Augustine Commission Members Announced

[mmeijeri]

I'm not absolving him, his architecture needed to be resilient enough to handle those changes, which are part of the equation in any public project.  It has not been.

Agreed, but in fairness, he was dealt a lousy hand. Recently there has been a lot of criticism from the DIRECT camp about thumbs on the scale, which conveniently forgets that a) without that thumb on the scale there wouldn't be an SDLV at all and b) it may not have been Griffin's thumb. The original mandate for SDLV may have come after ESAS, but that doesn't mean people didn't put pressure on Griffin earlier. Having to preserve the shuttle stack at a time when commercial players are trying to get into LEO is a difficult constraint.

How do you get from a side-mount LEO vehicle to an-inline beyond LEO vehicle with a team that has never designed a rocket before and with commercial competitors breathing down your neck? Using the 4 seg booster as a first stage as originally planned and only building a new upper stage, reusing the existing SSME does sound like an incremental plan. A pity it didn't work. Did they ever consider RL-10 or MB-60 on the AIUS or even a Centaur? That would have needed a smaller capsule of course.

Overreach, no science, no international cooperation, staying the course, are all typical of the Bush administration and it may be unfair to put all the blame on Griffin. The new administration is setting a new set of constraints. So far we have heard ISS extension, international cooperation, postponing moon landings, more science, budget cuts, commercial players, EELV and a review panel with no obvious shuttle huggers on it.

[mmeijeri]

Do you know of a good overview of SEI and its subincrements?

Found the answer to my own question here: America at the Threshold

I was under the impression it was a huge monolithic plan, like OASIS. Now I happen to like OASIS, but it only provides a picture of where we want to end up, and no way to get there. If it were incremental it would have one to two year milestones that show real progress and immediate applications.

The plan is much more incremental than I had thought, though with individual steps that are too large.

[Lee Jay]

Using the 4 seg booster as a first stage as originally planned and only building a new upper stage, reusing the existing SSME does sound like an incremental plan. A pity it didn't work.

And they should have jettisoned it as soon as they found out it wouldn't work instead of abandoning the concept and trying to develop two new engines and two new stages instead of one new stage.

[mmeijeri]

And they should have jettisoned it as soon as they found out it wouldn't work instead of abandoning the concept and trying to develop two new engines and two new stages instead of one new stage.

Absolutely.

[Antares]

Mars Wars is another good one about the political side of SEI
history.nasa.gov/sp4410.pdf

[nooneofconsequence]

Mars Wars is another good one about the political side of SEI
history.nasa.gov/sp4410.pdf

Perfect example of the "greenhouse game". If you don't know about the book "Games People Play", came out about the same time.

Glad you posted this - too much is eerily similar to VSE. And with the similarities of the Bolden appointment like Truly it gets scary.

This was where the political vision (actually empty marketing - they really wanted an "Apollo reminiscence" or carny act that they could fluff up like an Echo I balloon) and an Mars Society like grand vision done super (unbelievably) efficiently came into conflict. Instead of assembling dozens of competitive "circus acts" in order to play off for the cheapest thrill,  the 90 day commission gave POTUS a single path vision 30x more costly and full of long term commitment - exactly what they were attempting to avoid. "New technologies" was a code phrase for allowing other industry(nuclear) interests to enter into the pork barrel fray - they could have cared less about real technology!

The loss of confidence that followed predicated many, many disasters. One could easily see VSE following the same path but for different reasons.

You really have to understand where the political consensus is for manned space in order to do accurate roadmaps of where to take it.

The most obvious of these was the Moon race during the cold war, which was why it was so successful. And also why it died so quickly once the race was won. Largely its how you articulate a political objective here. And commissions don't do that - politicians do.
Commissions yank back control - that is what they are for.

add:
Excerpt:
"In the end, this led to his [truly's] firing and the hiring of Dan Goldin. SEI’s outcome demonstrates how important it is for the president and NASA administrator to be on the same page when trying to gain approval for a major human spaceflight initiative."

[Blackstar]

Lots of things done wrong there.  Perhaps the biggest one was rushing the decision.  Bush 1 entered office in January, did not have the space team until March, and they announced a major new initiative in July.  That's really only four months to make a major decision.  Not enough time.

There were a lot of knock-on effects as well.  For instance, rushing the decision meant that they didn't realize that NASA was not capable of performing it.  And if they had really considered the situation, they would have realized that NASA was already undertaking space station design and didn't have the people or the resources to begin planning for a lunar-Mars program as well.

When it came time to draft the Vision for Space Exploration, Bush II's people sought to learn from the previous mistakes.  They certainly did in a number of ways, and did quite a few things differently.

[Antares]

You really have to understand where the political consensus is for manned space in order to do accurate roadmaps of where to take it.

That is a tremendous quote.  There is no political consensus, so there's no wonder we can't get moving in any certain direction (or at least one that's justifiable beyond keeping the usual suspects employed).

[William Barton]

As I've mentioned before, I knew some of the people involved in drawing up SEI, and my feeling then (and now) is that they simply got carried away with themselves and forgot to stay grounded in what was really possible. My biggest fear with Augustine II is that exactly the opposite will happen: they'll feel they need to "think small," and instead of too much vision. we'll get too little. Call it the Three Bears theory of history! ;-)

[mars.is.wet]

You really have to understand where the political consensus is for manned space in order to do accurate roadmaps of where to take it.

That is a tremendous quote.  There is no political consensus, so there's no wonder we can't get moving in any certain direction (or at least one that's justifiable beyond keeping the usual suspects employed).

We had political consensus.  Then Steidel took us one way, Griffin another, and now EELV and others are pulling us in a third.  You know if any of those make progress forward but have a hickup, there will be another player.

Griffin said it best when he observed that the space community is the very definition of a circular firing squad.  Limited resources and monolithic programs (how it must be to accomplish great things) lead to scorched earth fighting between concepts and winner take all mentalities between mission areas.

His point was always that if we work together, the pie could get bigger rather than being split into smaller pieces to different constituencies.  Another thing he was right on ...

[mars.is.wet]

As I've mentioned before, I knew some of the people involved in drawing up SEI, and my feeling then (and now) is that they simply got carried away with themselves and forgot to stay grounded in what was really possible. My biggest fear with Augustine II is that exactly the opposite will happen: they'll feel they need to "think small," and instead of too much vision. we'll get too little. Call it the Three Bears theory of history! ;-)

I am serious when I say, NASA and the nation had its shot at the Vision.  No matter which concepts were chose, it is hard to escape that we are further from the first new crew capability today than we were when the vision was announced.  It would not be unreasonable for the panel to recommend reigning in objectives, letting NASA complete a relatively simple task (humans to LEO) and the regroup (despite the loss of continuity). 

In 2004, a number of people testified to Congress that this would happen, that NASA could not focus on ISS, and the Moon at the same time, and that the missions should be done more sequentially.  They were spot on.

[Danny Dot]

As I've mentioned before, I knew some of the people involved in drawing up SEI, and my feeling then (and now) is that they simply got carried away with themselves and forgot to stay grounded in what was really possible. My biggest fear with Augustine II is that exactly the opposite will happen: they'll feel they need to "think small," and instead of too much vision. we'll get too little. Call it the Three Bears theory of history! ;-)

I am serious when I say, NASA and the nation had its shot at the Vision.  No matter which concepts were chose, it is hard to escape that we are further from the first new crew capability today than we were when the vision was announced.  It would not be unreasonable for the panel to recommend reigning in objectives, letting NASA complete a relatively simple task (humans to LEO) and the regroup (despite the loss of continuity). 

In 2004, a number of people testified to Congress that this would happen, that NASA could not focus on ISS, and the Moon at the same time, and that the missions should be done more sequentially.  They were spot on.

You are so correct.  I was working on OSP to get to ISS when it was canceled so we could go to moon and Mars -- without an increase to NASA's budget.  I didn't think it was possible at the time and still don't think it is possible.  O'Keefe was a money guy.  How did he let this impossible money idea become NASA's vision?  When NASA decided to build a new booster rather than man rate an EELV, I threw up my hands and retired.

I also did'nt/don't like the idea of not using ISS after the huge amount of time and money building the darn thing.

Danny Deger

[Antares]

@mars.is.wet: I don't believe EELV is a 3rd way, or better said Steidle's wasn't a prescribed way.  It let more natural forces (market, technical reasoning) decide the way rather than politics.

@Danny, I think your timeline is a little off.  The VSE was not an "impossible money idea" under O'Keefe.  Its spiral development allowed us to actually bite off what we could chew and fund and field something new before proceeding on to the next thing.  Such an approach with actual new flying hardware verifiable by TV news cameras and not CGI would have developed DC and Main Street confidence in NASA.  It was only ESAS that levied the no money margin, no mass margin architecture on us.  O'Keefe had been gone for many months by then.

[Danny Dot]

snip
@Danny, I think your timeline is a little off.  The VSE was not an "impossible money idea" under O'Keefe.  Its spiral development allowed us to actually bite off what we could chew and fund and field something new before proceeding on to the next thing.  Such an approach with actual new flying hardware verifiable by TV news cameras and not CGI would have developed DC and Main Street confidence in NASA.  It was only ESAS that levied the no money margin, no mass margin architecture on us.  O'Keefe had been gone for many months by then.

I did think the first time I heard of going to the moon on the current budget I thought it was impossible -- especially when the idea of outposts, access to 100% of the moon, and anytime return were brought forward.  This all happened before ESAS.  I don't think any architecture and/or spiral development would make this happen.

Spiral development doesn't help when you have to develop a big delta in capability, like the first lunar lander or the first big booster.  This is a big development chunk that must be taken in one big step.  Spiral development is great for something like fielding a fighter that at first can't do air-to-ground then later adding air-to-ground capability.  For example you can't spiral develop from 50% access to the moon to 100% access, this is a complete redesign of everything.

Can you give up some more details on the use of spiral development to make VSE work on the current budget?  I didn't and don't see a lot.  It is a great management buzz word, but I see it being misused to solve the budget problems with VSE.

Danny Deger

[mars.is.wet]

snip
@Danny, I think your timeline is a little off.  The VSE was not an "impossible money idea" under O'Keefe.  Its spiral development allowed us to actually bite off what we could chew and fund and field something new before proceeding on to the next thing.  Such an approach with actual new flying hardware verifiable by TV news cameras and not CGI would have developed DC and Main Street confidence in NASA.  It was only ESAS that levied the no money margin, no mass margin architecture on us.  O'Keefe had been gone for many months by then.

I did think the first time I heard of going to the moon on the current budget I thought it was impossible -- especially when the idea of outposts, access to 100% of the moon, and anytime return were brought forward.  This all happened before ESAS.  I don't think any architecture and/or spiral development would make this happen.

Spiral development doesn't help when you have to develop a big delta in capability, like the first lunar lander or the first big booster.  This is a big development chunk that must be taken in one big step.  Spiral development is great for something like fielding a fighter that at first can't do air-to-ground then later adding air-to-ground capability.  For example you can't spiral develop from 50% access to the moon to 100% access, this is a complete redesign of everything.

Can you give up some more details on the use of spiral development to make VSE work on the current budget?  I didn't and don't see a lot.  It is a great management buzz word, but I see it being misused to solve the budget problems with VSE.

Danny Deger

The amount of development money spent on Apollo (full cost) in $2005 was about $150B.  A signficant portion was for facilities.

The amount of money available for Cx from 2004-2020 was about $100B. More importantly, without SSP and ISS, there was $10B available for HSR after 2015. 

We estimated that there was enough money for the requirements as-is (perhaps without polar access and all-time return) and enough to start work on an outpost (but not enough to complete it or service it) and to return to the Moon by 2020.  There was 30% margin on all estimates at the time.

With the effective $11B in budget cuts to NASA through 2008, extention of ISS through 2020 in the assumptions, and reduction of steady-state HSF funding to $8B (now reduced to less than $7B/yr if I read Obama's budget right) ... things that were possible in ESAS are no longer possible (both technical and schedule) ... no matter which launch vehicle you pick.

[Danny Dot]

First meeting June 17th.  Open to the public, but no statement of TV coverage.

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=31351

It is interesting that very few items are on the agenda, and EELVs are one of them.  I would love to see NASA managers testifying on why EELVs can't do the job.

I also find it interesting that there is not a word of this meeting on the NASA website -- that I could find.  In fact I couldn't find a word about the new Commission on the NASA web site.  I don't think this is an oversight by NASA. 

Danny Deger

[mars.is.wet]

First meeting June 17th.  Open to the public, but no statement of TV coverage.

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=31351

It is interesting that very few items are on the agenda, and EELVs are one of them.  I would love to see NASA managers testifying on why EELVs can't do the job.

I also find it interesting that there is not a word of this meeting on the NASA website -- that I could find.  In fact I couldn't find a word about the new Commission on the NASA web site.  I don't think this is an oversight by NASA. 

Danny Deger

Please stop looking for conspiracies.  There are lots of FACA (and non-FACA) committees that NASA doesn't put on its site.

The fact that the meeting is being held away from HQ and that they aren't "sponsoring" it on their site is appropriate.  People are already complaining that NASA is paying for it, managing it, and are involved in the day-to-day activities.  They are trying to keep a healthy distance while still doing a good job.

[Danny Dot]

snip
Please stop looking for conspiracies. 
snip

Please stop saying people that believe NASA was and is acting improperly are "conspiracy theorists."

There are no "conspiracies".  NASA is simply behaving the way it has for many years and was well documented in the two accident investigations.  I was right in the middle of it until the summer of 2006 when I retired from NASA.  I am not speaking as an outside observer.  I was right in the middle of it as it happened.

Danny Deger

[kraisee]

Mars,
I completely agree with you that the goals set out by ESAS are no longer affordable -- but only with the caveat that the current 2-launch vehicle architecture plans are the only yardstick.

If your architecture choice removed all of the costs for a second, even larger, launch vehicle you would 'instantly' save roughly $15 billion in development money alone, not to mention save another billion each year in fixed operational costs as well.   That adds up to a very significant proportion of the total costs.


To imply that no solutions are affordable just because Ares' costs are now too high is quite a leap to be making.


DIRECT, for one, *can* afford a robust Lunar program which meets all of the original ESAS goals, within that $7bn/year cost target you suggest.

Ross.

[mars.is.wet]

snip
Please stop looking for conspiracies. 
snip

Please stop saying people that believe NASA was and is acting improperly are "conspiracy theorists."

There are no "conspiracies".  NASA is simply behaving the way it has for many years and was well documented in the two accident investigations.  I was right in the middle of it until the summer of 2006 when I retired from NASA.  I am not speaking as an outside observer.  I was right in the middle of it as it happened.

Danny Deger

Sorry Danny, I'm not saying that there weren't mistakes in the past. 

What I'm trying to stem is the calls that if NASA puts the panel info up on their site, they are in control (and therefore biased) and if they don't, they are purposefully ignoring the panel.

I'm tired of "no win" scenarios, and people continually put NASA in that position through their 20-20 hindsight. 

You've done great service for NASA in pointing out their mistakes, but that doesn't mean that all actions they take (such as leaving the panel info off their sites) are mistakes.  The conspiracy (vice mistake) was my inference ... apologies if you didn't mean it that way.