Orion Good For Colorado Economy
This past week the Bush administration put a down payment on its promise to return astronauts to the moon and eventually land a manned vehicle on Mars. It’s a tall order, but a risk that is also worth taking.
Coloradans in particular should cheer the announcement because Lockheed Martin was awarded the contract for the $8.2 billion project. The operations center in Jefferson County put together the proposal for the Orion spacecraft. By landing the contract, the moon and Mars mission should create 600 well- paid jobs locally, many for engineers.
Orion must replace the shuttles, resupply the space station, ferry astronauts back and forth to the moon and be the prototype for a manned spaceship that can reach Mars. And, as space exploration goes, it must do so on a relatively tight timetable. The launch rocket will test- fly in 2009. The shuttles are to be retired in 2010 and the new spacecraft should be ready for a test flight in 2014, but preferably 2013. And the return to the moon should come in 2019 or 2020.
Unmanned space exploration has forged ahead; the Mars Odyssey craft, also designed locally, continues to beam images to Earth from the red planet. Still, manned missions offer some of the greatest promise for scientific advances.
What’s more, manned flight fills the innate human desire for adventure and exploration in a way that orbiting drones and robots could never satisfy.
Orion might be this generation’s last real shot at manned space flight beyond just servicing the space station. The shuttles are being retired, and if Orion comes a cropper, NASA has nothing else beyond the drawing-board stage.
That said, the fate of the U.S. manned space program should not rest entirely, perhaps even primarily, with that federal agency. NASA has long been resistant to entrepreneurial and engineering mavericks like Burt Rutan, Paul Allen and Richard Branson, who seek to commercialize space travel.
But these pioneers risk their capital (and in some cases their lives) to bring the innovations and discipline of the marketplace to an industry that desperately needs both. As the Orion project moves forward, NASA should consider building partnerships with space entrepreneurs.
To be sure, America faces challenges in foreign policy and looming fiscal crises. Is now the right time to commit such a major investment of precious resources?
The question might be fairly answered: When is the time ever just right? There were competing needs in the 1960s when the space program began and there will continue to be competing needs so long as it continues. Either this nation intends to be a leader in space exploration or it does not - and if it does, the Orion spacecraft may be just the ticket.
