President Obama's proposal to rely on commercial crew taxis would be at least as safe as a government-run program and is consistent with post-Columbia safety recommendations, five Columbia accident investigators said today. The proposed policy sets a clear mission of delivering crews safely to low-Earth orbit and could be accomplished by rockets with proven track records, the five members of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board, or CAIB, wrote in a letter to Congress.
The three-page letter was signed by five of the board's 13 members: Scott Hubbard, John Logsdon, Douglas Osheroff, Steven Wallace and Sheila Widnall. They claimed to be "somewhat surprised to learn" that some see the president's proposal as rejecting the board's recommendations.
Their letter comes about a month after fellow accident investigator Roger Tetrault wrote a separate letter saying the administration's proposal was "setting the stage for another major space-related tragedy."
"We are canceling a program built around the findings and lessons learned from Columbia," Tetrault wrote.
The latest letter takes a different view. They authors say much of their August 2003 report on Columbia "was an indictment of NASA's safety culture, not a defense of its uniqueness."
The experience of losing two shuttle crews suggests that a system involving multiple launch providers may be preferable to having a single operator over the long term, according to the authors.
"We see no reason why a well-crafted NASA-industry partnership cannot match,
or perhaps exceed, past performance in ensuring astronaut safety," the letter states.
The authors say the investigation's recommendation to separate crew from cargo has been taken out of context. The intent was that "human lives should not be risked on flights that can be performed without people," not that people should never fly on vehicles that to date have only launched cargo.
United Launch Alliance's Atlas and Delta families of rockets are building admirable records launching expensive military and science satellites, the letter adds, and SpaceX's Falcon 9 is headed in that direction.
"In conclusion, in our view the new space strategy fully meets the intent of the (investigation board's) findings."
IMAGE: On Aug. 26, 2003, a copy of the just-released Columbia Accident Investigation Board (CAIB) report rests on a conference table at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. Retired U.S. Navy Admiral Harold Gehman, Chairman of the CAIB, earlier presented the results of the panel's investigation to NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe. Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls.
5 comments:
Of course it's safe....we aren't doing anything!
Anon 6:19 PM - you're right. Kind of hard to hurt yourself if you are doing nothing at all. The astronauts have no fear of being harmed by actually doing their jobs from an American space program.
"The experience of losing two shuttle crews suggests that a system involving multiple launch providers may be preferable to having a single operator over the long term, according to the authors. "
How is oversight of multi-launch vehicle platform as safe as one system? I find flaws in this logic. If you can't make one system safe, how are you to make multiple systems safe? sheesh..
Shouldn't America once again be a nation willing to take risks? Going to the moon (especially the bold mission of Apollo 8 that 'only' orbited the moon for the first time) was certainly a risky undertaking. In historical perspective comparable to Livingstone, Columbus, Lewis & Clark and the ancient Scandinavian Vikings that discovered what is currently the great nation of Canada...
As a Dutch citizen I had great admiration for America once, when I witnessed as a young kid how Americans pulled of what before then was always thought of as impossible..
Think of it; having the guts to travel to the Moon and back... with 60s technology ! In that same era we could fly from Europe to the US in about 3 (!) hours on Concorde... Now we still need 8 or so hours in a boring but o so modern Airbus..
Are the best days behind us ?
It all depends.. will America (or the World) once again have the guts to prove that we can do the impossible; take the risk and fly a manned mission to Mars, in OUR lifetimes..?
Does America still have what it takes and show true Leadership like it once did ?
I'm not so sure anymore as I once was, only time will tell...
I just wonder, what will happen when someone dies aboard one of these private vehicles? Will it be brushed aside as just an accident, or will the government once again step in and begin to instill tougher rules and regulations to govern, these enterprizes? I personally think it is way to soon to rely on private industry to get us into space. They have no viable craft that can carry any people. Also they will simply hold us down longer in LEO. We need NASA and its abilities to send us out into deep space. Orion is the vehicle of choice for just such missions. Back to the issue of private enterprizes handling spaceflight. What will their respective insurance companies start doing once a disaster strikes? Here again, I dont think it will be to the benefit of any of us normal people! It will strictly be a ride for the rich and famous at best. I will never get into space, Im a poor man!!!!
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