Rethinking our space objectives

I don’t know why I have such a fascination with outer space.
Maybe it’s because I grew up watching and loving “Star Trek.” Maybe it’s the pioneering spirit or the desire to see and do things that are not natural. Floating weightless in the vacuum of space is not natural. Neither is plunging miles under the ocean to view shipwrecks. I haven’t done either of those things, but they still fill my daydreams and I love watching movies and documentaries about them.
I’ve been a Titanic buff most of my life – long before Robert Ballard discovered her shattered remains on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean. I also treasure my memories of watching Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong take mankind’s first steps on the moon.
Last week I wrote about my visit to Johnson Space Center to watch the launch of space shuttle Endeavour from the VIP viewing area at Mission Control. While that was a thrill, it didn’t come close to the experience of watching Columbia launch into space from the VIP viewing area at Kennedy Space Center. That was in 1995 and is one of my most treasured life experiences.
I have had the honor of meeting and interviewing several astronauts over the years, among them Buzz Aldrin, Jim Lovell, Vance Brand, Guion Bluford, Winston Scott, Charles Bolden, Jeff Ashby, Susan Helms, Ellen Baker, and, via phone, Alan Bean, Scott Parazynski and Kent Rominger.
They’re all remarkable people but I have a deep admiration for Aldrin. If there is anyone in the space industry who really gets what it’s all about, it’s him. I’ve spoken with him a couple of times and he even granted me an hour-long interview once – and went out of his way to do it. Most recently, I just finished listening to the audio book version of his autobiography “Magnificent Desolation: The Long Journey Home From the Moon.”
His book was written before President Obama’s election but published afterward. I have to suspect that Obama or his advisers must have read the book or consulted with Aldrin before Obama proposed a budget that effectively kills NASA’s Constellation program to take people to the moon, Mars and beyond.
At first I was outraged at Obama for daring to kill a sacred cow. With the shuttle fleet retiring this year and the space station given a retirement date in 2020, this leaves NASA without any clear direction for the first time in its history. After listening to Aldrin and reading comments from Bolden – who is now the NASA administrator – I have to backpedal and say that this plan might be in the best interest for America’s space program. I just don’t agree with the way it’s being done.
NASA might be better off shifting from a space exploration agency to one of space support. We might be able to do things in space, like going to Mars, faster and cheaper if it is directed by private enterprise rather than a government bureaucracy. But private industry has not yet caught up to the government and the funding needed to make it happen.
Aldrin understands that the future of space exploration is linked directly to sharing the space adventure with the masses. Space tourism dollars will fuel the industry. NASA can help that fledgling industry with funding and technical support. But entrepreneurs with plenty of moxie and capital are the ones who will be the next generation of space pioneers. They just need government to change its roll.
That’s not to say that NASA has outlived its usefulness. It hasn’t. NASA just needs a repurposing and a new role in space exploration. Space travel needs to be opened up to the average tourist. NASA needs to be to space travel what the government is to the airline industry. It operates airports and regulates the industry, but it does not run the airlines.
When early European explorers “discovered” the New World, they were funded by government. But settlement happened when people learned they could afford a new life on the frontier. Today, people travel across the oceans at their own time and expense. They no longer depend on government to do it. The same thing needs to happen in space. Orbital and even sub-orbital flights can lead to funding and technology for developing hotels in space and even rides to lunar orbit.
Space tourism has the potential of being a multibillion-dollar a year industry. It would be dependent on the economy and not the whims of Congress for funding.
It would make sense for NASA to auction off its Constellation programs and allow private industry to develop it for commercial/tourist uses. I think the Obama Administration is making a huge mistake by simply killing it. NASA should continue to develop the program with the intent of someone else operating it.
NASA should be open to allowing tourists to visit the space station on commercially-developed spacecraft rather than paying for rides from the Russians. I was stunned to learn that Aldrin was already hard at work on this concept nearly two decades ago.
The man is visionary and is one of the few people on the planet who truly understands space travel and man’s innate need to explore. He has not only been to the moon, he has been to the Titanic on the ocean floor and set foot on the North Pole.
Aldrin’s ideas for a cycler to transport people to the moon and/or Mars is revolutionary and makes a lot of sense. He is America’s ambassador to space and has done more to encourage space development and space tourism than any other person alive. I think we should take his advice and follow in his footsteps. After all, they’ve been in some incredible places.