The Space Show
The Space Show
The Space Show focuses on timely and important issues influencing the development of outer-space commerce, space tourism,space exploration and space development. The Space Show is committed to facilitating our becoming a space-faring nation and society with a growing and self-sustaining space-faring economy. The Space Show also focuses on other related subjects of interest to us all.
Station feed:  Created by: David Livingston |
Created on: 12 May 2005 Language: English |
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Space Cynics & 10th Anniversary Space Show, Tuesday, 5-10-11 (77.02MB; download) -- Guests: The Space Cynics with Dr. David Livingston, Dr. John Jurist, Tom Olson. Topics: A general space policy, economic and technology driven discussion. You are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. The Space Cynics got together to celebrate with The Space Show on its tenth anniversary with a 2.5 hour marathon space discussion without a break. We were sorry that the Space Cynics founder, Shubber Ali, could not be with us due to illness. As we kicked off our discussion which largely focused on the future of human spaceflight, the Cynics linked current U.S. and global economic problems to space policy and NASA budget issues. We also had much to say about Space X and its outstanding accomplishments to date. Later, I asked fellow Cynics about SSP. Tom said maybe 30 40 years but the solar sats would be around the Moon or Mars, not orbiting Earth. To combat some of our earlier tone about the severe economic problems facing the US and our space program, we talked about existing and future innovation and ongoing private investment into entrepreneurial activities. The Cynics referred to space cadets and our extended community as living within a space bubble. Tom suggested many inside this bubble were fighting tooth and nail new policies that would transform the job creating potential of space as well as the technology and innovation. Both John and Tom suggested that many within the bubble were in denial about the extent of our economic problems and the probable impact on space programs. Our first caller from Jersey City asked several questions about NASA shrinking budgets and Space X. Rich Godwin called in to talk & inquire about old business paradigms changing to new paradigms. One of his points was that an SSTO RLV was not as economic as a string of big dumb boosters. Another issue brought up by a listener email dealt with the addition of new people to space advocacy groups and who actually attends the conferences. We had a good discussion on rocket economics and Rich sent in an analysis of the Apollo era & Saturn V costs adjusted year by year for inflation to 2011. I read part of the analysis on air. John also shared some of the research he is currently doing regarding rocket economics & efficiency factors for a government program, then extrapolating to Space X. I suggested a book to the listeners, "Leo On The Cheap" By Lt. Col. John London (www.dunnspace.com/leo_on_the_cheap.htm). We talked about leading fantasy drivers such as the $10/lb cost to LEO if only this or that happened. The Cynics had a lot to say about this and fantasy space ideas in general. Toward the end of our discussion, I was asked to reflect on the past ten years of The Space Show. Those of you who are frequent listeners will not be surprised by my mini talk as I covered the usual grounds including fantasy, solid foundations for building the future, education, students, civility, and more. I also addressed some negativity traits I bring to the table & how I sometimes see things in the negative light. However, overall, the Show is a demonstration of hope and & faith in space and our future and is a positive force for change. While I am extremely critical of things and how I see the world, were I not ultimately optimistic and hopeful for our future, I would wind The Space Show up now and move on to something else. John and Tom each provided closing comments to our marathon discussion. This program will also be archived on The Space Cynics blog, http://spacecynic.wordpress.com. Please post your comments on The Space Show blog and you can do the same with the Cynics blog. If you have questions for either of the Space Cynics, use the blogs. If you do want to email Tom or John, you can send your note to me and I will forward it to them. Selected by: David Livingston [ stations ], Wed, 11 May 2011 16:42:20 UTC
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Mike Gold, Monday, 5-9-11 (45.43MB; download) -- Guest: Mike Gold. Topics: Bigelow Aerospace. You are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. We welcomed Mike Gold of Bigelow Aerospace to the program for a one hour discussion. Following Mr. Gold, we did a brief Open Lines discussion but more about that later. We started with Mr. Gold providing us with an overview of Bigelow Aerospace with a focus on having an affordable means of crew transportation to LEO. This was followed by my asking him about crew safety issues and the commercial launch industry. As you will hear, Mike was very positive about the crew safety issues for commercial space and put them in context alongside government programs. You do not want to miss what Mike said about this issue. He then discussed safety with a Bigelow Space Station and noted their testing against debris hits and radiation. He explained their ballistic tests and said that because of their construction, they were as safe or safer than the ISS, saying that a fatal collapse of a rigid structure was more likely than with an inflatable structure as one would typically have time to initiate repairs with the latter. Radiation was mentioned as well, comparing the expandable material to metal. Caller John had three questions, the first one was about ITAR reform. Mike went into some detail explaining ITAR and the Bigelow experience with ITAR. You do not want to miss what he had to say about this important policy. He talked about the exemption from ITAR that Bigelow got and explained that it was for the passenger experience. He then explained what exactly this meant and how they got the exemption. John's second question dealt with the potential Falcon Heavy launcher and wanted to know if the BA2100 or something even larger would be using this heavy lift rocket. Mike said that such a heavy lift rocket offered many possibilities to both Bigelow and the industry and they were looking at how best to take advantage of these coming opportunities. The last question posed by John dealt with converting a Bigelow module to a space ship, asking if there were plans to go from a station to a ship. Don't miss his reply to this question. Crew safety came up again with a listener email wondering if a space ship accident with the loss of a non-government astronaut crew would have any greater lasting impact than the crash of a Federal Express jet with the loss of crew. Another question asked about Bigelow being on the Falcon manifest for 2014 and wondered if that was for Sun Dancer. Jack asked about Bigelow & the Mid Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS). Mike had very positive things to say about the potential offered Bigelow at Wallops and MARS. Yet another listener inquired about micro gravity R&D and then Mike was asked about the model that would be used for buying/selling, leasing, or controlling a Bigelow station. He said they would follow the terrestrial lease model & we discussed this in some detail. I asked about activities in space that would be illegal on Earth given the absence of space law on such issues. He said typically such a lease has a list of prohibited activities in it and the same would hold true for their station leases. Remaining questions addressed the European Code of Conduct, more on commercial crew, then our guest suggested we write our members of Congress to support commercial crew development. During the last segment, we did a brief Open Lines discussion. I summarized upcoming Space Show programs, Trent called to comment on the Sunday program, and Gerry called regarding the current Space Review article by Victoria Samson addressing India & space security. If you have comments or questions for Mike Gold, please post them on the blog. I can also forward email to him. Do visit their website, www.bigelowaerospace.com. Selected by: David Livingston [ stations ], Tue, 10 May 2011 15:44:17 UTC
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Keith Dauzat & Eric Hunting, LUF, Sunday, 5-8-11 (59.45MB; download) -- Guests: Keith Dauzat, Eric Hunting. Topics: Undersea habitats leading to space development, the Living Universe Foundation. You are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. We welcomed our two guests, Keith Dauzat and Eric Hunting to the program to discuss the Living Universe Foundation (LUF) and their program for space colonization. The discussion has its origins in the book written by Marshall T. Savage in the early 1990s, "The Millennial Project: Colonizing The Galaxy In Eight Easy Steps." As a result of this book, the First Millennial Foundation was created to bring about the plan discussed in the book but then events, basically unclear in total, caused the project to fade away. In recent times, the new LUF was created to carry on with the plan and it is in the process of being approved as a 501C3. In addition, as you will hear throughout our nearly two hour discussion, a revision of "The Millennial Project" book is underway and you will hear our guests discuss some of the changes that will apply to LUF.. This new program is referred to as The Millennial Project 2.0 (TMP2). Our guests mentioned several important websites that you can use to obtain more information. Visit http://tmp2.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page and http://tmp2.wikia.com/wiki/Utilihab_Project to learn more about the Utilhab Project which was also discussed by our guests. As both our guests referred to the information on these and related websites, I suggest you use the websites when listening to this discussion. LUF team member Steve Carr emailed me information on the Mondragon Corporation in Spain as a model for what LUF was talking about, .http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondragon_Corporation. One LUF participant did email a comment regarding our economic discussion. This email came from Chad which I read on air and questioned the focus on quarterly profits. This email comment sparked a discussion on economics, investing, government projects versus investor funded projects & more. See what you think about this discussion. Other discussion points that came up included LUF outreach in the New Space and space advocacy communities and presenting their concepts at space conferences. Later in the discussion we talked about vision, big vision ideas. leadership, and being grounded in reality to build a strong foundation for moving forward with LUF. This prompted one of my usual rants on vision, leadership, reality, grounding, fantasy and such. In addition to describing the 8 steps referred to in the Savage book, our guests said some of the models were based on related economic activity for that model. For example, real estate development & agriculture. This will become clear when you listen to what our two guests said about funding, the economics behind LUF, and the 8 steps in the plan. In fact, Eric opened the discussion with a short summary of each of these 8 steps. LUF has a Forum that you can join, LUF_team@yahoogroups.com. For your comments & questions, please post them on the blog URL above. You can also email them to Millennialproject@gmail.com, Keith using keithd21@yahoo.com and for Eric, use erichunting@gmail.com. Selected by: David Livingston [ stations ], Mon, 09 May 2011 16:27:17 UTC
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Ian Brewster, Friday, 5-6-11 (72.27MB; download) -- Guest: Ian Brewster. Topics: Commercial space policy, space tourism, NASA, special forces, and more. You are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. During our first of two segments of this two hour fifteen minute discussion, Ian Brewster started out talking about some of his non-space journalism work and an upcoming book on special forces teams from around the world. We talked briefly about the Navy Seals and other special forces units & I asked him to return as a guest when his special forces book is released later this year. In addressing space, Ian said that commercial space was at a point in human history where it was needed for the good of humanity. He also said "rich people will put us in space," referencing space tourism and the emerging commercial space companies. We then talked about the need for reasonable rules of the road for space development & that there were long term benefits for commercial space development. We talked about NASA doing a better job of promoting the importance of space & at one time our guest suggested that NASA needed some good "PR copy." We also talked about NASA spinoffs and using them to help make the case for space development, both with Congress and the people. I did challenge him this area because it does not appear that marketing spinoffs has ever been that useful in promoting space policy. As we started the second long segment, we talked some more about spinoffs, policy makers not recognizing or respecting the path through space for solving many of the problems facing us today. I asked Ian about the Canadian Space Agency and the Canadian population support for space programming. Another question I asked him was about the impact of science fiction on the average Canadian in terms of influencing space policy and participation on the part of Canadians. Ian had much to say about science fiction from the Canadian perspective and its impact on space policy is about the same as what we have experienced in the U.S. We then switched to developments in the world of physics and talked about CERN & the LHC with the search for the Higgs Boson (H-B) particle. Our guest went into some detail describing this search and why it was important and what the discovery of the H-B particle might mean to us all. We then discussed short sighted policy using the LHC as an example. Ian told us about the positive commercial and economic impact the LHC was having throughout Europe. Since this was originally to be in Texas and we cancelled the program, the U.S. lost out on these advantages. This brought our discussion to the area of investing for the future in STEM & space programs, again using the LHC as an example. We had quite the discussion on policy, education, influencing Congress, accountability, and how to turn things around now rather than waiting for new generations to emerge with leadership in these areas. Near the end of the program, I read a letter I received from an 8th grade student calling for the downsizing and reduction in budget for NASA. Both Ian & I had much to say concerning the 8th graders view of NASA and space. This letter will be the focus of an upcoming program, watch the newsletter for details. If you have comments or questions, post them on the blog URL above. You can email Ian Brewster at i_brewster@yahoo.com. Selected by: David Livingston [ stations ], Sat, 07 May 2011 15:47:02 UTC
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CLassroom Lesson Three Artificial Gravity, Tuesday, 5-3-11 (68.78MB; download) -- Guests: Classroom: Dr. David Livingston, Joe Carroll, Dr. John Jurist, Dr. Jim Logan. Topics: Manned artificial gravity research station in LEO. Please note that you are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show Classroom program/guest(s) on the Space Show Classroom blog, http://spaceshowclassroom.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show Classroom programming. This two hour plus Classroom program was continuous without a break. For this program, refer to the Power Point presentation by Joe, "Design Concepts for a Manned Artificial Gravity Research Facility." Mr. Carroll took us through this presentation slide by slide, plus he responded to listener and co-host questions throughout the program. You can find this presentation plus his longer IAC Conference paper on The Space Show Classroom blog under Presentation Materials for our Classroom program for May 3, 2011. Rather than writing a summary of this program, let me say that Mr. Carroll has given considerable thought to the engineering and human factors/human physiology issues regarding an artificial gravity research station in LEO. Listener questions addressed technical issues relating to spin, center of mass/gravity, hits by orbital debris items and more. Throughout this Classroom discussion, Joe took us into the technology, operations, and why's regarding his artificial gravity research station. Many issues were discussed including but not limited to Mars & lunar gravity, .06 G, spin rates, the Coriolis effect, the Gemini experiments, a Moon/Mars Dumbbell Concept, Airbeam tunnels, radial structure lengths, and much more. Toward the end of the program, we discussed the economics, costs, and who might pay for and deploy such a station. You will hear Joe talk about the present economic, cost, and R&D uncertainties for such a project, but you will also hear him talk about the commercial potentials, who should be given "free" access to the research station and why, the use of it with Space X as well as Bigelow, and why not doing it as a NASA project makes sense though he advocated NASA as a customer. At the very end, I asked Joe about building some small models to help those of us who are not engineers in understanding and even visualizing his concept. He liked that idea, talked about larger models of the size of a Boeing 737 cabin (he used this cabin size throughout his discussion and presentation), and possibly locating it at a company such as Space X. As we concluded our discussion, all of us said that after 50 years of human spaceflight, to not be able to answer any of the questions regarding the issues discussed in this program was criminal. Furthermore, as you will hear Dr. Logan and the others say, you can determine the credibility of a human space program by the speed and determination of the commitment to understanding the necessary gravity needs for people, plants, and animals in space. If there is no commitment to understanding these issues, the program is more likely a rhetoric only program. Post your comments & questions on the blog URL above. You can email Joe Carroll at tether@cox.net. All participants can be emailed through me at drspace@thespaceshow.com. Selected by: David Livingston [ stations ], Wed, 04 May 2011 15:48:33 UTC
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Project Icarus, Monday, 5-2-11 (45.56MB; download) -- Guests: Dr. Richard Obousy, Dr. Rob Adams, Dr. Ian Crawford. Topics: Project Icarus, interstellar propulsion & missions, fusion propulsion. Please note that you are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. Visit their website at www.icarusinterstellar.org/index.php. We welcomed our three guests to the program to discuss Project Icarus, interstellar propulsion, missions, and fusion energy. In our first segment, Dr. Obousy, the team leader, provided us with background and history related to Project Icarus and the earlier British Interplanetary Society (BIS) Project Daedalus. To compare and contrast an actual interstellar mission designed for the purpose to a mission going interstellar such as Voyager, he said it would take Voyager 70,000 years to reach the nearest start but the interstellar designed mission would do so in 50-100 years. He talked about the Icarus team and that it was a joint BIS-Tau Zero all volunteer effort. At the end of the five year study in 2014, the team hopes to be able to say if such a mission is plausible. Our guests listed the criteria for the mission but you can find it on the Icarus website at www.icarusinterstellar.org/icarus_project.php. One of the important requirements for this mission is the ability to decelerate as the mission neared its target. Not only did we discuss the process to be used for selecting the target or destination, we talked about the need for the mission to be extremely well programmed with more than capable software and artificial intelligence (AI). This topic came up again later in the show, especially in terms of our programming and software capabilities of today as compared to what will be needed for the mission. Our guests talked about the scientific objectives of such a mission, then a listener asked if they had come up with cost estimates for the mission. Our guests said it was not possible to estimate costs at this time as the technology readiness levels (TRL) had to substantially increase to be able to do that. Later in the discussion, the cost issue again surfaced with an explanation of how costs can be determined and spread over space infrastructure and development given the nature of an interplanetary mission and our becoming space-fairing in the process. Later in the first segment, we started discussing fusion propulsion, a subject that remained with us for the balance of our program. We started the second long segment talking about Icarus outreach & PR. One particularly interesting site for Project Icarus is http://news.discovery.com/space/wide-angle-project-icarus-110208.html. Fusion propulsion was again the topic and we talked about the different kinds of fusion, what was most suitable for space propulsion, reaching breakeven, and fusion research progress. Our guests explained why only fusion propulsion could be used for an interstellar mission. We had several questions about "fringe" theories & our guests addressed these questions from a TRL perspective. We talked about being taken seriously within the industry and by funding sources. Near the end of the discussion, our guests talked about career opportunities in the field, how best to learn the subject matter, and internships. Post your comments/questions on the blog URL above. You can also email info@icarusinterstellar.org or I can forward your message to the guest you designate. Selected by: David Livingston [ stations ], Tue, 03 May 2011 15:51:49 UTC
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Open Lines, Sunday, 5-1-11 (70.52MB; download) -- Guests: Open Lines with Dr. David Livingston. Topics: Space workforce issues, policy, heavy lift, NASA policy, commercial space. Please note that you are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. We started our two hour Open Lines program with my listing several topics for discussion including the new idea for a Space Launch System Heavy Lift Launch Vehicle with congress, comparing and contrasting recent guests and their unique perspectives for our civil space program and commercial space, space workforce issues, and more. Our first caller was former Space Show guest Dean Davis who put a personal face to the space workforce issue. Dean was with us for half an hour talking about layoffs, his own situation, what is happening within the aerospace industry including the loss of mentoring, and other important elements comprising the American aerospace industry. Dean provided us with a real life reality check report plus specifics relating to his own search. If you want to follow up with Dean Davis, you can do so using QUARKSTAR13@aol.com. When we returned from our break, our next caller was Charles Pooley who told us about his Meetups in the Las Vegas area and then again commented on how he believes NASA has become irrelevant and that the Apollo era/Cold War era space programs were dead. He then said that markets don't exist, people interested in commercial space need to have a day job and seed the commercial industry with their creativity, innovation, and passion, to facilitate market development down the road. Charles then gave us an N-Prize and NASA NANOSAT Challenge update. John Hunt was our next caller who took issue with characterizing our civil space program as a Cold War Soviet style socialistic program. He did not agree with Charles nor did he agree with the comments expressed by Rand Simberg in his recent interview. When I pressed John, he said he was more in alignment with the views expressed by Dr. Griffin when he was a guest last Tuesday. John did say that there would likely be far too much push back for Congress to increase the NASA budget anytime soon. John also talked about the need for heavy lift. After John's call, I did a usual rant on our confusing space policy, the lack of leadership on space policy by all applicable parties and both political parties. I also said I thought it was natural for members of congress with significant aerospace workers in their districts to help protect their jobs. I said I saw nothing unusual about that nor did I believe such action was sinister on the part of the member of congress, especially given the state of the economy for our nation. I acknowledge that many hold a different opinion on this and disagree with me. Our last caller was Steve from Canada. He suggested a heavy lift plan to increase the four planned launches for the 70 mt vehicle to as many as ten launches. He provided us with ideas of what the payloads might be and why so see what you think of his idea. One of his ideas was for a much needed variable gravity research lab associated with the ISS. Before Steve got off the phone, I asked him some questions about the Canadian public and their interest in the Canadian space program. Steve had lots to say about this, including the earlier effort for RADARSAT to be sold to an American company which did not happen. Steven explained this from the Canadian perspective and its a story worth noting, especially for the ITAR impact from the American side. If you would like to comment or ask questions about this program, please do so on the blog URL listed above. If you want to contact any of the callers, send me your note and I will forward it to the person of your choice. Selected by: David Livingston [ stations ], Mon, 02 May 2011 15:59:41 UTC
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Rand Simberg, Friday, 4-29-11 (62.86MB; download) -- Guest: Rand Simberg. Topics: U.S. space policy, influencing Congress and preparing for NASA budget cuts. Please note that you are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. We welcomed back Rand Simberg to the program to discuss our developing U.S. space policy. Check out his blog at www.transterrestrial.com. The Competitive Space Task Force think tank organization (www.competitivespace.org) was mentioned near the end of the program. For contrasting perspectives on U.S. space policy, listening to the interviews with Dr. Tom Jones on April 25, 2011 and Dr. Mike Griffin on April 26, 2011. Mr. Simberg began our two hour discussion with an overview of space policy, space leadership, and our options for moving forward. Mr. Simberg commented on congressional members more focused on jobs in their districts than on "good space policy" for the nation. Going right into the FY 12 analysis and congressional policy, our guest talked about the Space Launch System concept for heavy lift. Rand often referred to our clinging to an Apollo style space program that was no longer viable for today's world let alone our fiscal crisis. The absence of leadership was a theme that both our guest and I discussed throughout the program as did listeners. Later in this segment, with so much focus on the problems in congress, I asked callers and our guest how to change or modify the congressional process. It seems this is the $64,000 question. We also talked about commercial competition and CCDEV2 along with the need to have multiple providers of services for intelligent risk management. At the start of the second segment, I asked our guest if government subsidies could seed the development of commercial markets. Rand said yes, cited some examples from our past history, but said the subsidies had to be smartly planned and carried out. We talked about commercial markets with Bigelow Aerospace and discussed human rating of rockets. Rand talked about Space X flying their own astronauts on Dragon as both their rocket and Dragon were being designed for human spaceflight safety. The company might decide to fly their own people before any NASA approval for government astronauts. In addressing our fiscal issues, he said we cannot avoid a fiscal reckoning and that NASA should have a plan for spending using 2008 and 2006 budget levels. Heavy lift vehicles came up & then I asked about the influence of New Space on policy makers. New Space was a minority pressure group, it needed to make lots of noise, and that it would be a long term process to get desired changes into the system. Rand talked about small victories here and there and cited recent examples of this. The issues of White House and congressional leadership again surfaced and Rand cited examples from our past when we had space leadership for the good of the nation. One of the points Rand made throughout our discussion was that space was not important to the policy makers. He said once we understood this, our confusing space policy begins making sense. Rand told us about the space think tank in the Beltway that he helped put together to issue space policy papers for congress and staffers to review. Check out the Competitive Space Task Force website listed above. As the show ended, we shifted to the UK space agency that was recently created and the long standing English role in space development. As for space being an inspiration to students and for STEM, Rand said it was but the impact was already accounted for as a known & a given. If you have comments or questions for Rand Simberg, post them on the blog URL above. Mr. Simberg can be emailed at simberg@transterrestrial.com. Selected by: David Livingston [ stations ], Sat, 30 Apr 2011 16:26:11 UTC
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Dr. Michael (Mike) Griffin, Tuesday, 4-26-11 (52.83MB; download) -- Guest: Dr. Michael (Mike) Griffin. Topics: This interview is a comprehensive space policy & program discussion with our former NASA Administrator. Please note that you are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. We welcomed Dr. Mike Griffin to the program, our 11th NASA Administrator from 2005-2009. This program was also co-hosted with Dr. John Jurist. First, I want to again than Mike for being a guest on The Space Show and for his openness and comprehensive discussion on many topics and listener driven questions. I do apologize for not getting to all the listener email questions but there were so many coming in that it was simply not possible to work them all into the discussion. If your question was not asked, I do apologize. We started our nearly two hour discussion with Mike making an opening statement about where we are with space policy today. He did say that today the policy was confused. Mike then clearly articulated the broader issue not being discussed which was about the justification for a publicly directed space program. This is a discussion you must hear. After Mike's opening statement, a part of which addressed NASA oversight if a private company takes gov. money, Dr. Jurist asked him about such oversight for human spaceflight. He followed that up by asking how one sets the priorities within NASA for the various types of space programs NASA administers. I then opened the phone lines up and there were non-stop callers with questions for our guest. One of my early questions pertained to the bi-partisan support Constellation had with both a Republican and Democratic congress, asking Mike what happened to that support? Mike had much to say about the 05 and 08 Congressional Authorization Acts and bi-partisan congressional support. In our long second segment, we continued talking about the 05 and 08 Acts and space normally being non-partisan. The space workforce issue was brought up by Trent and then I consolidated several email questions to ask about heavy lift. Mike explained why heavy lift was necessary for going beyond LEO and he took us through the economics comparing launching smaller vehicles many times to one larger heavy lift vehicle. He did this a few times during the remainder of the discussion, including with our final caller from Hong Kong. As you will hear, this issue may be more of a policy issue than a technical or economic issue. Listen to his discussion on this point. What policy is best for the American space program. A listener asked about affording Constellation in the context of the Augustine report. Mike had much to say about Augustine, the parameters required for the report, and how budget numbers were used which he said did not track with the reality of the budgets in place when he was Administrator and that NASA was using for the out years before he left office. The ISS came up in our discussion as did international cooperation and partnerships. Mike also talked about the congressional process and in particular committee chairmen and the realities of space politics. Do not miss this discussion. Other topics in this segment included suborbital tourism, CRuSR, and our tolerance for accepting risk. The Ares 1X came up as did the five segment SRB. Near the end of our discussion, a caller who said he was Gen X talked about budget problems and what we could and could not afford. Mike refuted what he said and talked about why and how we could continue investing in space. Space X was discussed as was the risk of being dependent on a sole source anything. If you have questions or comments, please post them on the blog URL above. Selected by: David Livingston [ stations ], Wed, 27 Apr 2011 16:36:09 UTC
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Dr. Thomas (Tom) Jones, Monday, 4-25-11 (43.24MB; download) -- Guest: Dr Thomas (Tom) Jones. Topics: Space Shuttle, space policy, planetary protection. Please note that you are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. We welcomed Dr. Tom Jones back to the program to discuss the retirement of the shuttle, planetary protection, space policy, and the possibilities for human spaceflight and why. We started off talking about the upcoming Endeavor launch scheduled for Friday, April 29. We then discussed human rating rockets and the need for abort and escape systems. In our first segment, we also addressed the space workforce issues arising out of our current space policy. Dr. Jones had much to say about this issue. We discussed how best to talk to our elected representatives regarding space policy matters and then a listener asked our guest about a space policy without time lines and destinations as part of the policy. Don't miss what Tom had to say about why time lines and destinations were important components of a good policy. As we started our second segment, we talked about what lies ahead with beyond LEO. We discussed the Moon and going to an asteroid. Tom outlined the budget problem in way that was easy to understand and suggested that by adding $2 billion a year or 10% over a decade, NASA could afford to go someplace. We also talked about destinations as part of an international consortium. Tom pointed out some of the risks with the transition to commercial providers, including the liability problem. Later on, space tourism was brought up. Again, you will want to hear what Tom had to say about this developing industry. In our third segment, Dr. Jones discussed planetary protection. He told us about Asteroid 2005 YU55 and November 8, 2011, a story you can read about at www.spacedaily.com/reports/Asteroid_2005_YU55_To_Approach_Earth_Nov_8_2011_999.html. You do not want to miss what he said about this 400 meter diameter hazard to Earth. We talked about sky surveys, the need for better telescopes, and the risks facing Earth by not being able to identify more of the dangerous items that have the potential to impact Earth. This is a very important discussion so don't miss it. As you will hear, it is a global problem but it appears that the U.S. is in the drivers seat and doing the brunt of the research plus footing the bill for it even though we are only spending about $4.2 million a year which is woefully short of what is needed. To learn more about this problem, check out http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov and www.space-explorers.org. As we closed the program, we discussed the fact that Houston JSC did not get a Space Shuttle for museum display. In the context of this discussion, Dr. Jones talked about the very strong human spaceflight history at JSC, oversight, and the recent Wayne Hale article on why JSC did not get a shuttle. He also directed us to read the last chapter of his book, "Sky Walking" which he said was right on target with this discussion. His book will be available on the OGLF Amazon partners page, www.onegiantleapfoundation.org and if you buy it there, Amazon makes a contribution to The Space Show. Visit http://home.comcast.net/~skywalking for more information about Dr. Tom Jones. Post your comments & questions on The Space Show blog URL above. You can also contact Dr. Jones through his website or using skywalking1@gmail.com. Selected by: David Livingston [ stations ], Tue, 26 Apr 2011 16:44:25 UTC
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