CASIS Would Rather Go Golfing Than Do Actual ISS Research
CASIS and COBRA PUMA GOLF Team Up For Commercial Research Investigation On ISS
“CASIS has been tasked by Congress and NASA to work with new and non-traditional researchers for the development of products, therapies, and services onboard the ISS U.S. National Laboratory,” said CASIS President and Executive Director Gregory H. Johnson. “Our partnership with COBRA PUMA GOLF is an excellent example of a truly non-traditional research investigation taking advantage of the microgravity environment to advance knowledge in applied materials science.” In June of 2012, CASIS and CPG signed an initial Memorandum of Agreement …”
Keith’s note: Has CASIS actually published or promoted any of the research results from this ongoing golf in space effort? I have seen zero evidence that it has. CASIS loves to promote these vapid press releases that promise – but never deliver – amazing return on NASA’s investment via goofy sports tie-ins – yet they ignore actual commercial research such as that being done by Ardbeg on the ISS. And of course, CASIS is so inept that they cannot figure out how to tell people about the weekly ACTUAL ISS research results that NASA puts out as part of its Spaceline updates. What is baffling is why NASA continues to put up with this inadequate performance by CASIS.
– ISS Commercial Research That CASIS Utterly Ignores, earlier post
– An Actual ISS Commercial Experiment that NASA/CASIS Ignores (2012), earlier post
– CASIS Signs Deal with COBRA PUMA GOLF for Research on ISS (2012), earlier post
– CASIS Announces Baseball Raffle in Space, earlier post
– CASIS: It Takes More Than Golf to Utilize the ISS, earlier post
– CASIS Defines Bedtime Stories on ISS as “Major Payload”, earlier post
– CASIS Is Still Incapable of Doing Its Job, earlier post
CASIS was created for political reasons, but finally a number of people with real experience have joined the staff. Although funding as always is limited about 100 payloads are in the pipeline and many of them are Earth observation systems that will produce practical results. Getting these systems on board is slower than it should be, but its happening. It isn’t CASIS that counts. Organizations will always have good and bad points. But there are people who are working to make the Space Station productive, and at the moment working with CASIS is the most feasible way of accomplishing this.
The space station has to come off NASA books. For the sake of the rest of the agency projects, it needs to be sold or deorbited. I say this in agreement with many of you who have now changed my mind on this. IF NASA really wants Mars, it has to give up something. Politically, this piece of hardware does not support any particular center. It could be sold to Space X and then the tax payer could stop sending $$ to Space X, and the others for resupply. James Webb, SLS, Curiosity. That is where useful science MAY be done.