Audit Results: More Concern About NASA’s Space Launch System

Posted on by onespaceman2000

First, the US Government Accountability Office reported that NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) is unaffordable, and now NASA’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) doubles down on that earlier finding, reporting that the SLS, a key component of the Artemis program, has costs that are spinning out of control.

In its report, NASA’s Transition of the Space Launch System to a Commercial Services Contract, NASA OIG concludes:

Our analysis shows a single SLS Block 1B will cost at least $2.5 billion to produce—not including Systems Engineering and Integration costs—and NASA’s aspirational goal to achieve a cost savings of 50 percent is highly unrealistic. Specifically, our review determined that cost saving initiatives in several SLS production contracts such as reducing workforce within Boeing’s Stages contract and gaining manufacturing efficiencies with Aerojet Rocketdyne’s RS-25 Restart and Production Contract were not significant and, as a result, a single SLS will cost more than $2 billion through the first 10 SLS rockets produced under [the Exploration Production and Operations Contract].

NASA OIG concludes that maybe other contractors needs to be considered, stating:

Although Congress directed NASA in 2010 to build a heavy-lift rocket and crew capsule using existing contracts from the canceled Constellation effort to meet its space exploration goals, the Agency may soon have more affordable commercial options to carry humans to the Moon and beyond. In our judgment, the Agency should continue to monitor the commercial development of heavy-lift space flight systems and begin discussions of whether it makes financial and strategic sense to consider these options as part of the Agency’s longer-term plans to support its ambitious space exploration goals.

Where are these “more affordable commercial options”? Could it be SpaceX? Blue Origin? If so, let’s start the transition ASAP so that the Moon and Mars remain a realistic goal in the near future. We have plenty of talent in this country and a race to the top is what we need, not a space agency stuck with an Edsel rocket system.

Annual International Mars Society Convention

Posted on by onespaceman2000

If you missed the Annual International Mars Society Convention last weekend in Arizona, you will soon be able to catch up on all of the presentations.

First, you can find abstracts on all of the convention presentations here, which includes many topics, such as:

  • Investigating the Effects of Time-Delayed Communications on the Crew Mission Support;
  • Terraform Earth, then Mars;
  • Methods for Choosing Government Officials in the Mars Context;
  • Space and Ocean exploration as the Alternative to World War III;
  • Agriculture on Mars; and
  • Advancements in Sustainable Materials for Revolutionizing Mars Exploration.

Next, you can find the recordings of many of the presentations from past conventions on the Society’s YouTube page. I expect you will soon see recordings from the latest convention on this same Youtube page as well.

It’s a great service for interested parties who could not make it to the conventions. I recommend you check it out.

Television: 60 Minutes Goes to Mars

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Artist’s rendering of a Martian habitat as envisioned by the Colorado School of Mines and ICON as part of NASA’s 3D Printed Habitat Challenge. (Logan Architecture)

Just a heads up. Tune into CBS’s 60 Minutes next Sunday to learn more about NASA’s efforts to design what may be future habitats on Mars. It involves 3D-printing technologies, which have also been discussed as a means of building a lunar base. In fact, NASA has issued contracts for such construction on the Moon.

Here is a clip discussing this upcoming segment. It is part of a 90-minute episode of 60 Minutes. I am not sure if we should expect a name change for the series.

Note: CBS News had another report on 3D-printing on Mars back in 2017 titled “Mars Colony Could 3D-Print Stuff from Red Planet Dust.” Hopefully, 60 Minutes had a good scoop that advances the story.

Asteroid Sample Coming to Earth This Weekend

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Asteroid Bennu as seen by the OSIRIS-REx as it begins its return to Earth back in May 2021. (NASA/Goddard/University of Arizona; Writer Daniel Stolte, University of Arizona)

This weekend will should see the safe landing of a asteroid sample from far away. On Sunday, NASA’s Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security, Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) spacecraft will return to Earth with sample material from asteroid Bennu, which it encountered two years ago.

Launched on Sept. 8, 2016, the spacecraft spent about two years getting to Bennu and then more than two years studying the asteroid and collecting a 250-gram sample that should be in the hands of NASA scientists shortly. The graphic below shows the return path of the sample as it heads for the Utah desert. You can also watch this NASA video for more information on the overall mission and keep abreast of mission highlights via this mission blog. NASA also has a recent podcast discussing the spacecraft’s adventures and trip back to Earth.

And what about OSIRIS-REx after it makes this deposit? It will become OSIRIS-APEX (APEX for “Apophis Explorer”) and go back into the inner solar system before encountering asteroid Apophis in 2029.

We talk about rocket reuse, but this is a terrific example of spacecraft reuse.

The timing could not be better as NASA awaits 2024 budget decisions from Congress and further discussions about another sample return, this one from Mars.

Credit: NASA

Space Stories: New Lunar Water Estimates, Coronal Mass Ejection, and Oxygen on Mars

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Shadows on the Moon’s south pole. (NASA)

Here are some recent stories of interest.

—Southwest Research Institute: “New Findings Suggest Moon May Have Less Water Than Previously Thought“

A team recently calculated that most of the Moon’s permanently shadowed regions (PSRs) are at most around 3.4 billion years old and can contain relatively young deposits of water ice. Water resources are considered key for sustainable exploration of the Moon and beyond, but these findings suggest that current estimates for cold-trapped ices are too high.

—Scientific American: “Massive Sun Outburst Smacks NASA Spacecraft“

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe was built to withstand the ravages of the environment near our sun—and with good reason. The car-size spacecraft has now flown through a giant solar outburst of charged particles called a coronal mass ejection (CME). If that CME had it hit Earth instead, it may have caused vast, continent-wide blackouts, scientists say. Some of those searing particles whipped through space at about three million miles per hour.

—BGR: “NASA Successfully Generated Oxygen on Mars“

NASA’s Perseverance rover has done the unthinkable. Or, at least, a small device on the rover has. According to a tweet and article shared by NASA’s Perseverance team on Twitter, a device known only as MOXIE has proven that we can generate oxygen on Mars using the planet’s CO2-concentrated atmosphere. This tech is a huge boon, and the success of this story could help pave the way for future oxygen generation on the Red Planet, something that would make long-term exploration of the planet far more feasible.