US Manned Space Flight Taking a Budget Hit

An anonymous reader points out that Congress has quietly begun dismantling NASA's manned space flight program. "Other recommendations contained in the bill include a $77million reduction in NASA's proposed space operations budget, which includes the space shuttle and international space station; a $6 million reduction in science; and a $332 million shift in funds from the Cross Agency Support account to a new budget line-item included in the subcommittee's mark. Dubbed Construction and Environmental Compliance, the new account would be funded at $441 million. Congressional aides said the new line item and accompanying funds are aimed at consolidating NASA's various construction efforts into a single pot of money."

Comments

A shame and ironic

[Hmmm2000]

In a bad economy, pure science and space exploration seem to be first on the budget chopping block. However the information learned and technology developed while performing these activities quite often lead to innovations that fuel the economy for years to come.

Re: A shame and ironic

[Anonymous Coward]

Utter bullshit. We need to spend money to live on earth before we try to explore how to live off of it. There will be far more technological innovations if the money is pumped directly into research and/or the industry as opposed to the trickled effects of a space exploration mission. This is a classic case of living beyond one's means.

Re: A shame and ironic

[MightyMartian]

NASA has produced a helluva lot of useful technology. The drive to miniaturize onboard guidance systems and other computers in the Apollo program pretty much lead to the blossoming of integrated circuits and microprocessors in the 1970s. The value that that has produced over the last forty years for just about every industry in the industrialized world would be hard to calculate. So even though Apollo was an insanely expensive program, the spinoffs were enormous.

I'm not saying NASA doesn't need to live within its means, and I'm not saying that there aren't areas where efficiencies can be gained, but guys like you who just mindlessly go "money shouldn't be wasted on space research" are tragically ignorant of just how important the Unites States' space exploration programs have been to the technological innovations of the last few decades.

Re: A shame and ironic

[MightyMartian]

What an odd question. How would I prove that, any more than you could prove directing the money to basic research would have been better? It's a nonsensical question, like someone asking "If Elizabeth I had married a Catholic monarch, would England have still become the major naval power of its time?"

NASA had a requirement, a solution was developed, and that solution also had uses in other industries. In this case, the solution has uses in just about every industry out there. The problem was an engineering problem, for the most part the technologies already existed in one form or another, but the specific applications had not. I can't think of too many other programs at the time that would have driven the miniaturization of ICs as much as Apollo.

Re: A shame and ironic

[MightyMartian]

Uh no, I'm basing it on the proven spinoffs from the Apollo program. You're basing your claim on a demand that I prove a negative.

Re: A shame and ironic

[DerekLyons]

NASA has produced a helluva lot of useful technology. The drive to miniaturize onboard guidance systems and other computers in the Apollo program pretty much lead to the blossoming of integrated circuits and microprocessors in the 1970s.

That's what the urban legend says. But it's utter bullshit. The Apollo computers and guidance system were based on those of the Polaris A-1/A-2. The USAF and the USN miniaturized the computers and guidance systems, all NASA did was issue spiffy press releases.
 
You find the same thing almost universally when you run down the list of technologies 'developed' by NASA. They were first developed by someone else, and then like a technological Sylar NASA sucks them up.
 
 

guys like you who just mindlessly go "money shouldn't be wasted on space research" are tragically ignorant of just how important the Unites States' space exploration programs have been to the technological innovations of the last few decades.

The tragically ignorant are people like yourself who endlessly regurgitate NASA press releases. As far as results for dollars expended, the NASA PR department is probably the most efficient in the US government.

Re: A shame and ironic

[DerekLyons]

I can't think of too many other programs at the time that would have driven the miniaturization of ICs as much as Apollo.

Atlas, Titan, Minuteman, Polaris...

Re: A shame and ironic

[Grishnakh]

I'm not against the space program but I'm one of many who think that the focus should be on things that are obviously useful. A manned mission to Mars /might/ provide some stimulus the overall sense of aspiration amongst people, but robotic missions seem to provide a greater practical return on investment.

I think it depends on exactly what returns you're looking for.

If all you want is scientific knowledge about Mars, then robots are definitely the cheapest way to get that.

But if we had been content with simply sending robots (or remote-control probes, since the Moon is so close this would have been feasible), instead of sending manned spacecraft, we wouldn't have developed all the technologies we did, and we also wouldn't have developed any knowledge or expertise about sending humans into space.

If your goal is to eventually send humans to Mars, then sending robots isn't going to get you to that goal as quickly as starting manned missions as soon as possible.

Of course, with everyone whining about the spending, has anyone looked at how little money in the Federal budget is spent on NASA? It's a tiny, tiny fraction of what is spent on the DOD and for the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. Exactly what "return" are we getting on our "investment" there?

Why is this a surprise?

[dtolman]

The shuttle replacement is over-budget, under-spec, and without a realistic mission. We have trouble building and servicing a base going around the Earth, in zero-g... why does NASA think we can do this without busting timelines or budgets on the moon?

I wish Bush had set a more realistic goal... landing on near earth asteroids. Then NASA would have two things going for it - something never done, and a bs fallback line to feed axe wielding politicians (we need these missions to learn how to blow up incoming astroids - you want to tell your constituents why they need to live in a tent camp for the next 5 years when we evacuate all of New Mexico?).

Now all NASA has is a half-assed Apollo clone, no clear goal, and a loud insurgent campaign (DIRECT). I just hope this doesn't blow-back and foul up the fairly successful non-manned space missions.

Re:Why is this a surprise?

[spacemandave]

Wow, an astounding amount of ignorance is on display in this post. Near Earth Asteroids (NEAs, or NEOs if you prefer) may indeed be easier to visit than the Moon, and they are quite a bit easier to visit than Mars. Mainly this is due to the lack of appreciable gravity, so that the escape velocity from the surface adds only a negligible delta V to the total delta V budget required (for both landing and taking off again). You're not going to find yourself on a 100+ year orbit on an NEA. If you did find yourself on a 100+ year orbit and on on your way out of the inner solar system, then, by definition, you would have landed on a Halley-type comet (or perhaps even a long-period comet if you were *really* on your way out). Take as a typical NEA 433 Eros. The NEAR spacecraft successfully landed on it, despite the fact that the spacecraft was designed to be an orbiter (which, I think, succinctly illustrates how easy it is to land on an asteroid). Its perihelion distance (closest approach to the Sun) is 1.13 AU (1 AU is the Earth-Sun distance) and has a period of a bit less than 2 years. Once nice thing about asteroids is that they basically represent remnants of the original solar nebula from which planets were formed, and most of them never differentiated (melted and formed iron cores and rocky mantles). That means that they are relatively rich in many raw materials compared to the surfaces of planet-sized bodies. A carbonaceous asteroid contains valuable metals (often as little blobs of pure metal), water (up to 30% by weight in many cases), and organics (kerogen). Some other asteroids are nothing but metal, and would require very minimal processing to make them useful (unlike many ores found on Earth). Going to asteroids makes a lot of sense. The main difficulty with an asteroid vs. a lunar mission is that the mission length to an asteroid would be longer than one to the Moon (although depending on the asteroid, it could be much shorter than a Mars trip).

They have yet to take my suggestion

[Locke2005]

The expensive thing about manned space exploration is the added costs of bringing the explorers back. Manned exploration would be cost-competitive with robotic exploration if we just sent astronauts on one-way trips! Any volunteers?

Is sending humans a novalty at this point?

[ViennaSt]

With robotics coming such a long way since the 60s, it is more efficient and cheaper to just send robots to do all the exploring and data/sample collection in space. Until the average American thinks the cost of human presence in space is a priority for the tax payer dollar, space flight will have to be unmanned in the meantime. We are just going to have to wait for China or another rising global leader to send humans to Mars until the US population is willing to put in the extra effort and dollar to compete in a second space race and reinflate their ego as the "pioneers of space".

Huston, the Eagle has landed

[transami]

Without our biggest dreams, even our smallest hopes are lost.

And so the Spirit of our country is lost.

GO CHINA! GO CHINA!

[solios]

We did the Apollo thing not really to do it, but to rub the Soviet's nose in it. The the NASA manned program feels like it's been coasting on "hey, wasn't that AWESOME?!" for the last thirty years.

Don't get me wrong - I love the space program and think it's money well spent (overall - Ares/Orion is debatable, but look at the science we've gotten from Hubble and compare the cost of the maintenance flights against, say... the F-22 Raptor program). However, there's no competition in the manned arena and there hasn't been since the days of the Saturn V and the N-1 (or space stations, if you want to go there - We've fielded one and a fraction. The russians have done much, much more in that area).

And there won't be competition until China - who's been excluded from the ISS program - starts making some serious strides towards putting a man on the moon. Or mars. Or an asteroid or a comet or whatever.

So despite the setbacks they've faced, I'm all for the Chinese space program - eventually they'll catch up to NASA/Roscosmos and we won't have a choice - we'll have to get off our asses and start giving a shit about the manned program again, or lose the prestige forever.

NASA costs pennies compared to the black hole of the bailouts and massive defense boondoggles such as the recent USAF tanker fiasco or the Army's Future Combat Systems. Pennies - fractions of pennies - on the dollar, with REAL results.

Re:Time for gubm't to step aside and let others le

[Nyeerrmm]

While I'm an advocate of the commercial space segment, I think you're reaching a bit far here. Most people calling for it (myself included) believe that NASA needs to get out of the business of building launchers and buy them off the shelf, but continue their efforts to explore the frontier.

There are plenty of commercial opportunities for launching to LEO, and new NASA programs like COTS are attempting to foster this development by basically assuring the companies that the government will be a reliable customer. As such, it makes sense that NASA should limit its work on directing the construction of new launch vehicles and help to develop an open market that they and others can purchase from. Things like COTS, as well as efforts to reform ITAR would go a long way for this.

However, there is no reasonable commercial reason to do science and exploration, yet there is very high value for society in exploring and doing this science and development. This is exactly why we formed governments in the first place, to do the things that benefit our society and advance our interests that individuals and private groups are incapable of doing. Defense isn't really commercially beneficial (neglecting war profiteering which just leaches off of the government effort), but I think most people agree its necessary to some extent, thus why we have governments do it. In the 1500s and 1600s, governments paid for the initial exploration of the world, and only later did commercial entities come in to exploit and profit from it. Continued government spending on exploration efforts seems appropriate and proper if we ever want to leave the planet, especially at the low level of funding it has.

Seven hours in Iraq

[Weaselmancer]

Other recommendations contained in the bill include a $77million reduction in NASA's proposed space operations budget

When I read this I decided to see what that is relative to the Iraq war.

I'm using this chart as a reference. It says we've been at it for about 7 years, and it's cost about $670 billion in total.

So, 7 years is about 2500 days. Divide that through and you get about $268,000,000 per day. That works out to 11.16 million per hour.

77 million / 11.16 = 6.89 hours.

7 hours.