Senators and Representatives from Texas, Alabama and Florida have all strongly decried President Barack Obama’s plan to cancel the Ares I and V rockets and NASA’s lunar program.

Florida Rep. Suzanne Kosmas, Alabama Rep. Parker Griffith, Texas Rep. John Culberson and Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby have all ripped the plan. These politicians are all from states with a substantial stake in the existing program.

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The Space Tourists documentary has won the World Cinema Directing Award at the Sundance Film Festival.

This week on The Space Show: Monday, February 1, 2010, 2-3:30 PM PST: We welcome back Don Beattie to the program regarding his Apogee book, “ISScapades: The Crippling of America’s Space Program.” We will also be discussing the retirement of the Space Shuttle and new civil space policy announcements. Tuesday, February 2, 2010, 7-8:30 PM PST: CLASSROOM: This is the introductory program to The Space Show Classroom series. With me […]

NASA PROGRAM UPDATE

NASA has awarded $50 million through funded agreements to further the commercial sector’s capability to support transport of crew to and from low Earth orbit. This step is the first taken by NASA consistent with the president’s direction to foster commercial human spaceflight capabilities.

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ATK doesn’t like President Obama’s NASA budget, which would cancel the Ares rocket program it is working on.

CSF PRESS RELEASE
February 1, 2010

The Commercial Spaceflight Federation welcomes the decision today by President Barack Obama to place U.S. human spaceflight on a new trajectory with major investments in technology, science, exploration, and commercial spaceflight. As part of this plan, NASA’s new competitive commercial crew initiative will invest $6 billion over five years for multiple companies to develop human spaceflight capabilities that will take astronauts to and from the International Space Station.

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With the release of NASA budget, the Obama Administration has proposed a course for the U.S. space program that appears to be reasonable and coherent. The questions are: Is the funding adequate? Is the political support there? And can they execute on it?

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STATEMENT BY BUZZ ALDRIN

Today I wish to endorse strongly the President’s new direction for NASA. As an Apollo astronaut, I know the importance of always pushing new frontiers as we explore space. The truth is, that we have already been to the Moon – some 40 years ago. A near-term focus on lowering the cost of access to space and on developing key, cutting-edge technologies to take us further, faster, is just what our Nation needs to maintain its position as the leader in space exploration for the rest of this century. We need to be in this for the long haul, and this program will allow us to again be pushing the boundaries to achieve new and challenging things beyond Earth. I hope NASA will embrace this new direction as much as I do, and help us all continue to use space exploration to drive prosperity and innovation right here on Earth.

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STATEMENT BY NORM AUGUSTINE

In 2009, I had the honor of leading a committee comprised of individuals with extensive experience in space activities in an assessment of NASA’s human spaceflight program and plans. We found that the current Constellation program was unsustainable and was highly unlikely to get humans to the International Space Station before its planned de-orbit or back to the Moon until roughly 20 years in the future. The root cause has been an incompatibility of funding resources and work scope in the human spaceflight program, a situation that has persisted for a number of years.

Our committee was specifically not tasked to make recommendations but rather to consider alternative paths going forward. In an effort to maintain an unfettered perspective we held no discussions on an overall preferred option. The plan released with the President’s FY 2011 budget does appear to respond to the primary concerns highlighted in our committee’s report.

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Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center

OSTP FACT SHEET

• Adds $6 billion to NASA’s budget over five years and draws upon American ingenuity to enable us to embark on an ambitious 21st century program of human space exploration and observation of the Earth and the Universe.

• Ends NASA’s Constellation program, which was planning to use an approach similar to the Apollo program to return astronauts to the Moon 50 years after that program’s triumphs. An independent panel found that Constellation was years behind schedule and would require large budget increases to land even a handful of astronauts back on the Moon before 2030. Instead, we are launching a bold new effort that invests in American ingenuity to develop more capable and innovative technologies for future space exploration.

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KEY POINTS FROM CHARLES BOLDEN’S STATEMENTS This budget cancels the Constellation Program, including the Ares I and V rockets and the Orion crew exploration vehicle. With this budget we are demonstrating our commitment to extend the life of the International Space Station, likely to 2020 or beyond. Today we are using stimulus funds to help drive the beginnings of a commercial crew industry and the as many as 5,000 new […]

SENATOR SHELBY PRESS RELEASE
February 1, 2009

U.S. Senator Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), ranking member of the Commerce, Justice, Science (CJS) and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee, today issued a statement sharply criticizing the Obama Administration’s proposed NASA budget for fiscal year 2011. NASA’s budget is under the jurisdiction of the CJS Subcommittee. Constellation is NASA’s current human space flight program. A critical component of Constellation, the Ares I rocket, completed a successful test flight in October of 2009. Disregarding Constellation’s progress, the Obama Administration’s proposed fiscal year 2011 budget for NASA, released today, would cancel the program and instead fund “commercial” providers who have failed to fulfill current contracts with NASA to deliver even cargo to the International Space Station.

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