This Week in Space 5 - February 3, 2010

[Kapitananime]

Constellation is not RELIVING Apollo. It is creating a long term human presence on the Moon and then into the outer solar system. NASA is on to something NEW? 10 more years of the Space Station and humans in LEO for another 40 years. Thats New??

Garver should be fired NOW!

[sbergman27]

Why is it that attention seems completely focused upon the start-ups like SpaceX? Did Boeing and Lockheed Martin disappear into a hole or something?

[jawayetti]

@sbergman27 Places like SpaceX and others at Mojave are the fastest movers in the industry. It seems that Boeing and Lockheed will not do major development without a contract and have not really dedicated resources towards vehicles.

[sbergman27]

@jawayetti Of course, as soon as SpaceX, et. al. have something of value... Boeing and Lockheed will buy them. And then things will really get moving. The current crop of private initiatives is taking baby steps. Adult strides are going to require deeper pockets. Also, in SpaceX's future is likely a "Titanic" style disaster, taking a group of the world's richest people to their deaths. This is almost certain to occur. The failure rate for manned space flight has held quite steady at about 1%.

[jawayetti]

@sbergman27 Perhaps they'll be bought, but I doubt it. The whole point of this is that LEO can be handled by small enterprise while the big boys go after loftier goals. I have direct experience with some of these companies and your narrow view of them does not match with the reality I see. YMMV.

[sbergman27]

@jawayetti "The whole point of this is that LEO can be handled by small enterprise while"

Really? Show me where it says that in the 2011 budget. The intent is to shift LEO to *private enterprise* and not to "small enterprise". You may or may not have experience with this narrow area. But I submit you are too close to the forest to see the trees, Step back and consider what *history* has to say about these situations.

[jawayetti]

@sbergman27 Believe what you want. It's not like either of our opinions matter.

[sbergman27]

@jawayetti While I would agree that the fate of the industry hardly rests upon what we agree upon, or fail to, in this YouTube discussion thread... I take issue with the idea that we should simply believe "what we want". We should base our views upon facts.

[jawayetti]

@sbergman27 The neat thing about facts is that no matter what you believe, they remain true. I HAVE been basing my view on facts. I can't divulge everything, nor do I have time to educate you.

[sbergman27]

@jawayetti Thus far, you haven't "divulged" any facts whatsoever. Not even those publicly available. Nice try, though, pretending that you're constrained by NDA. LOL!