New NASA Commercial Crew And Cargo Milestones
NASA Administrator Announces New Commercial Crew And Cargo Milestones
“NASA Administrator Charles Bolden announced Thursday new milestones in the nation’s commercial space initiatives from the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The latest advances made by NASA’s commercial space partners pave the way for the first contracted flight of cargo to the International Space Station (ISS) this fall and mark progress toward a launch of astronauts from U.S. soil in the next 5 years.”
Keith’s note: There has been no mention of this overtly commercial event by the Commercial Spaceflight Federation. No mention of XCOR’s big announcement either. CSF certainly isn’t paying much attention to commercial space these days.
I wish Bolden wouldn’t say ‘within 5 years’. SpaceX should be able to do it sooner, and targeting a start date of 2017 just gives ammo to the critics who see NASA as the sole relevant customer and the ISS (RIP 2020??) as the sole destination.
He has to. What if Congress holds back on funding in a subsequent year? Then it would be delayed, and if he quoted earlier, then “Commercial doesn’t keep to schedule” …
You have to actually address it as the time Orion is likely to … close on its schedule. Otherwise you’ll annoy certain people.
Actually, with Boeing’s experience I would expect them to do it within 5 years and SpaceX 5 to 7 years.
luckily it doesn’t matter what you expect. spacex will fly before boeing anyway:P
So Bolden has repeated the announcement from a few days ago plus a progress report and some heavy boot licking – please thank my boss the US President.
Every NASA announcment being centered around “creating jobs in Florida” is really getting old…..
And SpaceX gets $60 million for having a kick-off meeting. That’s quite an accomplishment.
John,
If you really believe that then I’m guessing you’ve never done proposal and contract work. There’s an awful lot of work to do before that meeting (and a significant element of risk).
Steve
I’ve worked on contracts that their total worth was $60 million including flight hardware. This milestone is due this month so in less than 30 days, they are to spend $60 million? The description says “SpaceX will hold a kickoff meeting at the SpaceX headquarters in
Hawthorne, CA, or a nearby facility to review the current state of
existing hardware, processes and designs, describe plans for CCiCap
program execution during both the base period and the optional period
and lay the groundwork for a successful partnership between NASA and
SpaceX.”
So that’s $2million a day. If you assume a burden rate of $200,000 per person annually, that’s 16,667 per person per month. $60million buys you 3600 people working it.
Please tell me how this $60million is being spent in less than 30 days for a kickoff meeting?
Come on, John,
If you have that experience then you know first hand that the money is neither just for the meeting nor just for 30 days work. For some reason you’re deliberately misrepresenting the situation. Is it simply that you don’t like SpaceX?
As you quoted: “ “SpaceX will hold a kickoff meeting at the SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, CA, or a nearby facility to review the current state of existing hardware, processes and designs, describe plans for CCiCap program execution during both the base period and the optional period and lay the groundwork for a successful partnership between NASA and SpaceX.”“
The “existing hardware, processes and designs” didn’t come into existence in those 30 days any more than the plans to be presented. These program payments are part of an ongoing set of contracts that have already been under way for years. The term “kickoff” for this meeting simply applies to the next phase of ongoing events; it’s not the start of something brand new for which they’re getting big money just to hold a meeting. This meeting actually signifies the END of an activity on which they’ve been working for a long time now. But since you have contract experience, you knew all of this. So, what have you got against SpaceX? Or is it all of commercial space that you don’t like? Or all space spending? Did Romney send you?
John, I don’t understand why you keep coming back to NASA Watch when your comments so often reflect disappointment.
Steve
First you imply that $60 million for a kick-off is normal then you say it’s for more than the kick-off. I thought the previous things done were paid by the previous money. Is this not the case? If this “kick-off” meeting was to signify the END of an activity, why wasn’t it paid for with the previous contract money? All of the contracts I worked on, when we satisfactory reached a milestone such as PDR or CDR, we received the money then. If the government decided to continue, then we received money solely for that next phase.
Steve, how come you take pointing out any inconsistencies in what SpaceX says or does as being against SpaceX? I thought NASA Watch was supposed to be more than a pro-SpaceX blog. My comments represent a more critical view than the “SpaceX can do no wrong crowd”. Can’t yourself and the other SpaceX fanboys take a step back and be a little more critical of SpaceX?
I didn’t say anything about $60m, or any other amount, being normal for a kick-off meeting, or any other meeting; you’re the only one who said the money was for the meeting.
Don’t get caught up on the term kick-off. As I said, this is a series ongoing contracts and this was just a new phase.
Let’s not go around in circles. A progress payment is paid after the items contractually tied to that payment have been shown to have achieved the required progress. A meeting is held to review that progress and determine if it is satisfactory. If it is satisfactory, then payment is made — i.e., after the work has been done, not before, and payment is not for the meeting, but for the work/product reviewed at the meeting.
As for SpaceX, your original comment seemed like a shot at SpaceX, so I asked what you’ve got against SpaceX. If this had been about Boeing, or any other company, and you had made the same confusing comment, I would have asked the same question, about whatever company. To me, your comment could only have been either a lack of understanding or a baseless criticism.
Steve
Steve, I made the comment about $60 million for a kick-off was quite an accomplishment, you made the comment “If you really believe that then I’m guessing you’ve never done proposal
and contract work. There’s an awful lot of work to do before that
meeting”. That sure sounds like you were agreeing that that wasn’t out of line.
I still think that more than 10% of contract award to be spent for an initial meeting is a lot. I would be interested in examples of other similar awards. I just don’t recall that before.
We need to harness this circular energy to get to LEO with no fuel lolol
Good luck Steve!
lol, you win the big prize for most ignorant comment of the day:D
With Neil Armstrong’s death the Commercial Crew companies need to have answers to questions like:
a. When can you get a man back into space?
b. When can you get a man back to the Moon?
b.(ii) When can you get a man back to lunar orbit? (Such as a spacestation at EML-1. Spacestation and lander to be made by a different company.)
First the journalists will ask the questions then the politicians.