For the past 10 minutes, I’ve been trying to nuzzle the Orion space capsule up to the International Space Station to dock, but I keep drifting left, smack into a European lab.

Then I look slightly past the flat-panel screen that displays my incompetence with the joystick, through the window and straight up. I see the moon. It’s filling the view and grabs my attention from the docking job at hand.

The moon is what this is all about.

I’m in a full-scale mock-up of Lockheed Martin Corp.’s Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle that’s supposed to replace the space shuttle fleet and eventually take astronauts back to the moon. The actual ship is still a few years away from being built, and it won’t fly until at least 2013.

Two weeks before my test drive, NASA awarded Lockheed Martin an $8 billion contract to build Orion, a capsule NASA refers to as “Apollo on steroids.” It’s the latest in a long line of planned next-generation spaceships for NASA, none of which has ever taken off.

Lockheed Martin built the mock-up to help understand the volume and geometry involved in the design and construction of the Orion. NASA has developed its own model, which is slightly different.

“It starts to give you an idea of the real size involved,” said Cleon Lacefield, Lockheed Martin’s vice president and the company’s Orion program manager. “It really comes up to be pretty spacious.”

Three other people are standing in the capsule and Marc Sommers, a Lockheed Martin avionics engineer, is sitting in the seat left of me, trying to get me to dock correctly.

This capsule is downright roomy. If the Apollo capsules were Volkswagen Beetles from the 1960s, cramped but useful, then Orion seems like a 1990s minivan, extended version. It’s good enough for a long road trip, which is pretty much what NASA envisions in a three-day one-way trip to the moon.

NASA Orion project manager Skip Hatfield said it was designed to be much more spacious per crew member than Apollo. Unlike Apollo, which had three astronauts, Orion will carry four astronauts to the moon, six for the much shorter hop to International Space Station.

So for the lunar trip, Orion will have about 95 cubic feet per astronaut, compared with 70 cubic feet per Apollo astronaut. Orion’s trip to the space station will be a little more crowded, with each of the six astronauts getting 63 cubic feet.

It looks even roomier because there’s no other equipment inside the Orion capsule. While most of the gear will be stored below and behind the capsule interior, stuff has a way of accumulating inside a vehicle so Orion will get to seem more crowded, Hatfield said.

There are actually two connected simulators here. One is a standard-seat model with a lot of screens and the sounds of jets. The other, which I used, offers no sounds and only one screen and a joystick a tad better than the run-of-the-mill video game. The ship doesn’t move, but it has a sense of realism because you are inside a large capsule in the prone position.

Before I get into position to simulate docking, Sommers and Hatfield tell me it’s easy. I say I’ve never flown a simulation successfully because of bad hand-eye coordination. Even an 8-year-old docked successfully when Lockheed Martin allowed families a sneak peak, Sommers said.

Once inside, I find myself in a reclining z-shape, sitting on my back with my thighs straight up, my calves horizontal and my head looking up at the screen.

Then I tried to dock. And failed. I lined up in front of the docking ring and went astray — far astray, almost leaving the space station environs. Sommers kept giving me tips and I kept moving the joystick wrong.

Maybe it’s because I can’t hear the thrusters in the simulator, Sommers offers as an excuse. That’s not it.

To my credit, I never actually crashed. After about 15 minutes of drifting away and inching back only to drift away again, I just gave up. I quit. It was humiliating and others were waiting to take this baby out for a spin — and probably laughing.

It’s just that this spaceship needs a better driver.

Dan Dumbacher, deputy director of the Exploration Launch Projects Office at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., helps manage and lead overall development and integration of the Ares I and Ares V launch vehicle systems.

NASA’s Ares I is the launch vehicle that will transport the Orion crew exploration vehicle to space. Ares V will serve as NASA’s primary vessel for delivering resources to space — from large-scale hardware and materials to establish a permanent moon base, to food and fresh water needed to extend a human presence beyond Earth orbit.

NASA is beginning detailed planning for the first round of flight tests for the Ares I Crew Launch Vehicle (CLV), with documentation – acquired by this site – showing the full outlines of the test flight objectives.

The first flight, Ares I-1, will be a suborbital test of the booster with an inert fifth SRB segment and a dummy second stage with steel-filled propellant tanks and mock-up engines.

The test flight, originally called ADFT-0 (Ascent Development Flight Test-0), is currently scheduled to take place in April 2009 at a cost of about $300 million.

The flight will provide a simulation of the performance of the first stage of the Ares I and a test of the staging sequence. The flight is to be suborbital and will test the effect of the maximum dynamic pressure being exerted on the vehicle.

The booster which is slated to make this flight, called the Flight Test Vehicle (FTV), will be integrated at KSC shortly before launch, and will not have the capability to receive commands from the ground while in flight (though telemetry will be returned). The first stage of the vehicle will be recovered and returned after staging.

The only active part of the FTV will be the bottom four SRB segments on the launchers first stage. The fifth segment will be a real SRM, but empty of propellant. NASA refers to this configuration as ‘4-segment XL’. This stage is about 167 feet high and 12 feet across at the SRMs, widening to 18 feet in diameter at the frustum.

The first stage will include the recovery systems that might be present on the actual Ares I first stage. An interstage, frustum, and forward skirts will separate the 4-segment XL stage from the upper stage.

The upper stage simulator (USS) to be carried on this flight. will be completely inert but will have an outer mold line identical to that of the planned Ares I upper stage.

A decision has been made to replace originally planned water ballast on this stage with 20,000 lbs of steel ballast. However, it will still be the ‘Tuna Can’ design, allowing worker access into the upper stage during stacking, and whilst on the launch pad.

A simulator for the CEV and launch abort system (LAS) will also be carried on this flight, again with an identical outer mold line, and very similar mass, volume and center of gravity to the real vehicle. This boilerplate CEV and LAS will not be recovered.

The second stage will separate from the first near the flights apogee and will provide a simulation of the performance of the interstage. The entire time of powered flight for the vehicle will last for just over two minutes.

The flight will be launched from Launch Complex 39B at KSC and will also include a test of the vehicles RCS.

The CEV physical model is comprised of the following: mass and volume simulators of a Crew Module (CM), a Service Module (SM), a Spacecraft Adapter (SA) for mounting to the USS; and attachment mechanisms between the CM, SM, and SA. The combination CEV/LAS will have the same OML, weight, and CG as that of the actual CEV/LAS.

The flight vehicle will be shipped to KSC in segments, where it will be assembled. The Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) will be used to stack the system prior to transporting it to launch complex 39B. Integration at KSC also includes installation, checkout ,and servicing of the Reaction Control System (RCS) and the avionics. Some segments of the vehicle have already been fabricated.

There are five primary objectives for this test flight. They encompass flight control, First Stage-USS separation, First Stage re-entry, launch processing, and First Stage roll torque. The success of this flight test will be determined by the degree these objectives are met.

Prototype CLV parachutes should be used to accomplish primary objective. These parachutes are already undergoing testing at the US Army range in Arizona. Tests have so far been successful.

Updated information points to the possibility that the LAS will indeed by tested – pending Lockheed Martin being able to support the test launch date. The dummy Orion on top of Ares I-1 won’t be recovered, with the test simulating a failed upper stage engine start – evaluating how the LAS performs in a live test.

Some of the biggest challenges for the vehicle will be on lift-off, with data showing how the TVC (Thrust Vector Control) handles the rise off the launch pad, plus the ride through Max Q, which some sources note concern over the structural integrity of the intertank section of the ‘stick’.

However, given the nature of the Ares I-1 vehicle, most of the systems that will undergo testing will be below the upper stage. Up to four test flights will be carried out in total, before the targeted 2014 debut manned mission.

NASA’s Orion crew vehicle’s smart cockpit will monitor the vehicle’s health, use synthetic, enhanced and virtual vision systems, have advanced on-screen symbology and may eventually employ a talking computer.

The Lockheed Martin-built Orion will use a glass cockpit that is derived from Honeywell’s Boeing 787 flight deck technology. Orion’s cockpit computers will carry out routine and repetitive system monitoring tasks, which Apollo-era astronauts had to do themselves.

Vehicle health management software is seen as key to automating this activity so the cockpit system only informs the astronauts, and ground control, about the spacecraft’s status when necessary. While the Shuttle’s cockpit’s screens are filled with data that astronauts have to interpret and act on, Orion’s displays will use graphics along with enhanced synthetic vision and additional flight related symbology.

The Orion’s symbology could include a pathway through the sky. There will also be software tools for astronauts to have enhanced situational awareness, which is the goal of the smart cockpit. NASA Ames Research Center is working on constraint based planning for Orion’s smart cockpit. Ames’ exploration technology director’s senior advisor Anthony Gross says, “we’re trying to get [Clarissa] implemented on Orion but it will probably be a later version.” Clarissa is software that guides astronauts through procedures for operating or maintaining space vehicle systems using natural language interaction, talking, with the crew member via a headset. It has been tested on the International Space Station.

NASA is extending a contract with ATK Thiokol of Brigham City, Utah, to continue developing the first stage for the Ares I crew launch vehicle.Ares I is the crew launch vehicle that will transport the Orion crew exploration vehicle, its crew or other small cargo payloads into low-Earth orbit. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration said the first stage will consist of a single solid rocket booster similar to those used on the space shuttle, but with a fifth motor segment added.

The upper stage will consist of a J-2X liquid hydrogen, liquid oxygen engine and the associated propellant tanks and main propulsion system.

The contract modification — valued at $35 million — also provides support for an initial test flight in the spring of 2009 known as Ares I-1. NASA says that test flight will involve the use of a simulated fifth segment on the first stage motor and a simulated upper stage.

NASA has awarded a contract extension worth up to $35 million to a subsidiary of Alliant Techsystems Inc. This is for work on the Orion spaceship program.

This is in addition to a $28 million contract awarded to ATK Thiokol for the development of booster rockets for Ares 1 – the vehicle used to launch the Orion spaceship.  The extension of the contract will focus on nozzle metal hardware and maintain design and engineering analysis for a systems review to be held during December of 2006.  The contract extension will also be used for an initial test launch of Ares 1 during 2009.

A U.S. scientist says human missions to Mars face technical challenges well beyond those faced during the exploration of the moon.

In two new papers, Donald Rapp, formerly with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, reviews the current state of our understanding of life support and radiation safety and concludes that significant additional research will be required before safe and affordable human missions to Mars can become a reality.

Rapp reviews the current state of the understanding of life support for human missions to Mars and concludes current plans for life support contain optimistic assumptions regarding the degree of recycling and reliability that can be achieved and the amount of mass that life support systems may require.

In his second paper, he compares and contrasts the levels of radiation shielding required for human missions to the moon and Mars and finds currently planned missions to both bodies are not without potentially serious radiation risks.

Both papers are published in the current issue of The Mars Journal, a peer reviewed, open-access journal focused on Mars science, exploration and policy.

We’ve reported on NASA’s problem with funding cuts a few times already this year, and there’s no sign of things getting better any time soon. Costly foreign wars and soaring budget deficits mean that every federal department has to tighten their belts, and budget overruns surrounding space technology mean that projects are coming under scrutiny by Congress and the Government Accountability Office (GAO).

First in the firing line is a planned weather monitoring satellite network, called Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-R, or GOES-R. GOES-R was originally planned to cost around $6 billion, but recent estimates have put that figure at almost double, even though it is still in the planning stages. GOES-R is not planned to enter operation until 2014. Despite dropping certain sensors from the design, the GAO still wants an accurate estimate from NOAA on just how much it will cost. A prior NOAA project, the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS), has already been affected by cost overruns.

NOAA aren’t the only people in trouble. NASA’s proposed shuttle replacement, the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) is also under increased scrutiny from the House Science Committee, as NASA is having trouble accurately forcasting the exact cost of a return to the Moon when the project is so early in the planning stages. Although current estimates are around $230 billion, NASA’s proposals still have shortfalls from 2014-2020.

“I don’t think it’s a foregone conclusion that we’re going to do this [CEV development] no matter what,” Bart Gordon, the ranking Democrat on the committee, said. “There is a point at which we might very well say, ‘This is too expensive. This is not working. Let’s stop, cut our losses.'”

Whether or not a return to the Moon will survive a change of leadership in Washington, DC remains to be seen. If only the CEV could be carried aloft by the soaring budget problems, we could get there next week.

Gov. Jeb Bush said Thursday he is optimistic that the 300 to 400 jobs created by Lockheed Martin’s decision to assemble NASA’s Orion spaceships at Kennedy Space Center will be the first of thousands of jobs tied to the space agency’s new moon-landing program.

Bush, in a rare visit to the Space Coast, joined about 140 government and industry officials Thursday at the Radisson at the Port hotel for a celebration of NASA’s decision to pick a contractor that plans to assemble the Orion crew transport craft at KSC. In the past, America’s manned spaceships were assembled somewhere else and shipped here for launch.

Bush last visited Brevard County on Dec. 14, 2005, to participate in a bill-signing event in Titusville, according to Kristy Campbell, his deputy press secretary.

Winning that work is a first step in preserving as many space jobs as possible after NASA retires its space shuttle fleet around 2010. Some predictions indicate the number of people employed at KSC could fall from 15,000 today to 10,000 or fewer. Economic development officials say landing as much work as possible on Orion and related projects is key to minimizing the impact of the shuttle’s retirement.

“If we sat and did nothing, we could be guaranteed tremendous economic losses,” Bush told a small group of reporters. “(Brevard) is the center of the new means by which to access space. Our expectation is it’ll be a growing industry.”

Orion should ultimately employ 2,500 to 3,000 workers at KSC by 2008 and likely through 2019, program manager Cleon Lacefield said. That does not count jobs created by the newly proposed Ares rockets that would launch crew and cargo on the moon trips.

The number also doesn’t count support jobs in fields that range from firefighting to security to accounting.

A congressional committee promised Thursday to scrutinize NASA and its spending as the agency proceeds with a program to take astronauts to the moon and Mars.

The space agency faces hidden costs by starting development of the spacecraft and rockets for the program without knowing the price tag of the new technology, a watchdog official warned Thursday in Washington at a hearing of the House Committee on Science.

“When you don’t abide by those particular principles _ which is not going beyond what your knowledge tells you _ then you do run into trouble,” said Allen Li, director of acquisition and sourcing management for the Government Accountability Office.

The committee held the hearing in response to a report the GAO released last July that raised concerns about the affordability of developing the Orion manned lunar vehicle and the Ares 1 and 5 rockets. The committee took no action but members promised to monitor NASA closely.

The report said that developing Orion, the rockets and robotic missions to the moon would cost $230 billion over two decades, and that those efforts likely would face a budget shortfall of more than $18 billion through 2025.

But Scott Horowitz, a NASA associate administrator, said he was confident the space agency would finish developing the spacecraft and rockets on time and within cost.

The price will be kept down because of the design simplicity of the spacecraft and rockets, which use technology from the Apollo era 40 years ago, Horowitz said.

Orion will cost $200 million a flight, said Horowitz, although Li said the figure wouldn’t be known accurately until 2008.

Horowitz stressed the importance of stable funding in keeping costs down. NASA wants to begin flying Orion with astronauts by 2014 and return to the moon no later than 2020.

“If you short-fund the program in the near term, you can guarantee that you will stretch it out and increase its costs in the long term,” Horowitz said.

NASA this month picked Lockheed Martin Corp. to build the manned lunar spaceship. The contract is worth $8.1 billion through 2019.

In response to the GAO report, NASA made some changes to limit its obligations to the projects if they don’t succeed, but Li said the space agency needs to go further.