I can't go?
Posted on 08/03/2007 6:54:15 AM PDT by Fitzcarraldo
One of the most respected top managers of the Apollo program, Joseph P. Gavin, who led development of the NASA/Grumman Apollo lunar module, is airing sharp opposition to the Bush Administration/NASA goal of returning humans to the Moon as a stepping stone to Mars.
In a letter to Aviation Week & Space Technology, Gavin, former director of the lunar module development at Grumman, says he believes the near term Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle lunar plan and Moon base goal should be scrapped in favor of even more emphasis on Mars—especially robotic Mars exploration.
“I have been somewhat surprised to see the lack of active criticism of the administration’s vision for space exploration,” says Gavin in his letter to Aviation Week. “It seems to me to be more concerned with the 'how' as opposed to the 'why' he says.
The letter is carried in Aviation Week’s July 30 edition. The Apollo Grumman lunar module design is being used by NASA as an engineering starting point for the initial assessments of a the manned Lunar Surface Access Module (LSAM) that would return astronauts to the Moon in about 13 years under NASA’s new exploration vision.
“The argument that the Moon is a necessary training base for eventual manned expeditions to Mars is flatly unpersuasive,” says Gavin, who directed development of the first manned spacecraft ever to land on another body in space.
After manned test flights in Earth orbit by Apollo 9 and lunar orbit by Apollo 10, six more Grumman lunar modules landed 12 astronauts on the Moon between 1969-1972 ( see Apollo 15 photo below ). Another acted as a lifeboat to save the Apollo 13 crew.
After leading lunar module development and other programs at Grumman, Gavin became president and CEO of the company. Now retired and in his late 80s, Gavin remains active in aerospace forums and also with his alma mater, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Gavin says the new NASA lunar vision should be shifted to Mars immediately. He will turn 100 yrs. old in 2020, about when the first lunar landing since Apollo is envisioned.
“Inasmuch as we have been to the Moon—-yes I remember the Apollo days vividly—-it is unclear to me that there is any particular urgency to return, he says. “Past studies have indicated the complexity and the implied great expense of a lunar base operation.
“The application of Apollo style technology to replace the shuttle appears to be a desperate effort to save development costs. It also seems to be an invitation to the Europeans and others to jump ahead of us in pushing the frontiers of technology.”
Gavin says “our first priority” should be to fully exploit the International Space Station. But the second major U. S. space program priority “should be to undertake further robotic exploration of Mars to see if human exploration [there] is really warranted,” he says.
“Mars is becoming more interesting as we receive more data from the unmanned devices now in place and reporting back. The intriguing question of current or prior life on Mars needs to be answered,” he says.
While Gavin’s comments came in a letter to this Aviation Week editor, several other key Grumman lunar module engineers, who were led by Gavin, told a recent NASA return-to-the-Moon symposium that they have doubts about whether the national political leadership and public have continued will to undertake a major new manned lunar effort, as in Apollo. The symposium was not a forum about whether the U. S. should return to the Moon, but rather for a discussion between Grumman and NASA managers about how lessons from the Apollo lunar module program (begun 40 years ago) could aid development of the LSAM for the new NASA plan.
“Because in the 1960s everyone was conscious of Apollo, we were able to attract the best and brightest people to work on the program,” says Gerry Sandler who helped lead the Grumman lunar module Reliability and Maintainability Team. “If it is not recognized that [the NASA/Bush lunar plan] is a major national priority people are not going to be as anxious to work on these kind of things as they were in the 1960s, he told the NASA symposium in Washington on the new lunar effort.
“We talked about that being one of the major differences on the upcoming program as opposed to the past,” says Bob Schwartz, also a retired Grumman lunar module engineer. “We were being watched by the entire world and we were not permitted to fail. I am not so sure there is that drive now,” he said.
Lunar module engineer Joe Mule’ said he believed it would take 15 years to reconstitute an engineering team like developed the Apollo spacecraft.
The Lunar Module veterans expressed concern about the current poor performance of U. S. students in math and science. But none of them openly expressed a preference for Mars over the Moon like their former boss Gavin, who did not attend the symposium because of a previously planned trip to Hawaii that conflicted with the timing of the Washington session.
Water on the Moon remains unconfirmed. (It could be confirmed with a relatively inexpensive unmanned landing mission to the lunar poles.) There is little or no carbon dioxide there, either, and there is no other source of carbon. You need to use rockets to brake to a landing on the Moon, hence additional fuel.
For a relatively small addition in escape energy, you can get to Mars, brake to a landing using its atmosphere, and have all the chemical components at hand to begin industrial operations - from what we know already.
I can't go?
Unconfirmed.
“M A R S Mars, Bitches!” - Dave Chappelle
007, I couldn’t help but think of Black Bush.
Have a great weekend!
IMO in the case of manned exploration of Mars, unless you put a very high "non-monetary" value on "being there", the answer is no: it's easy to think of more productive scientific, economic and military uses for the money.
Nobody cares. NASA funding remains what it was and the excitement has been totally gone since the second Shuttle disaster.
Some water vapor might be venting from a couple of craters. You'd have to get really serious about mining to recover any He3 and there is still no commerical use for it.
The Moon is a diversion on the critical path to space resource self-sufficiency beyond Earth. Mars has all the components, in large enough quantities necessary to sustain an independent human colony without resupply from Earth. The Moon cannot ever hope to match Mars in terms of resources and hence will always be a resource sink in space operations.
The "might" could be verified with relatively inexpensive unmanned landers - instead NASA comes up with a multi-billion dollar Moon program, and uses that "might" as a teaser, instead of quickly sending out the probes (it could be done cheaply in less than a year) to check.
During Clinton’s administration Neil Armstrong said we should return to the moon. During the Bush Administration, Neil Armstrong said we shouldn’t bother returning to the moon. It’s not hard to tell that Armstrong is a Democrat, is it?
Amazing that next to no spacecraft have been sent to the moon since Apollo. It’s like it doesn’t exist. It could be done cheaply and by any country with any kind of space program. They could even check up on Hoagland’s glass skyscrapers—yes or no.
The moon is a military foothold.
Mars may get PC eliminated.
aaahahahaaa! I love the Pres., but that is some funny shizzle!
Have a great weekend, too!
Mars does not have a magnetic field like the earth and is not protected from solar winds like earth.
Only Jupiter has the same type of van allen belt, hence the consistent statement of scientists that Jupiter moons might be the only other place in the solar system to find life.
Unfortunately NASA has proven time and again that it can commit endless resources and time to reinventing the wheel.
Instead of making incremental changes to the Mars rovers, to send more and more rovers to Mars to find much the same thing, the entire emphasis on the space program to both the Moon and Mars missions should concentrate at first, not on exploration, but on “infrastructure”, which in the long run will significantly increase the amount of exploration that can be done.
By this, I mean some very straightforward, “brute force” missions, to create a permanent foundation on both the Moon and Mars that, with every subsequent mission, will be improved upon.
Such a foundation should use large and powerful construction robots, probably built by Caterpillar, powered by a small nuclear reactor, to dig tunnels suitable for human use.
Horizontal rock tunnels with pressure doors would radically increase the amount of time all subsequent missions could be on the Moon or Mars. Instead of having to ship habitats with the astronauts back and forth every time, for brief stays, they can take far more oxygen, supplies, equipment, experiments, and everything else they need.
Rock tunnels would protect them from vacuum, cosmic and enhanced radiation, extremes of heat and cold, extremely abrasive dust, and also give them a LOT more space in which to work and live.
And using construction robots would save vast amounts of time, in that they could work continuously for years without there having to be humans present. The humans would just need to bring replacement parts for things like drill bits. And no need for the robots to stop working once humans have arrived or left again. They could just keep improving on the habitat.
Since such robots would be on a one way mission, even their landing craft could be cannibalized for things such as pressure doors, reinforcing rod and flooring. And once they had completed the basic tunnel, they could prospect for and mine water ice, both for water and to generate gas they could use to test the tunnel for pressure leaks. Finally, the robots could be reprogrammed and maybe retooled by the astronauts for new labors.
The short and long term advantages of doing it this way are profound, compared to endless repeats of two week long missions of the Apollo type, or endless variations of Mars rovers be-bopping around taking pictures of rocks.
The robot ships, being very large and heavy, would most likely be made in 100 ton modules, each of which could be sent into orbit on a heavy lift rocket, then assembled in orbit before going on their main mission.
The question becomes "Whose money?" I think it's a complete waste of money, but obviously you have a diametrically opposed opinion. Why should I pay for your pipe dreams? If you and your like minded friends think it's a good idea then YOU pay for it.
No, it's like it isn't worth the expense or effort.
A. The Apollo program was terminated leaving potentially interesting lunar exploration undone. Despite its success, this program was criticized in some quarters as "a huge expense to bring back a couple of bags of rocks." Many of the early Mars studies (patterned after Apollo) and especially the 1992 "90 day" study by NASA appeared very complex and many times more expensive than Apollo.
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