Orion's Web Log

The Kennedy Space Ceneter has appointed Bill Parsons as director.  The center is getting ready for a new fleet of Ares rockets and Orion spaceships for the return to the moon.

“When you pull all of that together, it’s going to require us to stay focused,” he said.

Parsons is not daunted.

These are some of the greatest people I ever worked with,” Parsons said. “They continue to pull off things that are very, very complex and difficult, and they make it look easy.”

An added challenge: angst among workers. NASA plans for the shuttle replacement fleet to operate cheaper. It must prepare and launch ships with fewer workers. KSC employs about 15,000 people. Some estimate it will be 10,000 by next decade.

Parsons noted that Lockheed Martin Corp. has committed to doing more work on Orion here than has been done with past space vehicles. In addition to launch preparations, some assembly work will be done at KSC too.

Parsons’ history and knowledge of KSC and NASA will help.

“It’s going to make a smooth transition,” said Adrian Lafitte, director of Florida Government Relations for Lockheed Martin.

Opportunities exist for KSC to land work on other moon-program components such as propulsion stages and lunar landers.

“We’re going to have to rebalance the skills a little bit and look at how we transition,” Parsons said.

The challenges do not dim Parsons’ excitement, or his wonder about the chances he’s gotten since that first launch in 1985.

“I pinch myself every day. I’ve been very fortunate,” Parsons said.

NASA internal planning, official’s comments and contractor expectations suggest the much touted goal of manned flights of new crew vehicle Orion before 2014 are unrealistic

NASA will fail to meet its goal of flying manned Orion missions before 2014, as the first delay emerges for the new spaceship’s development timetable just a week after its prime contractor, Lockheed Martin Space Systems, was selected.

NASA administrator Michael Griffin had wanted Orion’s development accelerated because the four-year gap between the Space Shuttle’s 2010 retirement and the new spacecraft’s planned 2014 operational debut was deemed unacceptable. The prime contractor selection process was even adjusted for changes introduced by NASA to accelerate Orion.

However NASA internal planning documents obtained by Flight International, and recent comments by Constellation and Lockheed Martin programme officials, reveal that this goal is unrealistic.

In an interview with Flight International last week, Lockheed Project Orion business development manager Patrick McKenzie said that the “requirements review (SRR) should slip into the first quarter of next year”. NASA’s plan had been for Orion’s SRR to occur in the fourth quarter of 2006.

While McKenzie was sure his company could deliver the Orion for a 2012 manned flight, at the 31 August contractor selection announcement Project Orion office manager Caris Hatfeld said “a full and final” Ares I test was unlikely before 2012 in order to complete the launcher’s upper stage and its Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne J-2X engine. That 2012 test flight will not be manned.

The leaked documents and corroborating NASA sources describe a timetable where the Ares I-1 test would occur in 2009, followed by the 2012 flight, which is now designated the Orbital Flight Test (OFT)-1. NASA had spoken of Atmospheric Demonstration Flight Tests (ADFT), but this designation seems to have been abandoned. The first manned flight is OFT-3, which is planned for April, May or June 2014.

When asked about Hatfield’s and Constellation programme manager Jeffrey Hanley’s ambiguous 31 August comments about testing, NASA said: “The test programme is still in review, which is why [Hatfield and Hanley] were circumspect. We need to see how the new prime contractor’s detailed schedule fits with rest of the programme test plan.”

The leaked NASA documents have the system design review, which follows SRR, by May 2007 the preliminary design review by March 2008, and the critical design review in the second quarter of 2009.

Officials at Lockheed Martin say the Orion crew vehicle, NASA’s Moon-bound successor to the space shuttle, will combine retro-1960s and cutting-edge aerospace technologies.

The Apollo program, which sent a dozen men to the Moon, ended in 1972. It’s so long ago that fewer than half of all Americans are old enough to have watched one of its missions on live TV. Yet some of the technology behind Apollo is about to be brought out of retirement for NASA’s return to the Moon, scheduled for 2020.

The agency’s new system for traveling to Earth orbit, and later to the Moon and Mars, dubbed The Constellation Program, essentially duplicates the Moon mission technologies proposed by Wernher von Braun in the late 1950s and used in the Apollo program. For instance, it includes a multistage rocket similar to Apollo’s Saturn V, a crew vehicle similar to the Apollo command module, and a lunar lander directly based on the Apollo lander.

Last month, NASA chose aerospace giant Lockheed Martin to build the crew vehicle, called Orion. The craft’s cone-shaped crew module and cylindrical service module might have just arrived from the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum–except they’re a bit larger than the Apollo versions, carrying four to six crew members instead of three.

Yet, according to Lockheed Martin officials, Orion will make the Apollo craft look like a Model T. Orion’s reentry system, for example, will incorporate knowledge gleaned from Lockheed’s recent Genesis and Stardust missions, which retrieved materials from comets. What’s more, the avionics software and equipment will be based on systems used in the newest passenger jets; and a new abort system will carry astronauts away from the main rockets in case of a Challenger-like launch disaster.

Patrick McKenzie is business development manager for the Orion project at Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Denver, CO. He talked with Technology Review on September 7 about the technologies–old and new–going into Orion.

Technology Review: What did aerospace engineers learn from Apollo that can be applied in the Orion project? And why does your design look so similar, at least superficially, to the Apollo command module and service module?

Patrick McKenzie: One of the most enduring things that Apollo got right was the aerodynamic shape of the capsule–which also happens to be the most visible element. One of the reasons NASA chose to go with the Apollo-type shape is the proven safety database that goes along with that. When you look at alternatives like lifting-body designs–space airplanes like the Shuttle–they provide things like additional cross-range [the ability to steer to different landing sites], but you are not able to fly them safely in the event that a control system goes offline. A ballistic reentry system like a capsule can return the crew safely in the event of a fault. But virtually everything else about this capsule is new technology–not necessarily bleeding-edge, but developed after Apollo.

TR: What are some of the most important new technologies, in your opinion?

PM: One of the major technology applications that is clearly going to be different with Orion is the automated rendezvous and docking capability. Orion will need to dock with the International Space Station and with the Earth Departure Stage [the rocket that will accelerate Orion out of Earth orbit to the Moon]. The Shuttle is manually docked, and Apollo obviously wasn’t automated. Orion will have manual override capability, but the vast majority of the time, there should be no need for a crew member to intervene.

TR: I understand that Orion will have a new type of heat shield for reentry into Earth’s atmosphere.

PM: The idea is pretty much the same as with Apollo, but there will be a new design and new materials that provide more robust protection. That’s important because with vehicles coming back from the Moon, or particularly from Mars, the reentry velocities are going to be a lot higher [than with spacecraft in low-Earth orbit]. We are looking at heat-shield materials like PICA [phenolic impregnated carbon ablator] and SLA [a cork-based ablative material] that Lockheed has proven on the Genesis and Stardust deep-space sample return missions.

Another thing that’s going to be new is “skip reentry,” which we are going to be doing routinely. That’s where you bounce off the atmosphere and come back in again, which gives you the ability to touch down on land, as opposed to the Apollo landings in the ocean. That provides an extra measure of safety and enhances the reusability of the system. Of course, we’re also looking at upgraded landing-impact systems. You still come down on parachutes, like Apollo did, then you deploy airbags or fire retrorockets, similar to what the Russian Soyuz vehicle does, to slow down the vehicle for a safe landing.

TR: What will conditions be like inside the crew module?

PM: Apollo could carry only three people, and they had very tight living conditions. The Orion crew module will have twice the volume: 361 cubic feet per crew member. Four crew can go back and forth to the Moon, and on flights to the International Space Station we could accommodate up to six crew. Also, the crew module will be able to stay in orbit around the Moon in a fully autonomous mode, so all four crew members could go down to the surface, for potentially long-duration stays.

TR: For Apollo, NASA designed an abort system to carry the command module away from the Saturn V rocket in the event of a launch emergency. Such an abort system might have saved the Challenger astronauts, but unfortunately the Space Shuttle doesn’t have one. What’s being planned for Orion?

PM: It’s the same kind of idea as with Apollo. One of the particular advantages of the capsule configuration over the Space Shuttle is the fact that we aren’t side-mounted. On the Shuttle, both the solid rocket boosters and the external fuel tank are right up against the belly of the vehicle, and there is no way to separate the crew from those in an emergency. Orion will sit on top of the Ares I launch vehicle in the same fashion as Apollo, so that if there’s any kind of issue with the rocket below, the advanced launch abort rockets on the tower above the crew module are fully capable of accelerating away from the Ares and getting the crew into a safe situation, with parachutes for landing.

TR: The old mechanical cockpit systems in the Space Shuttle were recently replaced with a modern “glass cockpit” design, with fully electronic displays and controls. I assume that technology will go into Orion as well?

PM: The avionics systems on board are going to be light-years ahead of where Apollo was. Not only will we have what you called the glass cockpit, but the other key element is “dual fault tolerance.” That means that with the critical systems being built into Orion, you could have two failures in the same system and still fly safely. The system that our teammate Honeywell is working on is based on the avionics architecture of the Boeing 787, which is also dual-fault tolerant. The systems constantly monitor one another, and if one system has a problem, another one automatically takes over. It adds some additional weight and complexity to the vehicle, but it provides a much greater margin of safety on these very dangerous space missions.

TR: The Space Shuttle is due to be retired in 2010, and the first crewed test flights for the Constellation Program–or at least the Ares rocket with Orion on top–are planned for 2014. What will be the hardest technology challenges as you try to hold to that schedule?

PM: Typically, the avionics software development ends up being a critical path element. The RCS engines, derivatives of the Shuttle’s RCS engines, are another [Reaction Control System--the small side-mounted rockets used for attitude control and steering. The Shuttle's RCS engines were themselves derived from Apollo. -eds.] So it comes down to software and propulsion. We’re aware of those critical-path issues and working with NASA to address them early. We’d like to close the gap after the Shuttle’s retirement and skinny the schedule down to test launches in 2012 or even sooner. But the Ares I launch vehicle development process has to come together along with Orion.

TR: From President Kennedy’s May 1961 speech announcing the goal of landing on the Moon to the actual Apollo 11 landing in July 1969, a little more than eight years passed. Today NASA says it’s going to take at least 14 years to do the same thing. Why?

PM: The Orion part of the project would probably be capable of lunar missions sooner than 2020. That being said, you’re also going to need to develop a lunar lander, an Earth-departure stage, and a lift vehicle [the Ares I and Ares V]. Because NASA’s budget in this day and age is a much smaller percentage of the budget of the nation than it was in the Apollo era, we have to “go as you can pay,” as NASA administrator [Michael] Griffin puts it. The initial budget priority is on developing Ares I and Orion. We will not be able to do development on the lunar lander, the EDS, and all the elements of Ares V in parallel.

TR: Why do you think Lockheed Martin’s proposal for the Orion contract won out over Northrop Grumman’s? Was Lockheed offering superior technology?

PM: I’m extremely proud of the team and what they accomplished with the technical concept we delivered to NASA. But the requirements are still in the process of changing, and all of the bidders actually had to deal with a diameter change [in the Orion capsule] halfway through the process, from 5.5 meters down to 5 meters. With NASA delivering so many things to us as requirements, the playing field was leveled somewhat.

When it gets right down to it, NASA is signing up for a relationship with an industrial partner that’s going to last a couple of decades. They wanted to know that it would be a happy marriage, where the spirit of partnership was in real evidence. During Phase I [when NASA paid several bidders to develop designs for Orion], we took the initiative to make sure our project office was co-located in Houston, which made it easy for them to participate in all of our control board meetings and other important events over and above the typical bimonthly reviews. We’ve got a significant workforce at the Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans [where the Shuttle's external tanks are put together]; we made a decision early on to do final assembly and checkout at Kennedy Space Center; we’re going to be doing engine testing at Stennis Space Center in Mississippi [NASA's primary rocket propulsion test site]. I think NASA has appreciated that.

From Radio Iowa:  NASA’s unveiled plans for its new space vehicle, called Orion, and an Iowa-born astronaut says he’s itching to be first in line to fly it. Burlington native Jim Kelly has logged more than 38-hundred flight hours in 35 types of aircraft, including piloting the space shuttle Discovery — twice.

The 41-year-old Kelly is speaking at several eastern Iowa schools this week and will escort his mother to her 50th class reunion at Muscatine High.

The Russian view of the Orion Project from Pravda.

NASA awarded a $7.5 billion dollar contract to build a manned spaceship to Lockheed Martin Corporation. The Orion crew exploration vehicle is supposed to replace the space shuttle fleet. The new spaceship is expected to start taking astronauts to the International Space Station in 2014. It should fly to the Moon in 2020. The Orion will look more like the Russian-made Soyuz booster than the space shuttle Discovery or space shuttle Atlantis.

NASA seems to be pretty weary of a decade of the space shuttle, the very spaceship the Americans have admired so much all those years. The crews of two space shuttles have already perished in the missions that went wrong, too many emergency situations occur during the flight, and the space shuttle’s dependence on weather conditions results in frequent postponements of the launch. Finally, NASA looks set to replace the space shuttle with a new space ship. The space agency opted to benefit from a design and technology approach similar to that used for the development of the Russian Soyuz and U.S. Apollo. Michael Griffin, head of NASA, called the new spaceship “Apollo on steroids” while announcing the results of the bid.

Boeing and Northrop Grumman, two major U.S. aviation and space equipment companies also bid for the contract yet it was awarded to Lockheed Martin Corp. Lockheed Martin Corporation, an advanced technology company, is a giant player in the U.S. military-industrial complex, the world’s largest military contractor. However, the company has not won any manned spaceship contracts until recently. The ill-fated spaceplane contract, which was awarded by NASA to Lockheed Martin Corp. in 1996, was the only exception. NASA spent about one billion dollars on the project. The ship, dubbed X-33, never got built because of technical problems. Lockheed Martin specialized in building unmanned space vehicles, which continue to astonish experts both in terms of scientific results and nonpareil reliability demonstrated during the long years of outer space missions. The company’s latest projects include Lunar Prospector and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

The Orion crew exploration vehicle will not resemble an aircraft. The Orion will not glide while landing, it will descend by parachute. No doubt about it, the new spaceship will carry no external fuel tanks – a source of trouble which ruined the space shuttle Columbia and might have destroyed the space shuttle Discovery. Some components of the Orion’s first stage can be reused for further launches, and therefore the ship is, to a certain extent, a reusable space vehicle. The ship will be primarily used for the missions to the ISS. It is also supposed to take astronauts to the Moon and perhaps on to Mars in line with President Bush’s ambitious space program aimed at colonization of nearest heavenly bodies.

The first manned mission is slated for 2014. The Orion should be ready to fly to the Moon in 2020, the deadline specifically mentioned by President Bush in his space program. NASA is expected to spend $7.5 billion on the project by that year. The Orion will be launched using a new booster dubbed Ares, which is yet to be built.

The Orion will resemble the Soyuz when it comes to the latter’s relative simplicity in terms of design. Rocket designers learned by experience that complex technical solutions could undermine the safety of space equipment. The Orion will be the first U.S.-made manned ship to be equipped with a launch emergency rescue system, which automatically activates a crew ejection in case of emergency.

In the meantime, Nikolai Sevastianov, designer general of the Russian Space Corporation Energia said that his company was working on a modernized version of the Soyuz. According to Sevastianov, the modernized Soyuz should be ready to fly around the Moon by the year 2011. The ship will be equipped with reinforced heat insulation. The upgraded Soyuz will be capable of lifting a heavier payload to orbit. Some new on-board systems will be mounted on the ship. The systems will be subsequently used on Kliper, the next-generation reusable space vehicle. A heavier payload and much thicker heat insulation on the modernized Soyuz have to do with a higher speed at which the ship will move during reentry. The new Soyuz is planned to enter service in 2010.

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.

Shares of Lockheed Martin Corp Friday climbed on news of a consortium led by the defense contracting giant having won a contract from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

The contract to design, develop and build the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle, the human spacecraft aimed at replacing the space shuttle. The contract won by the consortium, which also includes Honeywell International Inc and Orbital Sciences Corp, is expected to last through 2013, is estimated to be valued at almost $4 billion. The group led by Lockheed Martin beat a joint bid from The Boeing Co and Northrop Grumman to win the NASA contract. Lockheed Martin’s share price rose $1.06, or 1.28%, to $83.66 at 2:57pm ET on the NYSE on Friday.

Captain Eugene Cernan, veteran of three Apollo space flights, last man to walk on the moon

“The announcement demonstrates concrete progress is being made with the Vision for Space Exploration. It won’t be long before construction begins, which means job security for thousands across the country … money not spent in space but on Earth to help keep our economy strong. The money spent on the Vision becomes an investment in our future — the benefits coming in the form of new technology, medical advances, consumer products and, most importantly in my opinion, education.”

Captain James Lovell, commander of historic Apollo XIII mission, veteran of two Apollo missions

“The hallmark of this announcement in our space program is that it will positively affect every single American. We can’t deny the tangible benefits space brings to the table. It’s a long roster — more than 1,500 documented products — all derived from space technology. Fire fighters use drastically improved fire-retardant gear. Meteorologists depend on enhanced weather- forecasting tools. We sleep in homes equipped with smoke alarms developed in the Apollo program. The list goes on. And on.”

Dr. Rhea Seddon, veteran of three shuttle flights, assistant chief medical officer of the Vanderbilt Medical Group

“At a time when our nation is faced with so many urgent issues that compete annually for our national resources, many Americans are wondering, ‘What’s the point?’ The point is that a major national initiative like this has never been more important than it is right now. Our world leadership and economic security are being globally challenged while our way of life is depleting the known natural resources of our planet. Space exploration is a critical tool in winning these battles for our country and for the sake of future generations.”

Read press release from the Coaliition for Space Exploration