The Disappearing Constellation

If the rumors are true, President Obama will be killing NASA's Constellation program and its comically expensive, flawed Ares I and Ares V rockets. I believe that the designs are flawed, even though they may be technically very advanced, because of the bad assumptions that went in to them. These aren't the best rockets that we can build, they are the best rockets that we can build that employ lots of people in key congressional districts and that we can make hand-waving green claims about. Look, we're being green by reusing the solid rockets after each launch. Well, sure, the parachute recovery system adds 11,000 pounds to each rocket's launch weight and put the whole program in jeopardy by weighing too much. Well, yes, it costs lots more to reuse a spent rocket than to just let it sink in the ocean and build a new one — but we're GREEN!

There are lots of other valid criticisms that can be made. I'm more interested in Obama's rumored plans to fund commercial space development to get NASA astronauts where they need to be. I'm thrilled that SpaceX seems to have positioned itself perfectly to be the beneficiary of this change in direction. The Falcon 9 with its Dragon capsule, much (if not most of it) developed with private funds, may be in a position to orbit astronauts in as little as 2-3 years — the Ares I was at least five years and tens of billions of dollars away from that.

I'm sorry that NASA, the public, the Congress and a long series of administrations turned NASA into just another bureaucracy. It's a sad state of affairs for the former miracle workers to be in, but that doesn't mean we should keep funding them and their gold-plated contractors extravagantly. I'd rather that those dollars went to funding a new, sustainable space industry so we can eventually get off this rock.