Sunday, August 28, 2011

Florida Today Reflects on NASA

Two opinion columns in today's edition of Florida Today that reflect the dysfunctionality at the heart of NASA politics.

John Kelly "Same NASA, Same Issues"

NASA's three most important future space exploration projects — the ones critical to the future of KSC — already are repeating the exact same three mistakes that have been made on every over-budget, behind-schedule boondoggle project in the space agency's history ...

Auditor, after auditor, after auditor, after auditor has found the same three problems at the root of every NASA project that's blown its budget by billions of dollars and its schedule by years. The space agency and its big contractors issue lowball cost estimates that assume superhuman ability to leap technological hurdles, no unexpected surprises and cost-savings not backed up by historical performance.


Matt Reed "After Russian Crash, Turn to the F-150 of American Rockets"

Supposedly, this week's crash of a Russian supply rocket exposed the urgent need for a proposed NASA mega-spaceship to haul boxes to the International Space Station ...

That's like trying to build a nitro-burning monster truck from scratch in your garage just to make a few trips to Publix.

Someone please introduce Congress to the Atlas V rocket, the Ford F-150 of space travel ...

Three private companies, Boeing, Blue Origins and Sierra Nevada Corp., have already chosen the Atlas as the rocket to carry astronauts to the station in a capsules and a mini-shuttle they are building. Their test flights begin in three years.

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