YM COLUMN ARCHIVE

August 19, 2009

No possibility to realize manned lunar mission of NASA by 2020

Manned flight plan made by Bush administration is now under total review at NASA directed by President Obama. The committee responsible for this review is “Augustine Panel” chaired by Mr. Norman Augustine, ex-president of Rockeed Martin. The panel is composed of ten members including Ms. Sally Ride, the first US female astronaut, and Mr. John Logsdon, authority figure on space policy. The initial responsibility of the Panel was to offer opinions on feasible manned flight plan within the range of budget indicated by President Obama. However as a result of high paced meetings, they came to the final conclusion that under the current budget allocated to NASA (18 billions a year), the best NASA can do is to operate International Space Station (ISS) until 2020, therefore manned flight beyond Low Earth Orbit to Moon and Mars would be unrealizable at least for another twenty years.

As of August 6, the seven plans were finally sorted out of total three thousand proposals, out of which three are based on the current budget during the period of 2010 to 2020 and the other four were on the premise of incremental budget, though specific amount was not indicated. The budget allowed for NASA to realize manned flight before 2020 is approximately eighty billion dollars, which is short of as much as twenty-eight billions as compared to the prospective budget needed for implementing Ares and Orion projects. For your reference let me explain below of the seven plans.

(1) The simplest plan is the existing plan as it is, which is to terminate space shuttle by 2010 by shifting to the new transportation system under the combination of “Ares I” rocket and “Orion” spaceship, thus abandoning the ISS onto the Pacific Ocean at 2015. As Ares’ debut is scheduled to be in 2016, until then Russian Soyuz will be in service. The budget needed for the development of “Ares V” which is of absolute necessity for sending men to moon to land there is to be annually reviewed throughout the process. To add as a basic knowledge, the scheme NASA terms as “Constellation Program” is the manned flight plan to Moon and Mars, of which program consists of disposable “Ares I” and “Ares V” rockets succeeding after space shuttle and “Orion” spaceship to go to Moon and Mars, and also of “Altair” Lander to land on lunar surface.

(2) The other plans within the framework of current budget is to discontinue space shuttle by 2010 but to extend the operation of ISS until 2020, instead of which NASA is to develop “Delta IV”, “Falcon 9” and “Taurus 2” in place of “Ares I”. There is no change to “Orion”.

(3) The third plan also within the framework of current budget is to discontinue shuttle service in 2010; to abandon ISS in 2015; to call off “Ares I”; and to send men to lunar orbit or to Lagrange points by using smaller sized two types of new “Ares V” while depending upon Soyuz for flight back and forth to ISS. In this case NASA has to give up landing on moon.

(4) One of the plans to increase budget is to extend shuttle service until 2015 and then seamlessly carried through to larger transportation system by using more of the present shuttle technology than current plan of “Ares V”. The new transportation system is to be used for construction of base on moon, in which case ISS is to be operated until 2020 while depending on Russian Soyuz and other commercial rockets for back and forth to ISS after retirement of shuttle. Intention of this plan is obviously clear; that is not to depend upon Soyuz.

(5) The second and third plans of incremental budget are to retire shuttle by 2010 as scheduled; to operate ISS until 2020; to call off both Ares I and V to travel to the Low Earth Orbit by Soyuz or large commercial rockets; to use large rocket fully applied of accumulated technology of NASA or improved type of Atlas V. Only the difference between the second and third plans is the destination; the second plan to head for moon and then to Mars; the third is for lunar orbit/Lagrange points/near earth asteroids.

(6) The fourth plan of incremental budget is to directly head for manned space flight to Mars without lunar plan, which is so-called “Mars Direct”. This plan is really a “brave” project to make full use of Ares V with in-space refueling, and so moon flight is only used to provide test opportunity for hardware of Mars flight.

The Panel has been having meetings at very high pace for past several weeks to have consequently come to the conclusion above stated. The Augustine Panel said at the press conference on August 12, “In order to go somewhere to solar system territory beyond the Low Earth Orbit by 2030, we need to increase annual budget of NASA by three billion dollars at least.”

However, strange enough, what the Panel advised White House on August 14 is not any of the seven plans but the four items as follows:

• To continue Constellation Program as scheduled.
• To continue ISS operation until 2020 to use commercial rockets for transportation to ISS. To continue development of future exploration rocket.
• To continue space shuttle service until 2015. To continue development of new transportation system for moon by making full use of shuttle technology.
• To newly develop large rockets to explore solar system.

I presume it must have been difficult to select any particular plan because of the conflicts of interest among committee members, which seem to me consequently led to the rather desperate conclusion, “We need more money. Otherwise we are quite at a loss what to do.” From now on, I suppose routine process of negotiations between government and enterprises will be going on behind the doors. I was expecting clear-cut conclusion, which ended up rather frustration to me.

I welcome your opinions on this column to the following E-mail address.
matogawa@planetary.or.jp

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