Members of the Agustin Committee also encourage reliance on the private market for manned launches to the International Space Station
The Augustin Committee published its full report at the end of the week. While it did not make specific recommendations regarding NASA's manned flight program, they offered five options and made it possible to formulate a flexible plan that would allow access to multiple destinations outside of low Earth orbit. The report also encourages commercial space initiatives for a flight to the International Space Station.
"The various options speak for themselves," said the chairman of the committee, Norman Agustin at a press conference following the publication of the report. "We believe that there is a clear goal for the manned space program, but for safety reasons we do not rule out a direct flight to them. We have proposed several alternatives for building heavy payload launch capabilities, and we believe this is essential to the manned space program. We also believe that it is time to create a civil-commercial market for launching humans into orbit around the Earth."
However, the strongest point established by the committee is that NASA needs an additional budget of at least 3 billion dollars a year to achieve anything.
"The main conclusion of the committee is that the manned flight program is on an unstable course," Augustine said. "We say this due to the incompatibility between the vision of the program and the resources available for it." In the report, the members of the committee write that an additional budget is urgently required, otherwise it will not be possible to carry out manned launches at all or very few of them.
Meanwhile, the White House said that President Obama is committed to manned flights and he wants the US to have a solid and stable space program over time, but did not elaborate on the way in which the administration will implement the report's recommendations. NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden said he plans to meet with the president in November.
The 157-page report titled "Searching for a Manned Space Program Suitable for a Great Nation" is not much different from the initial report released in August but also offers evidence for the arguments made at the time. Agustin said.
The committee's consensus was that NASA must pursue a manned space program in a somewhat different way than the current return-to-the-moon route. The flexible plan will allow you to reach exciting and different destinations faster than landing on the moon.
"There are many ways to build a manned flight plan to Mars." Augustine said, for example circling the moon, circling Mars, landing on an asteroid, landing on one of the Martian moons Phobos or Demus and carrying out scientific missions from there. We can do these things quickly and not wait 15 years for the first major flight." said.
Another member of the committee, Ed Crowley added, "What made the flexible route make sense is that you can build parts of the overall assessment, for example the accelerator and the capsule, and begin to reach places with them such as a flight around the moon, a flight approaching a near-Earth asteroid, and much less energy will be required to travel around Mars than to land on the surface of the moon. You can build the heavy launcher and the capsule, and start exploring, and then build the landers."
Koleri compared these options using long-term savings to buying a car trailer for a short-term trip or buying a trailer and attaching it to the car.
When asked about a timetable, Crowley and Augustine said that it is likely that NASA will be able to leave low Earth orbit in the early 20s: "In the early to mid-XNUMXs, without giving an exact year, we could reach other destinations, a few years earlier than The prospect of landing on the moon" said Karolyi.
The report proposes an extension of the space shuttle program until 2011, instead of a little after half of 2010. "The rate of flights until 2010 is double what was recommended by the determining factors in the field of safety after the loss of the Columbia shuttle," said Augustine. "We believe that it is worth investing a little more money in 2011 and fly on a better and more realistic schedule. NASA does not have the money in the current budget to do this, we think that this is required by reality."
As for the Ares program, the panel did not call it an engineering failure, but a victim of the low budget compared to the need and the change in circumstances. "With enough time and budget, NASA can successfully develop, build and fly Ares 1," the report said. "The question is, should she do it?"
They said the Ares 1 flight scheduled for October 27 should go ahead as planned because there are still lessons to be learned from the demonstration. However, since the development is lagging and this will cause a delay in the delivery of the spacecraft, it will be too late for at least one of its missions - transporting passengers to the International Space Station. The panel recommends that a better option is for flights to Earth's orbit to be made through the private market. Augustine said that NASA should be more concerned with what is happening beyond Earth's orbit than performing a low orbit service.
The panel also discussed the development of heavy launchers based on rockets used by the Air Force to launch large satellites or a launcher based on the Space Shuttle design. The committee also recommends extending the life of the space station to 2020. The committee found that the return on investment in the station for both the US and its international partners would be increased by extending its life to 2020. "It seems unwise to bring the station down after 25 years of planning and assembly and only five years of regular activity. A decision not to extend the life of the space station will harm the US's ability to develop and lead international partnerships in the field of spaceflight. Moreover, the return on investment in the station will increase if it is financed at a level that will allow it to achieve its full potential," he said. Augustine.
Like the interim report, the committee also has five alternative recommendations in the final report:
- Keep the program as it is but extend the shuttle program to 2011 and the life of the space station to 2020. Without additional funding, the Ares rocket will not be available until 2020 and there will never be enough money to reach the moon.
- Maintain the current funding, cancel Ares 1, develop a version of Ares 5 that will be about two-thirds of the original design, and direct additional funds to extend the life of the space station until 2020. Purchase commercial launch services to low earth orbit. Ares missiles will be ready by 2025, then we can talk about returning to the moon in 2030.
- Add 3 billion dollars per year and advance the Constellation program to return to the moon. The International Space Station will be dismantled in 2016 to allow a return to the Moon in 2025.
- Add $3 billion per year, extend the station until 2020, and reach the moon in about 2025. Use the light version of Ares 5 or a similar version of the shuttle launcher to lift heavy loads.
- Add $3 billion per year, extend the shuttle program to 2011 and the station to 2020. Instead of landing on the moon, just circle it or reach near-Earth objects and even circle Mars. In this option, the light version of Ares 5, or Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicles (EELV) or alternatively a derivative of the shuttle will be used.
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The main expression is a budget, as the friends said before, therefore as long as there is a monetary economy that monitors the progress in all fields and especially in space technology, it will remain primitive.
The big problem of humanity is not the inability to advance technologically, but the control of the economy and the distribution of resources in a poor, incorrect and fixed way.
When the majority of humanity is busy and preoccupied with how to simply pass the time because almost everything humans do is mainly to waste time about the same as the Israeli government.
And of course it starts with the smallest things and stems from the monetary economy for example:
Most of the service providers are not necessary and their role can be performed automatically and almost without human touch.
For example banking companies, insurance, accounting, government offices, shops and many more.
Even in the agricultural and manufacturing system, these people are hardly needed in the inspection city.
And so it is possible to direct many more people to science and engineering and increase the progress many times over.
Of course, all of this is prevented by the economy practiced today where everyone tries to do less and earn more, even though there has long been no sense for economic profit beyond a certain limit, it is neither useful nor purposeful, these are just numbers that have no use, this is greed for hearing and the inhibition of evolutionary development.
One can ask if this is what will help us to have bankers, economists, accountants, sellers, cashiers...
There is no need for them, we have endless resources in the throne universe, it is only a limitation that must be removed, it is a completely virtual word from a long time ago, no one understands what it does.
Does it really make sense to create cars that waste an astronomical amount of resources in order to move one person a few kilometers? It doesn't make sense if they used all the resources of creating the cars ever and operating them (many times sit because you are either standing in traffic or filling up or looking for parking or in a garage or in a test, etc.) could already reach not only this Mars, in my opinion, the moon Europa and send unmanned spacecraft to nearby star systems.
But of course we will not produce and throw away cars, we will produce a lot of things that are only destroyed and we will produce them again and again so that the "economy" will flourish so that the giant companies will be billionaires, trillionaires, quadrillionaires, etc., etc. Why is it good, what does it contribute.
Yes, it's true, nothing, just a passing craze.
Good luck to all of us and we hope that the monetary economy will finish its respectable chapter soon
Pashsh Iran, nice response..
But the technology is not the thing that delays the arrival to Mars, but the budget. If they start pouring bigger budgets into NASA (3 billion +) you and I will get to see a landing on Mars.. If not then even in another 50 years there will be nothing like Arye said regarding 1969.
good week .
The amount of nonsense here is amazing...
It was also once predicted that there would be flying spaceships instead of cars until now and it was in the respected science magazine scientific american..so what.
We have problems in space that are still waiting for technology to be developed for them. Nothing to do has not been solved since the 60s.
which has been in space for a long time is still problematic.. the fuel that a large spaceship that will hold humans inside will consume. Landing on Mars and taking off back from Mars are two completely different things.
Let's not talk about food...
NASA can't invent anything in this matter, so right now we are still at a loss as to what to do in the field of space when the only field in which we have really made the most impressive leaps out of all the fields required for space is the field of computing.
Unpleasant .. sucks .. but it is what it is.
Ron:
Mirom Golan's question was about technology development.
Others gave him reasonable answers and what do you do? You again bring up the "disclosure" project as if they are at all concerned with the budgets that will exist these days, the goals that they would like to achieve, and the like.
Do I even need to explain that it's irrelevant?
I am limited by the site administrator to one comment per article.
Response 3 asks a question regarding:
And I will answer honestly
UFOs and extraterrestrials the full picture: what is "easy" to digest - unbelievable
Statements of:
Former Canadian Defense Minister
Former astronauts
The official researcher of the British Israel Defense Forces
Members of the French Investigative Committee
Russian Air Force
Belgian Air Force
Area 51 workers in Groom Lake Nevada
Testimonies of the members of the security forces about the existence of UFOs, the existence of extraterrestrials - the reverse Hinduism of UFOs and contact with extraterrestrials since the late 40s
and much more
All on one page
http://www.emetaheret.org.il/wiki/doku.php?id=disclosure_project_על_פרוייקט_חשיפה
In every conversation and in every article in 1969 there was talk of a landing on Mars until the turn of the century at most or even earlier. Even the most pessimistic did not think then that in 2009 - 40 years in the future, we would be in the situation we are in today.
The unreasonable delay in the plans stems from a number of factors: the two shuttle disasters, periods of economic depression, NASA's policy that most missions can be performed using robotic spacecraft, and the government's investment policy in NASA.
In any case, the reason is not technological or safety. The technology for landing on Mars has existed for many years and the risk level of the mission (with today's technology) is not higher than the risk of landing on the moon (with the technology that was available in 1969).
The cost of the operation is not a problem either. The US can lift the project in the format of the space station, that is - as an international operation.
All that is required is a strong, charismatic and ambitious president who will recognize the importance of the operation like Kennedy did in his time.
The USA is still the strongest power in the world, but its position is getting weaker. A manned landing operation on Mars will help the USA to return to where it was in 1969.
For 3, the goal is not to recreate the landing of that time, but to build an advanced spacecraft with the latest technology that will allow to achieve much more than the Apollo program achieved, and such development costs money.
Even if we were content with just recreating the landing, it would be about as cheap as trying to build a car whose production was stopped 40 years ago (when in the meantime the assembly line has fallen apart, the components are not available on the market, and the engineers are retired) - meaning probably at least as expensive as the original cost, if not more.
There is no problem reaching the moon, the problem is building the base on the moon that will become what the International Space Station has become.
And my question is-
If we managed to reach the moon in 69, with such primitive means, how is it that we have difficulty finding a budget, or that we have difficulty developing a certain superior technology that will get us there in 2025? The conspirators celebrate hearing such things, but I ask honestly.
Link to full report:
http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/396093main_HSF_Cmte_FinalReport.pdf
There are a lot of small spelling mistakes, it wouldn't hurt to proofread.
Interesting article, thanks.