Slashdot Mirror
NASA Prepares To Launch an Orion and 3 Cubesats To Deep Space: 3 Years To Go (examiner.com)
MarkWhittington writes: As NASA has noted, the space agency and its contractors are working diligently on the first launch of the heavy-lift Space Launch System. The launch, officially called EM-1, or Exploration Mission 1, will loft an unpiloted version of the Orion spacecraft around the moon. NASASpaceFlight.com also noted that a number of secondary payloads, known as CubeSats, will be along for the ride as well. NASA considered EM-1, scheduled for 2018, a crucial step in its Journey to Mars which will, it is hoped, reach its ultimate destination sometime in the 2030s.
Factually as related to the crewed space program I don't think your conclusion holds up.
After the Apollo 1 fatal accident in January 1967, the first crewed flight of Apollo was delayed from its scheduled February 1967 to October 1968, a delay of 20 months.
After the Challenger fatal accident in January 1986, the next STS launch was delayed until September 1988, a delay of 32 months.
After the Columbia fatal accident in January 2003, the next STS launch was delayed until July 2005, a delay of 30 months.
The difference between a 20 month program delay after a fatal accident and a 30 month delay doesn't seem to qualify as "lost its collective balls".
And as for the manned space program in the 1960's, Alan Shepard aboard Mercury-Redstone 3 would have beaten Yuri Gagarin and been the first human into space if the previous Mercury-Redstone 2 had not exhibited some anomalies (which the chimpanzee aboard survived fine) and influenced NASA to add another test flight before launching Shepard. So NASA was not quite as "ballsy" back then as the legends have it.
Well, in 1975 we abandoned our existing orbital (and deep space) capability and put all our leftover Apollo/Saturn vehicles in museums. Then we had a six year gap in crewed space capability until STS-1 in 1981. Now, the first crewed missions for the Boeing Atlas/CST-100 vehicle and the SpaceX Falcon 9/Dragon vehicle are both scheduled for 2017, again giving a six year gap in US crewed orbital capability (SLS/Orion is a deep space capability to follow a few years later). But, I don't recall the enormous wailing and hand wringing about the USA losing its abilities in space back during the gap in the 70's like there is today.