‘Blunt’ NASA boss says sequestration will widen the gap with Russian space program, Huntsville Times
The gap between America and Russia, which can still launch astronauts, will not close, Bolden said. “The gap is going to get bigger,” he said. “I’m just being very blunt about. Anybody who thinks this is no big deal – it’s a big deal.”
No furloughs seen in NASA’s Huntsville programs because of sequestration, Huntsville Times
“NASA isn’t expecting budget sequestration to lead to contractor furloughs in Huntsville, where work on a new heavy-lift rocket remains one of the agency’s top priorities. However, 26 research contracts to small companies and universities have been put on hold to keep funding for the big rocket secure. That was the word this morning from NASA officials attending a Small Business Alliance meeting at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center today. More than 450 contractors, and subcontractors attended to learn more about getting NASA contracts.”
White House: State-by-State Sequester Impact Reports, Politisite.com
“Today, the White House is releasing new state-by-state reports on the devastating impact the sequester will have on jobs and middle class families across the country if Congressional Republicans fail to compromise to avert the sequester by March 1st.”
Keith’s note: I did not see NASA mentioned anywhere – but I might have missed something.

Biologist, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA Space Biologist and Payload integrator, Editor of NASAWatch.com and Astrobiology.com, Lapsed climber, Explorer, Synaesthete, Former Challenger Center board member...

11 replies on “Sequestration Impacts in Huntsville”

  1. Commercial is again sacrificed to save SLS.  Even Bolden says it makes no sense, but he is powerless to stop it. Oh, the irony of it. 

    2.  “Commercial” space is hardly being sacrificed.  Rather it is “Govt Contractor” SX being sacrificed for “Govt Contractor” BA+MSFC.  Note that MSFC is part of the surviving program.

      Secondly, it doesn’t really matter, human spaceflight has no clear mission anyway.  It is on an endless holding pattern to LEO.  Provide one compelling reason that the US requires men in space that is worthy of a national imperative.

      Thirdly, according to SX, they will do just fine without their Govt contracts as they have significant backlog with true commercial customers that will allow them to expand to commercial human space flight, albeit at a slower pace.  Given no national imperative for USG manned space and only a conceptual notion of a private manned space business case, the slower pace poses no issues.

      1.  “human spaceflight has no clear mission anyway”If it can become practical and reasonable in cost, it can provide a major new tourist industry that would attract foreign visitors and capital to the US. Research could also be efficiently conducted by humans if the cost of access to LEO can be reduced to $2M or less.

        1. “… it can provide a major new tourist industry”
          That is your national imperative for human space flight, tourism?  Seriously?  Okay, let’s take that at face value.  Developing that market doesn’t require NASA involvement, isn’t in their charter, and quite frankly would slow/impair any real commercial market given the nature of its bureaucracy.  Why would you willingly put NASA in your critical path with your own money at stake?  As far as the low-cost to space access, SpaceX is already there, at least according to the SpaceX fan-club on this site and others.

          1. Tourism is the largest industry on the Space Coast, so don’t knock it. Most human travel to exotic locations like Antarctica and the far north is for tourism or research, both critically dependant on price. Although there’s always discussion about resource utilization when we get to the asteroids, that is also impractical without vast  reductions in cost. Yes, flying tourists into orbit for exotic vacations is pretty mundane compared with “2001” or the giddiness of the Moon Race, but at the right price tourism could be a commercial market for sustainable human spaceflight, something we don’t have now.

      2.  How about exploiting the solar system, kind of like how we expanded across and exploited the continent?

        If your argument is that we should start with robotics first then fine.

        1. That might be a viable path but it only really works if there is some recognized guarantee of “property rights”.  The US Government fulfilled that role (mostly anyway) for settlers expanding west by authorizing transfer of US Govt land and associated mineral/water rights and enforcing those rights against theft and/or squatters.  Who does that for space bodies (asteroids, comets, moons, planets, etc.)?

          It’s not really a robot versus human issue, it’s a mission cost per returned science or economic value issue.  To date, there is no compelling reason to expend the resources (money) to put humans in space given what potential returns that monetary investment might yield.

          1.  Understood. What if a company mines a pile of gold or something from an asteroid and drops it somewhere for safekeeping. Is there anything in treaties saying that is not their property? (Even if the asteroid isn’t their property)… like Mineral Rights. Just thinking hypothetically of course. Property rights might not matter that much in the early days since who is going to steal your asteroid if there are only a handful of companies getting into space?

            You mentioned the West, well that reminds me that space could be a Wild West. Maybe nobody to guarantee property rights, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t money to be made 🙂  That is what could happen if international laws and their executive bodies can’t keep up with the expansion. I believe there has been a sci-fi show or two about that.

  2. It’s as simple as this: if Commercial Crew is slow-tracked, crews flying on Orion/SLS still don’t happen before 2020, in the most optimistic time-line.  So, all it does is increase the time NASA is dependent on Roscosmos from three years to seven, more likely eight.

    Administrator Bolden must, must, must hammer this home the next time he appears before Congress.  He must have the courage to tell them that no amount of screaming, threatening, accusations and waving their hands in the air calling him a ‘defeatist’ will change anything.  If NASA loses half a decade of indigenous human flight, it will be their fault and theirs alone.

  3. Keith Appreciate the Link to our story on sequestration impact reports released by the White House on Politisite  

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