House Science Leaders Seek Answers on Removal of NASA’s Gerstenmaier, Hill
WASHINGTON (House Science Committee PR) – Yesterday, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) leadership reassigned Mr. William H. Gerstenmaier from his post as Associate Administrator of the Human Exploration and Operations (HEO) Mission Directorate. He will now serve as special assistant to NASA’s Deputy Administrator Jim Morhard. Mr. William Hill, who served with Gerstenmaier as Deputy Associate Administrator of HEO, was also reassigned to now serve as a special advisor to NASA’s Associate Administrator, Steve Jurczyk.
“I am baffled by the NASA Administrator’s decision to abruptly remove the highly respected heads of NASA’s human spaceflight directorate and its Exploration Systems Development office with no permanent successors identified,” said Chairwoman Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX). “The Trump Administration’s ill-defined crash program to land astronauts on the Moon in 2024 was going to be challenging enough to achieve under the best of circumstances. Removing experienced engineering leadership from that effort and the rest of the nation’s human spaceflight programs at such a crucial point in time seems misguided at best. The Administrator needs to explain this personnel action, as well as provide an executable program plan accompanied by a credible budget if Congress is to have any basis for supporting the President’s Moon initiative.”
“As the head of NASA’s human exploration program, William Gerstenmaier has a long, successful track record of shepherding people safely into space,” said Chairwoman Kendra Horn (D-OK) of the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics. “He had just testified on the future of the International Space Station before the Subcommittee that I chair the morning of the announcement. The Subcommittee found his testimony very important given his technical insight and his depth of NASA experience.
“I was surprised about the Administrator’s announcement. I look forward to speaking further with the Administrator about his decision.
“I am concerned about the impacts that such abrupt leadership changes in our nation’s human space flight programs could have at a time when we are at the threshold of testing the integrated Space Launch System and Orion crew vehicle that will take humans into deep space and the commercial space flight systems that will take our astronauts to the International Space Station.”
11 responses to “House Science Leaders Seek Answers on Removal of NASA’s Gerstenmaier, Hill”
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Did Sirangelo leave a little too early?
No, Jeff, I just think that he mainly felt, wisely it would seem, that it was just time to “get out of Dodge”. 🙂 Regards, Paul.
its all about a policy unraveling
Maybe, maybe not. By that I mean that, yeah, the Artemis plan is unlikely to get fully funded at up to $8 billion a year without cuts to other programs, the initial $1.6 billion hasn’t been authorized by Congress, Congress hasn’t gotten a budget done on time in years (continuing resolutions), and then beyond that shutdowns have become not uncommon. And then there’s the inevitable delays with SLS, everything having to go right with the test flights, and we haven’t even gotten into the suits and landers; now Trump is talking Mars…so, yeah.
But, Gerstenmaier has been in charge during an especially non-groundbreaking time at NASA human spaceflight. Not saying it was necessarily all his fault, but he was in charge during the slow roll of SLS, Orion, “asteroid redirect”, Lunar Gateway, adding a commercial module to ISS, etc. Everything has been taking forever and it’s been about 15 years with no results. As Lauri Garver said of this news, ““His reign on NASA human spaceflight has been long. While this gave some people comfort, it has been a challenge for those wanting to advance change.”
If, *if* we are going to get to the Moon in 5 years, which shouldn’t be impossible being that it’s been done before, SLS is designed and the first one basically already built, Orion designed and the first one built and delivered, LAS and parachutes tested, Service Module built and delivered, Vehicle Assembly Building, transporter and launch pad already built, Deep Space Network in place, etc., then Gerst probably wasn’t really the right guy to lead that sort of “Okay boys, let’s get ‘er in gear and get this thing done!” effort
I hesitate to quote him, but as Pence said back in March, “If NASA is not currently capable of landing American astronauts on the Moon in five years, we need to change the organization, not the mission.” I agree with him to the extent that, yeah, with the head start it’s got this time, if NASA can’t put two people on the Moon in 5 1/2 years, the organization has gotten too set in its ways and needs a shake up. Does firing Gerstenmaier do that? Maybe not, but some kind of shakeup would seem to be needed
Any manned missions with the SLS & the Orion to Cis-Lunar by 2025 is iffy at best. More realistic is the original schedule goal of 2028.
The SLS is really in the prototype stage. There likely will be major changes after the integrated 1st stage does it’s first full duration static fire. However the progress on the software needed for the SLS have fallen really behind with personnel retention issues.and using archaic programming languages.
The first Orion is not carry crew for the shake down first flight with a revised reentry heat shield. We shall see if it all works as planned with just paper studies and boiler-plated stand-ins.
IMO NASA putting a person on the Moon’surface by 2025 is somewhat doable, just not with the SLS and Orion plus the nebulous future manned lander and Lunar surface activities infrastructure (rovers, Moon suits, etc.).
I hate to even remotely be seen as defending “Gerst”…in any position personally or professionally…but.. sigh
he at least is clued into the reality of the situation and while that has made him a defender of the status quo…I doubt “Sox” can do any better
NASA HSF right now is a fine turned balance of politics none of which have any thing to do with doing anything in space, but spending money on earth
Mike Pence must know this…and if he, the VP wants to carry the cudgel to change things (and I agree that they need changing) then it is someone at Pence or higher pay grade who has to go to the mostly GOP stalwarts who are the keepers of that balance and force its change.
Gerst is not at a pay grade which can do that…and firing him is only useful if the behind the scenes work is going on that will allow :Sox to go a direction that Gerst could not go…even if he wanted to.
I have not watched Jimbo’s missive with Jeff, its just to early here to spoil a day off…but the reality is that firing Gerst is not going to change much unless Pence can well modify several senators
Agreed that the root of the problem wasn’t Gerstenmaier. But, you can’t fire Alabama.
The problem’s actually even bigger than Alabama (MSFC and Alabama’s congressional contingent)…the whole (well, maybe not “whole”, but I can think of many examples) military and government aerospace big project procurement system is out of whack (endemic and systemic cost overruns and delays).
But, it’s like putting together an NBA team for a championship run. Rebuilding is over, your home grown talent is ready, last year’s big free agent is acclimated, the team has had two warm up playoff runs and now you do the massive sign-and-trade for the superstar — but, you’re halfway through the season and stuck just over .500
The press and fans are starting to howl, but the players have guaranteed contracts; they can’t really be forced to do anything, and at this point they can’t be traded — whaddayado? Ya fire the coach. It ain’t his fault, but you can’t fire the players and you’re not gonna fire yourself. Still, something has to change. See ya later, Coach. Thanks for the years of service.
Sometimes, surprisingly, it works though. Things can grow stale even when no one is doing anything “wrong”. It shows management is serious and sometimes just a fresh voice is what the players need to hear.
Other times, such change is just the most visible sign of internal disfunction and/or of having put together incompatible or insufficient pieces. A flailing at an attempt to “do something”. We’ll see…
There has been too much consolidation in aerospace, IMHO. The US Government is now left with a handful of government contractors that are all “too big to fail”. So, the contracts are spread around amongst them and there are now no consequences for programs that fail (i.e. maximize profit for the contractor while not delivering what the contract requires).
SpaceX and Blue Origin are both notable exceptions. But let’s face it, orbital launch is a tiny fraction of DOD’s budget and a small fraction of NASA’s budget (SLS, unfortunately, can’t be ignored).
Gerstenmaier was a huge impediment to actually getting anything done. Good riddance.
I hope Gerst has not done anything wrong. He is my hero for not mentioning Trump once in the last hearing. When Trump 1st came in we use to count the # of times he was mentioned by his people. Usually over 20. I think 20 is required by Trump people. He did not do it, so they fired him. But so many times I have been disappointed by people I admire. I hope he is a true good person he seems to be.
The man who demonstrated he was a willing conduit for money to districts, while getting a bit of science and station work done, is gone. The House wants to know why this open valve of the funding flow has vanished from the flow. Their purpose in NASA, the flow of money to their districts, is threatened, and they want to know why!