The road to finding the new way into space has been a hard one. But now a clear picture has begun to come into focus. While the journey will be long, the first steps are being taken to return man to space and ultimately to Mars.
The Death and Rebirth of the Constellation Program
Fundamentally, the Constellation Program, enacted under the Bush administration, proposed to position NASA as the foundation of both fronts of space exploration -- missions to low Earth orbit and deep space exploration. Such a path turned out to be costly; with budget overruns, extended timetables and questions about the very sustainability of the program causing the new administration to call for a change.
The resulting declaration by President Obama back in February that the Constellation Program was all but dead, and the virtual privatization of low-Earth orbit missions was met with considerable distention and hostility. In retrospect, the Obama plan left out too much detail, making broad sweeping change with little indication how he might accomplish his lofty goals.
I have to admit, that I was not a fan of Constellation due to its identity of trying to be everything for every situation. But clearly the direction laid out by the Executive Office was not the answer either. And now Congress has presented the President with a version of his plan that is steeped in compromise, and I have to say, it's not really the answer either. But that's alright. It does not have to be perfect, it only has to lay the groundwork for the future, making clear the direction NASA will take from here on out. The details will be amended, the budget numbers will expand and contract (though I anticipate much more expansion than contraction). It's the goals that matter now.
And while I had hoped that the goals and function of NASA would become clear once the budget was passed, it appears that we may have to wait a bit longer. But while clarity has yet to be achieved, the path at least looks a bit less fuzzy.
How Will We Return to Space?
While the Space shuttle fleet will remain in operation through 2011, we will need to rely on foreign powers for several years while the development of a replacement takes place. And a big part of this new vision is the development of a heavy lift rocket as well as a new crew module that will ultimately provide a replacement for the retiring shuttle fleet as well as serve as the platform for reaching beyond the Moon. Such work was already taking place as part of the now defunct Constellation Program.
This new legislation, however, has revived certain elements of Constellation, particularly the Orion Crew Module. NASA currently plans to essentially continue the Orion project in its current course, having already had successful tests of the abort and rocket propulsion systems.
But this brings to mind the conditions under which Constellation and the Orion Crew Module were cancelled in the first place. Namely, the projects were behind schedule and over budget. So why are we continuing these very same programs?
Well, another aspect of this restructuring is that the guidelines under which NASA and its contractors has been operating have also changed. While the details aren't exactly clear, it seems that now Orion should be ready for flight tests by 2013. In this day and age of continual delays I remain skeptical of this timeline, but it is nonetheless encouraging that progress is being made.
How is this possible? Well even as the specifics of the NASA bill were discussed ad nauseam in Congress and the future of the program was in doubt, Lockheed Martin, the primary contractor on the project, continued the arduous work of designing, building and testing the components of the system. Lockheed even went to the trouble of designing flight scenarios and missions for which the capsule would be used.
That last point was especially interesting considering that even once Orion was integrated back into the legislation its designated purpose was reduced to an emergency escape capsule for the International Space Station, a far cry from the centerpiece of the manned space flight program for which it was intended.
And this is one of the remaining problems of the recently passed legislation. How are all the pieces of the space puzzle going to fit together? Congress has commissioned these various projects, among others, but the important details about their function and use remain in flux. Will the Orion, with all its complexity and expense be relegated to emergency functions only? Will the heavy lift rocket, which is woefully underfunded, ever even reach the darkness of space? And, more fundamentally, what purpose will the rocket serve if the module for which it is designed (Orion) never serve its intended purpose; would a new module have to be designed for the rocket?
The short answer to all of these questions is that only time will tell. The important first step of standing up and making a commitment to the manned space flight program will pave the way for the future. All I can really offer is my instinct that, considering the public scrutiny now at play in this boondoggle, is that the highlight programs (those that involve lots of money and jobs, such as those listed here) will be purposed to their full potential.
