The Great Space Race

NASA deserves credit for motivating and financially backing private sector initiatives to travel into space. The space agency started a competition for a privately-run workhorse (called COTS for "Commercial Orbital Transportation Services") to assist NASA with future space lifts to the International Space Station (and who knows, maybe the Moon and beyond). NASA's concern is that the Shuttles will go offline in 2010 and the planned Crew Exploration Vehicle may not be available until 2014. The commercial spacecraft could will the gap and meet other future needs as well.

So NASA offered the winner(s) of the contest $500 million in seed money, something it has never attempted before. About two dozens companies competed and NASA announced the two winners last Friday - SpaceX and Rocketplane Kistler.

"By stimulating the development of commercial orbital spaceflight, the NASA COTS program will have the same positive effect on space travel as the Air Mail Act of 1925 had on the development of safe and affordable air transportation," said Elon Musk, SpaceX CEO. "Moreover, the requirement for significant private investment and the fact that NASA only pays for objective, demonstrated milestones ensures that the American taxpayer will receive exceptional value for money."

The new support for the space industry could lead to additional spinoffs, including space tourism. Stay tuned.

For more on the contest, click here.
For more on the overall NASA initiative, click here.

Update: A $3.9 billion dollar contract was awarded to Lockheed Martin Corp. to build the Crew Exploration Vehicle. The multi-part contract is expected to cost as much as $7.5 billion through 2019. For more visit this link.

Alone in Space - And Almost Blind!

Hubble still hovers over our planet, but its camera stopped working back in June possibly due to a bad transistor. The telescope/spacecraft was launched back in 1990 and has been the subject of prior rescue efforts. Fortunately, NASA was able to work around the problem and get the camera back online.

"This is the best possible news," said Ed Ruitberg, deputy associate director for the Astrophysics Division at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. "We were confident we could work through the camera issue, and now we can get back to doing more incredible science with the camera." (Click here for more on the story.)

In addition to a bad transistor, NASA noted that the Hubble needs new batteries and gyroscopes to remain operational beyond next year. With the Shuttle delays and International Space Station backlog, it will be interesting if NASA can find the time and funds to make the necessary repairs. We have been well served by Hubble, including the fantastic picture of Jupiter above, and it would be nice if we could keep it going for many more years.

Update: NASA has decided to send a rescue mission to save the Hubble. The overall mission is slated for May 2008 and is expected to cost $900 million and last 11 days. With the repairs, the Hubble should remain active until at least 2013. Visit this link for more information.

Ever Hear of 2004 XP14?

No, this is not a new reusable rocket designed by Boeing. It is the name of an asteroid that missed the earth by 269,000 miles last month - appoximately the distance between the Earth and the Moon. The half-mile wide asteroid was first spotted back in 2004 (hence its name). If you missed it this time don't you worry. It will be back another 10 times over the next century (the rest being near misses as well, or so we hope).

But Will We Want to Come Back?

Have you heard of the Alliance to Rescue Civilization (with the cute acronym ARC)? While it may sound a little wild to worry about the day we can no longer live on this lovely blue planet, maybe they have the right idea. Always know where the fire exit is before you settle down in a new place.

ARC's mission is to "protect the human species and its civilization from destruction that could result from a global catastrophic event, including nuclear war, acts of terrorism, plague and asteroid collisions." How about simply bad management? None of that here, right?

The group envisions an off-site location, such as a space station or the moon, to act as a back up system. The site would store seeds, DNA, historic records, technology, literature, and more. Could we maybe store a leader or two up there - don't worry, we will call you if we need you.

We have already left a lot of our memories and technology around the solar system, and some is even leaving the solar system on the Voyager spacecraft. And what about the Russian and American space junk on the moon?

So why not try to be more orderly about it? I support the idea of a backup system, but let's also make sure we take care of what we have. The problem with any backup system is that we may take the original for granted. We may not be able to do a lot about an asteroid (though some would disagree), but war, terrorism and plague is a human specialty that we could do without (and should try and remove from the body politic, not move it out into space).