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Budget

Dick Malow

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
June 2, 2016
Filed under ,
Dick Malow

Keith’s note: Dick Malow, a long-time staff member on the House VA-HUD Appropriations subcommittee, has died after a lengthy illness. Malow was known for his support of NASA which often required some tough love on his part. Over the years Malow managed to have a lot of influence upon the way that the International Space Station was designed, re-designed, and then redesigned again so as to make it easier to assemble and more useful to the people who would eventually do research on it. His influence on what eventually became the ISS was rather substantial and was not totally appreciated at the time. I can remember more than once sitting in a meeting with the engineering side of the Space Station Freedom program when a design or science utilization issue came up. Usually someone was trying to cut a corner or reduce some capability that the science users needed. More than once I said something to the effect of “well, if the science types tell Malow about this you know that there will be a directive from Congress telling you to stop doing it.” Indeed, that actually happened more than once. Dick Malow helped keep the space station alive when others wanted to kill it and helped make it useful when others just wanted to launch hardware – any hardware – that simply kept the lights on.. Ad Astra Dick.
Obituary, Washington Post

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

2 responses to “Dick Malow”

  1. JadedObs says:
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    A bright guy who really showed that Congress isn’t just about pork barrel politics; he made a great contribution.

  2. Scot007 says:
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    As the first Chief Scientist for the Space Station Program in 1986, I can vouch for Dick’s strong support of science on the station. He was tough, but was fair in playing his role to do what he could to assure that the station did what he believed it could to advance science. Sadly, it is still far from attaining that potential, but much of the success that has been there is due to his strong and sincere support of science.