Where is NASA’s rocket development plan?
Readers may recall that NASA deputy administrator Lori Garver promised earlier this year the space agency would make public its plan to develop a new rocket by the end of summer. We can quibble about...
View ArticleHere’s a stat to embolden NASA cynics
It’s now been nearly four decades since Americans flew beyond low-Earth orbit. It’s never happened in my lifetime. The question is when we’ll do so again. I’m beginning to think it may never happen...
View ArticleCritics blast NASA’s “rocket to nowhere.” See the space agency response.
There’s been a lot of concern expressed about the state of NASA’s rocket program in recent months, especially since the space agancy announced its plan to develop a heavy-lift vehicle. Paul Spudis...
View ArticleThe Congressional debate over NASA’s asteroid capture mission ignores the...
There’s a lot of buzz in and around Congress right now about NASA’s proposed mission to capture an asteroid, which Republicans are disinclined to support. The issue has gotten considerable news...
View ArticleTop five coolest spaceflight missions in the next five years
Sure, it’s been two years since the last space shuttle launch. And NASA’s budget is tight. And the program is a political football. Nevertheless, as I write in today’s Chronicle (premium), that doesn’t...
View ArticleThe big problem with the “big win” for NASA’s exploration program budget
The massive budget deal finalized by Congress late on Monday includes the particulars for NASA’s budget. There are winners (Europa robotic mission, which got $80 million for development) and losers...
View ArticleAdrift: How NASA came to depend on Russia for access to space
As everything is hitting the fan toward the end of The Two Towers, the second movie in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, King Théoden asks, “How did it come to this?” That’s the question I’ve been asking...
View ArticleNew report: NASA Mars goal is not viable
The National Research Council released a new report today that reviews America’s human spaceflight goals and the direction of NASA’s programs. As I have been investigating many of these same themes for...
View ArticleNASA’s new rocket is big, beautiful and probably not sustainable.
As I report in the second part of my Adrift series on America’s human spaceflight program, work is well underway on NASA’s first heavy lift rocket in four decades, the Space Launch System. Whatever you...
View ArticleFive years after Augustine: How does the panel feel about NASA’s Space Launch...
In 2009 President Obama asked Norm Augustine, and other luminaries such as the late astronaut Sally Ride, to review the state of NASA’s human spaceflight program. Five years ago, today, the commission...
View ArticleNASA’s asteroid mission takes a beating
NASA can’t afford to send humans to Mars. With its current plans to build a large rocket, the Space Launch System, NASA can’t even afford to go back to the moon. What NASA can afford to do, in about a...
View ArticleNASA’s Space Launch System formally moves from design into construction
Today NASA announced it has formally switched the Space Launch System program from its “formulation” stage into “implementation,” a Rubicon of sorts known as Key Decision Point-C. This is the large...
View ArticleHow Chris Kraft got un-invited to a Senate hearing on spaceflight
You may not know the name Chris Kraft, but he is a man who as much as anyone led NASA to the moon. Mission Control in Houston is named after him. He was the space agency’s very first flight director...
View ArticleHere’s why SpaceX recovering its rocket is critical to the future of spaceflight
Today, weather permitting, SpaceX will launch its Falcon 9 rocket carrying the DSCOVR satellite. Of far more interest to me, and most space buffs, however, is the effort by the rocket company to...
View ArticleReport: Private rockets will lower cost of moon, Mars missions
I’ve written much today about a new report that finds NASA could use private rockets to explore the moon, and then Mars, in a much more affordable manner. What I haven’t done is provide a copy of the...
View ArticleThree reasons to be truly outraged by Congressional stonewalling of...
This week NASA Administrator Charles Bolden stepped up his war of words on Congress, saying the space agency had to extend a pricey contract with Russia through 2019 for crew transport due to...
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