do engineering. Didn't work out so well. So now the pendulum has swung over to do research. At least that is the way it seems to me at the moment.

And, as far as I can gather at the moment, NIH, NSF, DOE, NIST, and USDA all got funding increases due to connections with research. Nothing special about NASA.

So I guess the question is, can the US support all this research? Probably not. Get ready for the winds to change in a few years.

That's a good point.

To make this whole thing viable, a large portion of the NASA budget for the next few years will need to be devoted to purchasing services from commercial suppliers.

The ISS finally represents such a destination that can be standardized in a way that a commercial entity can provide a service and not a one-off capability.

I hope that NASAs next steps down this path would be to research and develop other destinations that could be supported by the commercial side as stepping stones away from LEO.

Fuel depots, small L1 stations, moon outposts, deep space missions.

The thing I always found disappointing about Constellation is that it looked so much like Apollo.

We just spent a good long time figuring out how to (or not too) put together a larger structure in LEO. I fail to understand why we need to lift everything into space all at once ala Apollo.

I want to see small short-term increments of infrastructure; not a massive effort for more footprints alongside those of Neil and Buzz.

Just my 2 cents. Remains to be seen what will actually come out of this.

@ sb023: The nice thing about not having a 'goal', i.e. date for a flexible path mission, is you will never be over budget, and you will never be behind schedule; therefore you will never fail; and you can never be held to account for anything.

How perfect is that!

@ TharsisA330: What makes no sense to me is the language that speaks to upgrading the facilities at KSC for the next generation of missions. (not an exact quote). Now how does one go about doing that when there is no mission defined, and no schedule for it either i.e. total lack of requirements? And, if I am a COTS provider of said new launch vehicle, why in the world would I want to step onto NASA Property when I can get a sweet deal from one of the many state run launch sites now popping up all over the place? (New Mexico, Va. etc.)

And which Center will be leading the development of the 'steady stream' of robotic scout missions to provide recon for a manned mission at a later date? JSC is not a robotic development house, JPL, GSFC, and LaRC lead Robotic missions. Or will these new missions be managed/developed out of the JSC,MSFC, KSC workforce?

Lots of unanswered questions....

While there is always a period of mourning when dreams come into conflict with reality, software skills should be readily transferable to whatever tele-robotic and robotic missions are coming down the pipe... and I would think that JSC would be involved in any lunar surface missions. So while you may have to find realization of your dreams in a slightly different form than you imagined, don't give up on finding fulfillment in your work at NASA.

Well TX didn't go with Obama in '08 and I doubt that the space vote is what made the difference in FL. Given that there would have been a loss of jobs in FL that lasted well into his second term with the old plan, I doubt he's losing much by changing course...

Buzz Aldrin helped plant that flag at Tranquility. He also happens to support this new direction.

Mike Griffin took the handoff and promptly started running toward the wrong end zone. He set us back. Obama, wrong on so many other things, got this one right.

we could do a mission to the moon or flexible path or whatever NOW and have technology to do it.
Impossible in the current political and fiscal environment. You're saying "if they'd just give us the money, we can already do it." Unfortunately (1) that's not true, and (2) they won't give us the money. Read the news. We're lucky Obama is proposing a NASA increase, vs. holding a flat line like every other discretionary expense.

So instead, the President rolls out a broad policy change with a new initiative that hasn't been developed in detail. Anybody remember about 5 years ago when VSE was introduced? That too was a bolt from the blue, with fuzzy (bogus) economic projections, and no technical detail. NASA spent the next year deciding what he meant. They needed a management change (Griffin for O'Keefe) before it got all worked out.

So take a deep breath and watch for a couple years like you did the last time.

heck, lets just make the leap to warp drive right now

CONTRACT RELEASE: C10-004

NASA SELECTS COMMERCIAL FIRMS TO BEGIN DEVELOPMENT OF CREW TRANSPORTATION CONCEPTS AND TECHNOLOGY DEMONSTRATIONS FOR HUMAN SPACEFLIGHT USING RECOVERY ACT FUNDS

WASHINGTON -- NASA has awarded $50 million through funded agreements to further the commercial sector's capability to support transport of crew to and from low Earth orbit. This step is the first taken by NASA consistent with the president's direction to foster commercial human spaceflight capabilities.

"The president has asked NASA to partner with the aerospace industry in a fundamentally new way, making commercially provided services the primary mode of astronaut transportation to the International Space Station," said NASA Administrator Charles Bolden. "We are pleased to be able to quickly move forward to advance this exciting plan for NASA."

Through an open competition for funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, NASA has awarded Space Act Agreements to Blue Origin of Kent, Wash.; The Boeing Company of Houston; Paragon Space Development Corporation of Tucson, Ariz.; Sierra Nevada Corporation of Louisville, Colo.; and United Launch Alliance of Centennial, Colo. The agreements are for the development of crew concepts and technology demonstrations and investigations for future commercial support of human spaceflight.

The Space Act Agreements are designed to foster entrepreneurial activity leading to high-tech job growth in engineering, analysis, design and research, and to promote economic growth as capabilities for new markets are created. Funding for these Space Act Agreements will stimulate efforts within the private sector to develop and demonstrate human spaceflight capabilities.

"These selections represent a critical step to enable future commercial human spaceflight," said Doug Cooke, associate administrator for Exploration Systems at NASA. "These impressive proposals will advance NASA significantly along the path to using commercial services to ferry astronauts to and from low Earth orbit, and we look forward to working with the selected teams," Cooke said.

All Space Act Agreements are designed to partially fund the development of system concepts, key technologies, and capabilities that could ultimately be used in commercial crew human space transportation systems. The selected teams also proposed matching funds from other sources that would leverage the taxpayer investment.
The selected teams and awards are:

Blue Origin will receive $3.7 million

The Boeing Company will receive $18 million

Paragon Space Development Corporation will receive $1.4 million

Sierra Nevada Corporation will receive $20 million

United Launch Alliance will receive $6.7 million

The signed Space Act Agreements will fund performance milestones beginning in February 2010. The aggregate value of all of the Space Act Agreements is approximately $50 million.

The Commercial Crew and Cargo Program Office at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston is managing this effort.
For more information about NASA's Commercial Crew and Cargo Program,
visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/offices/c3po/home

SpaceX has shown what the price point in today's dollars a program such as Atlas/Mecury and Gemini costs. And NASA has contributed a lot to placing such an engineering effort into the realm of possibility for an entrepreneur. So maybe the same will be true for vehicles such as the shuttle, assuming the future asks for such a vehicle.

OK, so if more focus will be placed on the ISS would a revisit of the X-38 be in order?

I don't think NASA is going to have difficulty deciding what Obama meant. Don't you think we are back to the days before VSE/Constellation, minus (shortly) the Shuttle?

- WASHINGTON -- Sparks, Nev.-based Sierra Nevada Corp. was the big winner in NASA’s Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) competition, receiving $20 million of the $50 million in economic stimulus money meant to seed development of commercial crew transportation services.

- NASA did not release details about the selected projects.

A Sierra Nevada executive,however, told Space News late last year that the Spark, Nevada-based company’s plan involves a runway-landing, lifting-body vehicle called Dream Chaser that the company has been working on for several years. The six-passenger vehicle is based on NASA’s HL-20 concept from the early 1990s

Link:

http://www.spacenews.com/venture_space/100201-biggest-ccdev-award-goes-sierra-nevada.html

Dream Chaser:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceDev_Dream_Chaser

With all due respect From a 29 year member of the Shuttle Program I am going to have my whine.

This is for Mike Griffin and I quote from the movie Hunt For Red October "You arrogant ass you killed us all".
Senator Shelby what were you thinking? Mikey played you well

Obama I remember your early campaign platform to defund NASA for 5 years. You better hope your running against Palin in 2012 because I am sitting the next one out if she's not running against you.

Salute to all the people I have worked with at KSC, MSFC, Michoud, and Vandenberg. We Rocked

Anybody know how good Medicaid is?

I hope this budget gets passed as is. This is the right path for NASA. If you can't get on board and want to dig in and defend the status quo, maybe you shouldn't be in this business. Not that dissenting opnions are bad (if they are valid), but we've done this tired old crap for 50 years and it's time to make some real progress. Constellation was a major retreat for NASA. This proposal is a quantum leap into the future. If Congress derails this and reinstates Ares I/V, then I will be looking to leave NASA and work for an agency that is in touch with reality.

How is this different than 10, 15, or 20 years ago? NASP. X-33. X-34. OK, Sierra Nevada wants to doing something inspired by X-34. I was a part of the original (and later) X-34 concepts. The original vehicle was the one which was going to be mounted on top of a 747. The 747 was going to go up to altitude, go into a dive, and release the X-34. The X-34 was going to fire it's rocket(s) and go into LEO and then glide back. That was an effort between Rockwell and Orbital. That eventually got downscaled into a low cost suborbital test bed. Don't get me wrong. I'd like to revisit the design. But "revisit" is the key word. And if it didn't work then (and I'm not talking about technology) I'm not sure what will make it work now.

Link:
http://www.spacedev.com/spacedev_advanced_systems.php

SpaceDev’s Dream ChaserTM Piloted Lifting Body

* Derived from NASA HL-20
* Over 1200 hours of NASA wind tunnel testing
* Builds upon seven years of NASA development
* Low re-entry deceleration Loads ( * Large cross range (1600km) → Frequent Landing
* Low impact recovery (conventional runway landing)
* Exceptional crew safety:
* Onboard hybrid propulsion
* Designed for Commercial Orbital Transportation

SpaceDev’s Dream ChaserTM - Hybrid Propulsion

* Based on our proven hybrid rocket propulsion
* Over 10 years of development
* Over 300 firings
* Based on motors designed for SpaceShipOne (SS1)
* Human flight rated motors
* Hybrid propellants are safe, non-toxic
* Propellants: nitrous oxide (N20) & rubber (HTBP)
* Common Space Vehicle Hybrid Propulsion Modules
* Modular construction simplifies production
* Throttleable & restartable
* Thrust vectoring control
* Reaction Control System (RCS) uses N2O

"These selections represent a critical step to enable future commercial human spaceflight," said Doug Cooke, associate administrator for Exploration Systems at NASA. "These impressive proposals will advance NASA significantly along the path to using commercial services to ferry astronauts to and from low Earth orbit, and we look forward to working with the selected teams," Cooke said. (emphasis added)

Heheh.

Yes Indeed, Not one thin dime from science, 15 billion later the steroids program is cancelled.

I could not be happier.
Date: April 27, 2009
Contact: Maureen O'Leary, Director of Public Information Office of News and Public Information
202-334-2138; e-mail news@nas.edu

WASHINGTON, D.C. - In a speech today to members of the National Academy of Sciences, President Barack Obama announced new initiatives and investments in scientific research, innovation, and education, declaring once again to restore science to its rightful place. "The days of science taking a back seat to ideology are over," he said.

Calling science "more essential for our prosperity, our security, our health, and our environment than it has ever been," Obama said he is going to make major investments -- 3 percent of the gross domestic product -- in research and innovation. This exceeds the amount invested in 1964 at the height of the space race. He emphasized the importance of using funds to encourage high-risk, high-return research and to support researchers at the beginning of their careers. Following a welcome from NAS President Ralph J. Cicerone, Obama was introduced to the audience by his science adviser and NAS member John Holdren, who said that Obama "wanted to bring science back into the center of how the government thinks, what it says, and what it does; and he is doing it."

Keith

Your summary article offers a lot more insight into the proposed plan than anything in MSM. I hope you are right about the intentions of this plan. If it works, NASA's human space could pivot from rehashing the past to an engine of opportunity. Let's hope so.

Oh, it seems that Sierra Nevada wants to do something along the lines of the HL-20. Hey, I'm somewhat familiar with the aerodynamics of the HL-20. Now, does Sierra Nevada mean 1200hrs of WT for the Dream Chaser or the HL-20? Or are the outer mold lines the same?

Twas a good thing I left NASA 2 years ago after being there 11 years... I do enjoy the real world better --like moving at 95MPH instead of 10MPH.

Oh, and the wake from the vehicle at top makes for some interesting aerodynamics and loads. And for something like that, would one really trust CFD or even WT tests? And the loads will affect the launch vehicle, so maybe the structure will change or even the outer mold line of the Dream Chaser. And maybe the mass will change, etc... Hey, this is a fun research project!! Seriously. I'm drooling already.

This is a DISGRACE and slap in the face to all the past astronauts of Gemini to Apollo and the Shuttle. AN ABSOLUTE DISGRACE!

I'd say Obama just lost Texas and Florida in 2012.

Oh, and if the 1200 hrs of WT time is for the HL-20 do they mean the final version or does that include prior versions.

This is a DISGRACE and slap in the face to all the past astronauts of Gemini to Apollo and the Shuttle. AN ABSOLUTE DISGRACE!

That must be why Buzz Aldrin strongly supports the new plan.

Oh my, at the moment I sure do feel like I'm rehashing the past. And enjoying it.

"I'd say Obama just lost Texas and Florida in 2012."

Yes, he was definitely counting on Texas to carry him in '08. ...oh, wait...

@macman1138
I take it you're a Republican because all you folks care about is re-election. Obama is doing this for the good of NASA and the country. He certainly has a political agenda, but it's about bringing this country out of its Byzantine past and into the future. The things he has done are not popular and will not get him re-elected (unless Palin is the GOP candidate) and frankly I like what he's doing on many fronts.

I'm having a little trouble understanding this whole budget. Admittedly, I haven't been kept up with all the goings on today (I'm retired and spent the day doing fun things), but we get a $700M budget increase to almost $20B; we're going to spend $6B over the next 5 years to "commercialize"; we're canceling Constellation; and we're canceling Shuttle.

For part of FY11, the Shuttle flights will cost something (not sure how many flights are scheduled, but they're about $1B each). Constellation will not be worked.

So what do we do with the rest of the budget?? There seems to be a lot of money with nothing to do with it. Or did I miss something?

BTW ... I define "commercialization" as the companies developing capabilities on their own, not with government funding. Looks like initially it will be like it was up until about 10 years ago ... we just farm out the vehicle development and other work with government-managed contracts (which was a good thing ... in-house design, to me, was always iffy).

Can anybody elucidate? Or will I have to read all the articles? :)

So, the plan is "gee we sure would like to explore with human space flight, but for now we won't"?

Heresy, thy name is Obama.

I'm a fan of Buzz Aldrin but he changes his mind like the wind blows. A couple of months ago, he was telling us that we should go to Mars. Yeah, right Buzz!

Marcel F. Williams

The decision is consistent given one's political pedigree.....

Per Wikipedia:

On the eve of the Apollo 11 launch, July 15, 1969, Dr. Abernathy arrived at Cape Canaveral with several hundred members of the poor people to protest spending of government space exploration, while many Americans remained poor. He was met by Thomas O. Paine, the Administrator of NASA, whom he told that in the face of such suffering, space flight represented an inhuman priority and funds should be spent instead to "feed the hungry, clothe the naked, tend the sick, and house the homeless." Mr. Paine told Abernathy that the advances in space exploration were child's play compared to the tremendously difficult human problems of the society, and told him that "if we could solve the problems of poverty by not pushing the button to launch men to the moon tomorrow, then we would not push that button." On the day of the launch, Dr. Abernathy led a small group of protesters to the restricted guest viewing area of the space center and chanted, "We are not astronauts, but we are people."

Dr. Ralph Abernathy 7-15-1969
Wikipedia

Martin,
Have you purchased CFD software developed from the legacy of NASTRAN? It is grossly absurdly abusively expensive, and has substantially delayed the utilization of this technology in aerospace as a result.

Open Source CFD, such as OpenFoam, has slowly evolved and is leading to the wide spread adoption of CFD in Aerospace.

The development cost of Integrated Modular Avionics software is 10,000 dollars per line of code. This cost is amortized (in commercial aircraft) over 1000s of aircraft.

Commercial Spacecraft are not foreseen to be built in the 1000s, so commercial funding appears not to be a viable option.

This technology is pre-competitive with regards to commercialization of low earth orbital spacecraft.

NASA's charter is to develop pre-competitive technologies, to allow US commercial activities to develop.

Bingo!
Ok Plan A is dead.
Part of Plan B is known.
Most of Plan B is not known!
Especially the details.
When will that be?

"I'd say Obama just lost Texas and Florida in 2012."

Who cares? Besides, I don't agree with the statement about Florida. KSC and its community are going to benefit, big time. Read the budget, and you'll see it. Texas, Alabama, Mississippi and Utah are lost causes. Even if the situation of the NASA interests in these states benefited, it's not going to change the political orientation of those states.

First, NASTRAN is FEA not CFD and CFD was not derived from it. But I think your point is that CFD packages from commercial companies can be very expensive.

Second, I do wish that NASA would release NASTRAN, or at least their version, open source. But instead, one needs to go through Open Channel. Why I the tax payer need to pay $7K yearly for NASTRAN is beyond me, except to say that it is politics, wheeling and dealing, and how the contract was written.

Third, have you used OpenFOAM? As far as I know, for external aerodynamics, it can not converge on a solution for supersonic flow and gives questionable answers for flow with supersonic pockets. Well, that statement applies to the standard solvers from OpenFOAM. And it's got issues with boundary conditions. For example, try an O grid around an airfoil at any Mach number. (BTW, a look at OpenFOAM's online posts seem to confirm some of this) There is a solver, AeroFoam, http://www.aero.polimi.it/freecase, which addresses some of these issues. However, AeroFoam is for an earlier version of OpenFOAM and has not been updated to the latest version. Also, AeroFoam does not include a turbulence model.

Fourth, and this is related to the point above, please point out a comparison of OpenFOAM for a NACA 0012 airfoil at small angle of attack over a range of Mach numbers, subsonic to supersonic to other CFD codes, such as Overture, FreeCFD, OVERFLOW, CFL3D, and/or CART3D. Or, just run the case (more than just subsonic) and compare it to literature. It is so easy to do, and I bet it's been done. But I can't find the results.

If what I say about OpenFoam is correct, this too substantially delays the use of CFD. And shame on the OpenFOAM community for not doing a better job in regards to the solver and presenting validation cases.

If I am incorrect with my assessment of OpenFOAM, please let me know!! I would love to be wrong and revisit this. And I realize that software is a moving target, especially with the open source community.