Major Themes From VP Pence's NASA Langley Speech
Remarks by Vice President Pence to NASA Langley Research Center, White House (larger word cloud image)
“The President has directed NASA and the Administrator to accomplish our goal to return to the Moon and then on to Mars not only within five years, but let me be clear: The President has made it clear that we’re going to accomplish this goal by any means necessary. In order to succeed, we are going to continue to focus on the mission over the means. We want to challenge each one of you here at Langley: Consider every available option and platform to meet our goals, including industry, government, and the entire American space enterprise. It’s the reason why we’re cutting out the underbrush of needless regulations and barriers to innovation, because we want you all to be able to reach, to engage, and to draw on the best ideas in America to get us where we’re going by the time we set ourselves to get there. Our administration is absolutely committed to this goal and we want you all to have the same determination and resolve to get there. And this President and this administration and the American people are committed to achieving this goal through NASA and through the Langley Research Center. So let me at least give you one word of admonition on behalf of your President and on behalf of the entire National Space Council: More than ever before, we want you to engage your imaginations, your creativity. Challenge one another. You know, there’s that old proverb that says, “Iron sharpens iron.” So I encourage you to come in every day with that same impatience and energy that, frankly, I heard in the voices of everybody that Director Turner introduced me to today. The enthusiasm as we walked through the Center, the fire in their eyes — just let that be in your eyes.”
This is going to get someone killed. There is no rush to send humans into space. Do it carefully, do it logically, do it safely.
Don’t worry, not going to happen. Congress holds the purse strings , not the WH.
Cheers Neil
While that is true today, today’s Congress is not the Congress of 2021. Will it be different enough?????
I dunno yet. Neither does anyone else. A Republican House and Senate strong enough to revolt against the Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee??? Now *that* is different!!!
Senator Shelby is an establishment of his own, and the leading LBJian, when he was a Democrat before 1995, and as he is, a Republican.
And its tradition for Alabama to promote Huntsville. That is how Von Braun and company got transferred from WSMR in the 1940’s.
Carefully and logically are fine ways to do things. But safely is a different matter. What “safely” means is subjective. The next dozen flights to the Moon will not be as safe as civil aviation. Actually the next thousand probably won’t be. Pretending otherwise is just courting a public reaction backlash, and trying to actually make it that safe would mean doing nothing forever. What about “not recklessly” instead of “safely”?
What gus said years ago still holds true.
“If we die, we want people to accept it. We’re in a risky business, and we hope that if anything happens to us it will not delay the program. The conquest of space is worth the risk of life.”
If we don’t try for 2024 then chances of getting out leo dims with each adminstration change.
Yes, and given events in China and Russia it looks like they will be stuck in LEO as well.
Russia under Putin is completely unserious about addressing corruption. They will, indeed, get nowhere for now. As for China, I’m not sure what you mean. Covid-19 is certainly no more than a temporary hiccup. Politically, they’ve shown the will and the focus to continue making steady progress in space. I expect to see them on the Moon within 10-15 years.
I don’t. There are lots of economic, political and demographic pressures building up in China and they were building long before the current virus outbreak. When it collapses it won’t be pretty. It never has been in the history of China and I don’t expect it will be this time around either.
Historically, the dynasties have lasted more than a century and often survived revolts or civil wars. I’m not expecting a new warlord period anytime soon.
If we were expecting China to keep acting like a pre-industrial nation, then a warlord interregnum might be expected. But China has changed, in spite of “The Princelings Party”, because it has gotten a bite of the industrial apple. People in Szechuan today hear what people are thinking in Heilongjiang 5 minutes ago. When “The Princeling’s Party” goes away, I would not look for any centrifugal interregnum.
Yes, a warlord period isn’t the best way I could have put it. Let’s say a less centralized and controlled government. Consider the European Union, which is as well-connected in terms of communication and as industrialized as China. There is growing support for making it less rather than more united. So I can imagine the same thing happening in China. But I don’t see it happening for decades. Strong regimes in China tend to be good at holding on for a long time regardless of pressure from below. Not forever, but for more than a century.
Yes, but China was more isolated from the outside world in those days. I also don’t expected a warlord period. More likely China will fragment after a period of civil unrest.
I believe he means the months of protests in Hong Kong. Personally I’m far from convinced that will have any effect on how China’s government works. Although I’m curious what effect Covid-19 has had on the protests.
The best analogy is a tree being chopped down. Those protests are one swing of the ax, Covid-19 another, the aging workforce another, the increasing outrage over the “re-education” camps another, and so on. Enough ax swings and even the biggest tree falls.
Those words are foreign to this administration.
We better stop using ALL forms of mechanical transportation then because someone WILL get killed just as long as any of them are utilized.
Mechanical transportation? Riding a horse is a bit risky as well. And so is walking in very bad weather (or, from personal experience, after a snowstorm when the sidewalks are icy.) Maybe the people who want to be absolutely safe should just stay in their homes.
An obsession with safety will bolt your feet to the ground. A clear-eyed understanding of the risks is a far better way to approach the work.
Sometime someone should really design their speech making sure a word-cloud actually highlights the desired message. Write and rewrite to make it work. Oh well.
Is the word ‘science’ in that jumble?
No, it is not.
In Mike Pence’s NASA, science does not apply.
A related question is if “why” was included. In support of the Apollo program, President Kennedy famously said, “why, some say, the Moon? Why choose this as our goal?” And he went on to answered that question. I think a human landing on the Moon would be great. I and others might be able to say why. But I have yet to hear a politician clearly articulate that “why”.
This op-ed by a former ESA Policy analyist offers one geopolitical reason.
https://spacenews.com/op-ed…
Op-Ed | The United States won’t go back to the moon,
I’ll follow China there instead
by Giulio Prisco — February 17, 202
I know there are good reasons. I just haven’t heard the politicians pushing Artemis (e.g. Mr. Pence or Mr. Trump) expressing them clearly. The speech I quoted was made by John Kennedy, not James Webb or Hugh Dryden.
“by any means necessary” Translation should be – If NASA is not ready with SLS/Orion then we will use the SpaceX Starship when its operational.
Personally I would like to see the Administration make that clearer by hiring SpaceX to send an uncrewed Dragon2 around the Moon as a test. The FH is ready and there will soon be surplus Dragon2’s to experiment with. Indeed, they have the one from the Pad Abort test to use if they want, and FH components recovered from the last FH launch. Just add a new FH core, a new second stage and rock everyone’s boat. I imagine the cost would be under $250 million.
I bet if SpaceX was given a contract it could fly in a few months. They could even put some cheese aboard as with the first COTS demo. I am sure Ripley would like to go… To the Moon in 2020…
No and yes. You started off writing about Starship, and that is just one alternative. So, no, that isn’t what I think “any means” boils down to. But then you wrote about considering Falcon Heavy and Dragon 2. That’s another option. So is the use of multiple launched and docking in low Earth orbit. Or in lunar orbit. Or in-orbit fuel transfer. Or many other things. I take “any means necessary” to mean considering all the options and using the one which will get the job done. That goes far beyond the SLS versus Starship issue.
Yes it does and that illustrates the problem well. Folks are so stuck on the SLS/Orion/Gateway they aren’t seeing there are more ways to do it. It is more than simply Starship/SLS
I believe somewhere deep in NASA the spirit of Apollo stills lives and it is trying to get free, the same spirit that did the all or nothing first launch of the Saturn V and the pivot to Apollo 8 when the LEM was delayed.
There is a capsule at the Cape today that could go around the Moon and the rocket to launch is there as well… Time to put them together and just do it. The NASA of the Apollo era would have done so without a second thought. That is why they were able to reach the Moon.
You seem to forget a couple of things: First, the financial resources available for Apollo dwarf what is available now. Second, the political will just isn’t there, no matter how many times you click your heels and say ‘Make America Great Again.”
SpaceX could send it around the Moon for probably under $300 million. Everything is in place. It would be sad to see a repeat of 1956 when Dr. von Braun had everything ready to put a satellite in orbit and was stopped so the Navy could be first. Of course Sputnik beat them…
No, don’t even think it. That capsule is reserved for the first flight with astronauts aboard to the ISS. The one after that will be for crew rotation. After that, there may be some available crew dragons, after all they are going to start selling to commercial tourists, so there is that. The second thing is, Falcon Heavy is not human rated, and to do so now would just be a diversion of funds, effort, and time. We won’t have to wait too long for Starship, so no problem. I am confident that a moon landing is well within the President’s 2024 deadline. They are planning the “Dear Moon” transit for 2023.
My understanding is that the capsule used in the launch abort would not be used again since NASA only wants new capsules for ISS flights. As for human rating the FH, given that the Falcon 9 has a large number of common systems the path to do so should be easy to outline. Probably far easier than the Starship.
Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy have a number of common systems – but then they have a number of unique systems. You are enthusiastically recommending an enormously risky mission – as a stunt.
Who is going to give up that $300 million for one thing – does the Federal Government have that sitting around, unobligated? You would just grab it out of the DoD (along with funding for the wall)? Take it from the DOJ?
In what program is there an uncrewed capsule mission around the Moon? What is the purpose of that mission? You know we can’t have $300 million dollar missions just because someone thinks it would be “cool” to do.
If we devote $300 million and a rare capsule to this stunt, and the capsule does not come back, what will the American public say? It will NOT be an enthusiastic response, it will be like “Boeing had some problems on a test of StarLiner and so we should terminate the Boeing space program” sort of response.
The “stunt” is to prepare the way for a human space flight just as with commercial crew. It’s no different than the planned flight, someday, of the SLS/Orion Artemis 1, only at a fraction of the cost of it. And like Artemis 2, the second flight will have crew aboard, again sooner at a fraction of the cost of it.
As for wasting a capsule. Tell me, exactly what do you think the future plans are for the launch abort test capsule? It will probably be just left in a hanger to rot away or if it’s lucky end up in some minor museum as an attraction.
You mean doing a manned lunar flyby this year? I don’t see that happening, and I say this as a big SpaceX fan. It’s just way too dangerous.
I could see them doing a unmanned lunar mission using the excess hardware, it would fit nicely as part of their bid for Artemis lunar lander, showing they can enter/exit NRHO would have some value.
Yes, it would be without a crew, just like the DM1 flights were and for the same purpose, to demonstrate it is capable of taking humans to the lunar Gateway just like Orion. Think of it as a backup for Artemis 1, only at 10% of the price.?
Well, they are already on the books to launch a robotic lunar lander in July, 2021. The second CLPS mission is flying on a Falcon 9. That’s not quite what you were suggesting, but it’s close.
If you consider Gunther’s Space Page a reliable source (it usually is), then DM-2 and the first crew rotation will use different Dragons. And I believe you are correct about NASA only wanting new vehicles. For now; they said the same thing about Falcon 9 and Dragon for commercial cargo. Then they changed their mind when it became clear reusability actually works. In any case, that would give them a couple of previously used Dragon 2s this year. If they actually wanted to send a Dragon to the Moon, I’d also expect they would do multiple flights without a crew, just to break anything that’s likely to break. On the other hand, pad availability at LC-39A might become a bottle neck.
That of course is the nice thing about the FH and Dragon2, its cheap to be able to do multiple flights without crew. Maybe even send the same Dragon2 around twice as a test of reusability. But at $2-3 billion a flight its hard to do more that a single test of the SLS/Orion.
Peak Apollo NASA annual budget is about $37B, this year’s NASA budget is $22B, I wouldn’t call a mere 1.7x difference “dwarf what is available now”, especially considering today NASA can purchase LV half the size of Saturn V at a small fraction of the cost.
As for political will, that is inverse proportional to the funding needed. If it costs $1, there would be infinite amount of political will, it’s all relative.
That’s true. I bet less than 10 percent of the American public is even aware of the Artemis program, much less approve of it. Everybody heard of the Apollo program back in the 60’s and a lot of people approved of it (although not quite 50 percent).
The politics is largely about the money. I doubt 10% of the voters have ever heard of McMurdo or the NSF Antarctic Program. But the government does pay for that. And, to be honest, there isn’t any political maneuvering over air support for Antarctic research being done by the New York Air National Guard. I’d be shocked if even 1% of the voters knew or cared about that detail. So _if_ the cost of lunar work falls below some threshold, I don’t think widespread public support or even public awareness is necessary. The trick is figuring out a way to do it below that threshold. Personally, I don’t think SLS does that.
If you’re referring to the SpaceX Crew Dragon for Demo-2, no, it could not go to the Moon. It does not have the necessary equipment (communications, at least, perhaps more). I hope you’re not seriously referring to the Saturn V on static display…
No, I was referring to the one used for the Launch Abort test. As for the communication equipment, I expect SpaceX knows what is needed and will add it when refurbishing it. Remember, Dragon2 was designed for deep space flight and its Elon Musk’s habit to not delete capabilities even if not used. FYI, from a few years ago before SpaceX started focusing on the Starship
https://www.spacex.com/news…
February 27, 2017
SpaceX to Send Privately Crewed Dragon Spacecraft Beyond the Moon Next Year
And no, I am not referring to the Saturn V but to the flight proven Falcon Heavy. The FH has more than enough power to send Dragon2 around the Moon IF SpaceX has a reason to do so. Hopefully NASA will give them that reason.
What communications equipment? We’re talking about the Moon. Communications with a spacecraft at Jupiter takes some work, but the Moon? Maybe for a CubeSat with only a 10 cm antenna and a few watts to push out it, but for a crew vehicle like Dragon 2? That should be easy. They might need to grab arrayed DSN antenna time, and it might just be a voice link. Live, HDTV is not mission critical. In that context, I don’t think this an issue.
Meh…
I assume this is all about November. I would think a stop at Glenn would be in order as the election gets closer. I do love it though when Pence channels Malcolm X!
Jean-Paul Sartre. Although Malcom X might deserve credit for the English translation. And certainly for making the English version famous. But I still prefer M. Sartre’s version.
If Pence was channeliing Sartre, I would think it would be Nausea.
When most of us read “by any means necessary” that means accept a LOT of risk, that means skip testing. If we focus on the mission over the means does that imply that if systems fail testing we press on with them anyway? What is the motivation for the 2024 goal – a phony race with China still?
If we accept schedule pressure and lose a capsule it would be bad. If we lose a crew (to win a phony race to the Moon) it would be unacceptable.
It’s worse than that — the motivation for 2024 is to give Trump something to brag about before the end of his hoped-for second term in office. Certainly not a good reason to risk the lives of the astronauts by compromising safety.
Tell me, wouldn’t it be nice to know you had the Dragon2 available as a rescue vehicle if anything went wrong with the Orion at the Gateway? That is one way to reduce risk.
If that decision is made – yes it would be great. But where is the money coming from? Do we add that since some space enthusiast would like to see it? There are MANY things that MANY of us would like to see.
We need to see real thought in taking risk, not add lots more risk to be able to claim that we will reduce risk in some distant future scenario.
So anyone that doesn’t work for NASA is merely a “space enthusiast”? Even if they have numerous published academic papers on space policy?
Yes you are a space enthusiast – I leave it at that.
You did not address my questions – where are you going to get the money for this mission? Are you willing to fund it?
In your next paper please address the validity of adding a lot of work (taking many qualified people away from the main effort) and taking the chance of a launch failure, a failure in the space flying phase, and a failure in the recovery phase just to get a “nice to know” capability.
By the way space is far bigger than NASA today. The US Air Force has a huge program, there are independent commercial programs. For instance Digital Globe flies the World View spacecraft – that is not NASA. There are many highly qualified people out here to talk about what is reasonable. We like having enthusiasts contribute but they need to curb their enthusiasm for very expensive projects that take a lot of effort.
Mr. Bridenstine at least, has offered a coherent reason for a 2024 deadline. As he puts it, the greatest risk is political. Since every new administration seems to change the next big goal for NASA, NASA will get nowhere unless the next big goal can, at least in theory, be accomplished before a new administration comes in.
If that’s the real reason, we definitely won’t be able to launch this year.
“When most of us read “by any means necessary” that means accept a LOT of risk, that means skip testing. “: That’s not how I read it, in fact he explained what he meant right in the next sentence: “In order to succeed, we are going to continue to focus on the mission over the means. We want to challenge each one of you here at Langley: Consider every available option and platform to meet our goals, including industry, government, and the entire American space enterprise.“
So what he meant is basically what ThomasLMatula said below: if FH/Dragon or Blue Moon/New Glenn or Starship can get us to the Moon faster, then we’ll use them.
If pence meant that I would agree with him, but he realizes (as a guy who has been in government for years) that those are NOT options. I think that Falcon Heavy would be a good booster but how much time would it take to switch over? A couple of years. We would have to human rate the Falcon Heavy, we would have to look at the Dragon capsule – it was designed with lunar reentry in mind but does it have what it needs? Using FH/Crew Dragon would mean taking the money/people/votes away from SLS/Orion. BTW I am no fan of those two.
As it is the chance of actually making it to the Moon by the end of 2024 is vanishingly small anyway. If we switch you will add a couple of years to that.
Don’t have to switch out SLS/Orion, Bridenstine’s current plan is pretty good: Limit SLS/Orion to crew transport to NRHO, then let commercial companies to build lunar landers, this is a compromise that covers both sides and have broad support, also best utilizes the talent and hardware from both sides (new space and old space).
The problem is Boeing and some people from congress is trying to sabotage this and mandate lunar lander to be built by Boeing under cost plus contract and launched on SLS. I think this is what Pence is trying to prevent by saying “consider every available option and platform”
The question still remains: where are the additional billions coming from? You propose keeping the very expensive SLS/Orion and adding another capability. The commercial companies are NOT going to donate their time and systems – we have to pay for them.