New NASA Administrator Named

CheshireCatCO writes "The Bush Administration has nominated Mike Griffin as the new chief administrator of NASA. Griffin currently heads the Applied Physics Laboratory at Johns Hopkins University and holds degrees in physics, civil, electrical, and aerospace engineering and aerospace science, as well as an MBA. (How did he ever have time to do anything else?) He was also part of the Strategic Defense Initiative in the 80s."

Comments

Good appointment for 3 reasons

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, this is a Very Good idea for three reasons:

(1) the nominee is Not a Beancounter;
(2) the nominee is not an astronaut married to the Space Shuttle/Space Station welfare system;
(3) the nominee knws some science and engineering.

-- Jonathan Vos Post

Re:Good appointment for 3 reasons

[lecithin]

I'll give you another one:

"From an entrepreneurial standpoint, he has someone who has actually experienced what it is like to be on the other side of the table dealing with the government," he said. "We haven't had that before."

Re:Good appointment for 3 reasons

[demachina]

The one concern I would have is I think he was spearheaded Bush Senior's Space Exploration Initiative(SEI) which was Bush Seniors version of going back to the Moon and Mars, and he presided over a program that dead ended. You have to wonder if Bush Junior is hoping for a different outcome the second time around, or if he doing a bad rerun of SEI meaning the current initiative is doomed.

A few noteworthy Google hits on Mike Griffin below, a hard name to Google because its so common.

I gather he invented Faster, Better, Cheaper while at SDIO, a concept that has some merit if properly done, it has a lot in common with Kelly Johnson and the old Lockheed Skunkworkds that built the U-2 and SR-71, but became much maligned when Dan Goldin tried to implement it at NASA, because NASA is institutionally and structurally incapable of doing faster, better, cheaper and have it end up being actually faster, better and cheaper.

theForce.net

Mike Griffin, a former senior NASA manager and aerospace industry executive, presented the most charitable assessment of NASA's human space flight efforts, ranking it second in priority only to building a new, more reliable heavy lift launcher.Griffin advised following through with space station, which means returning the shuttle to flight, while setting a new course that includes Mars. To accomplish this, Griffin recommends increasing NASA's budget from $15 billion a year to $20 billion.

"NASA costs each American 14 cents a day. A really robust program could be had for about 20 cents a day," Griffin said. "Americans spend more on pizza then they do on space."

Free Republic

The final nail in the coffin of Goldin's "legacy" came when NASA published its damning critique of his vaunted "better, faster, cheaper" approach.
A couple of points on this greatly misunderstood concept..
First, FBC is not Dan Goldin's invention. It came out of the old SDIO ("Star Wars") organization back in the late '80s. At the time, the dominant paradigm in both military and civil space was big, complex, very capable spacecraft, on which any and all instruments and experiments could be accommodated.
This development model led to decade-long, multi-billion dollar missions (e.g., Galileo, Milstar). When these kind of missions screw-up (e.g., Hubble Telescope, Galileo antenna), the public and Congressional ramifications can be devastating.
"FBC" was devised as a way to deal with this problem. I believe it was mostly developed by Mike Griffin, then Director of Technology at SDIO. The concept was simple: cut costs by having a small, compact, "Skunk Works"-type development team. Fly small satellites, each with one or two instruments, more often. As you are launching smaller sats more often, you have more flight opportunities, so if there IS a failure, you can recover from it quickly. In short, the objective is the knowledge gained from space flight, not to design and fly the most capable vehicle.
It's "faster" because you don't have decadal development times as the satellites as smaller and less complex. It's "cheaper" because you're not paying a marching army of highly paid technical staff (where the true costs of space flight really are). It's "better" because for a given amount of expenditure, you get more data, more often.
You can criticize this all you want to, but the simple fact is that FBC "worked" on a lot of the SDI flight projects of the early 90s (e.g., Delta Star, MSTI), culminating with the successful space test of the Brilliant Pebble spacecraft, the Clementine mission in 1994.
Goldin and NASA (specifically, JPL) never really understood this concept. They understood "cheaper" in the sense of reducing engineering development costs, but kept the glacial JPL pace, which ran the manpower costs right back up again. The Mars Pathfinder mission, NASA's FBC "success" story, was successful o

Re:Good appointment for 3 reasons

[ktakki]

"From an entrepreneurial standpoint, he has someone who has actually experienced what it is like to be on the other side of the table dealing with the government," he said. "We haven't had that before."

Of the ten NASA administrators (actually nine since Fletcher served twice) -- from Glennan (1958-1961) to O'Keefe (2001-2005) -- seven have come from the private sector. Two (O'Keefe and Frosch) came from academia and one (Truly) came up through the NASA ranks.

So, seven of nine (heh) of the men who headed up NASA also had either engineering or administrative roles at companies such as Sperry Gyroscope, General Electric, General Dynamics, Hughes, Aerojet, Westinghouse, and TRW. All have been major defense contrators and NASA vendors.

I'm not going to go so far as to imply a conflict of interest, but I would be hesitant to uphold defense contractors as shining examples of private sector management. TRW, in particular, has had its share of cost overrun problems with respect to NASA and DoD projects.

k.

Re:Heavy lift

[Chairboy]

Russia's biggest operational booster is the Proton, which has equivalent delivered cargo capacity to the US shuttle.

Before you yell ah-ha! and trot out the Energia, note that I said 'operational'. In all likelihood, no Energia stack will launch again. You might as well count the Saturn V if you're optimistic enough to think the DE will fly again.

Correcting some info...

[TroaIzwhoot]

Griffin currently heads the Applied Physics Laboratory at Johns Hopkins University

Correcting some info: Griffin currently heads the Space Department at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, not the entire lab itself.
Press Release: http://www.jhuapl.edu/newscenter/pressreleases/200 4/040419.htm

Re:Time?

[Quantum Fizz]

As a hiring manager, I would be automatically suspicious of anyone who spent that much time in school. Sounds like he's trying to avoid real work.

Real work? Like heading the Space Department, a group with more than 600 people, which is the 2nd-largest group at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory?

As for your doubts that he actually built stuff, according to that first link above he helped design the Delta 180 missile components of the SDI program. He was also SDI's deputy of technology, associate administrator for exploration at NASA, and COO of In-Q-Tel (a private CIA-funded group to invest in relevent technology companies). He also had leadership positions at Orbital Sciences Corporation, and tech jobs at NASA JPL and Computer Science Corporation.

Regardless of whether you agree w/ SDI and the other jobs, you cannot doubt the fact that he has had both engineering and management positions, and apparently been rather successful and has a buttload of experience.

So back to your quote above, I'd say you'd make a pretty lousy hiring manager if you just judged their time in school without putting their work experience into context.

Impressive resume

[daveschroeder]

Prior to being at JHU's APL for the second time, Dr. Griffin was also the "president and chief operating officer of In-Q-Tel, a private, non-profit enterprise funded by the Central Intelligence Agency to identify and invest in companies developing cutting-edge technologies that serve national security interests."

Some may be familiar with In-Q-Tel as the CIA's private venture firm.

He had just rejoined APL last April. He was with APL in the 1980s, and left to become the technology chief for the Strategic Defense Initiative.

To expand a bit on what the summary said, "in addition to a doctorate in aerospace engineering, he holds master's degrees in aerospace science, electrical engineering, applied physics, civil engineering and business administration, and a bachelor's degree in physics." He is also the president-elect of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA).

There's no question he is not only a skilled academic with a clear appreciation for space sciences, but a competent administrator and manager as well, and experienced with Washington politics to boot. Let's hope he does well for NASA.

Re:Nasa Scared Shitless?

[RebelWebmaster]

I think NASA is well aware of that. It's the public that needs to learn that lesson.

Re:SDI?

[r00t]

If nothing else, SDI encouraged the USSR to run themselves out of money.

Plus you have to understand that SDI is only part of a many-layered defence. All layers are weak, and some have already failed. Some layers have not been implemented; this is terribly irresponsible. The layers can include at least:

• nuclear non-proliferation treaty (mostly successful, but note India and Pakistan among others)
• economic ties (you wouldn't nuke your trade partners)
• foreign aid
• export of culture
• revenge ability
• border crossing and port inspections
• monitored airspace
• spys and pre-emptive strikes
• early-stage ICBM take-down (airborne laser, high-speed rocket in nearby area, long-range gun in nearby area...)
• space-based mid-stage ICBM take-down (X-ray laser, smart rocks, chemical laser, rail gun...)
• late-stage ICBM take-down (high-speed rocket, long-range gun, various laser systems)
• bomb shelters

Every single one of these layers can fail. Relying on just a few layers is foolish.

Re:SDI?

[Rei]

The whole "SDI helped break the Soviet Union" thing is a myth. About the only things SDI could be responsible for would be additional programs for MIRVing warheads and other countermeasures. That's hardly a budget busting line item there.

The whole "military buildup helped break the Soviet Union" might have some truth to it, but countermeasures for SDI cost a tiny fraction of the cost of SDI. It's only good against newly emerging nuclear powers.

Of course, even the notion that the military buildup was the big issue is wrong; many people had rightfully predicted far earlier that the internal contradictions within the soviet system would destroy it. One of their biggest flaws (which is still around, BTW) is the fact that people often (rightfully) felt that they would be better off by hiding damaging information than admitting it. We got a nice taste of it, for example, after the Kursk accident. Factor in the failed collective farms and other failed social experiments, and it's not surprising that so many people saw this one coming.

You can't factor out the military buildup; however, crediting SDI is pretty unrealistic.