NASA Announces Innovation Initiatives With Fiscal Year 2011 Budget

[shamandgg]

Well I guess it is time to rename SSM2010 project to Space Shuttle: The Legacy
I wish good luck to multinational corporations.
However, to cool the hype. VentureStar was supposed to be huge commercial success. It brought new initiatives and was very innovative. We all know what happened to it! It is like new US administration officially denied what they did before - rejected support for innovative commercial system.
I suppose NASA will be US based space administration like FAA is currently for aviation (where the last already proposed guidelines for commercial human space flight).

[Moonwalker]

Well, the VentureStar also was an over-budget NASA project. Yes it was very innovative indeed. I guess it was nearly 90% completed. But it also suffered from significant technological problems which actually caused the cancelation (mass, the tanks, etc....).

The success of multinational corporations can already be seen: the ISS. If this is done commercially we can safe a lot of more money. Whilst commercially does not necessarily mean no tax money, but just a different way to assign money.

Just look at Falcon 9. Its development costs is only 400 million dollars, which even includes the development of the Dragon capsule. Launch cost is more than three times less than the Soyuz launch cost whilst it has a higher payload capability. I can only imagine how costly this would have been under the NASA regime with all the jobs and contractual partners hiding behind the project...

[neosonic2k]

I've had mixed thoughts about the new course for NASA, but, sticking to a more open-minded approach, this IS cheaper on the budget, and if those commercial space ppl do meet/exceed NASA's safety guidelines, all the better. And if all collaborate, hey, we might get to Mars faster. I mean, look what collaboration got us. *points at ISS (actually passing over his home island)* Here's hoping this was truly the right course. Unfortunately, I can't really be an astronaut due to my left eye problems (they require 20/20 vision on both eyes, My left eye can't even distinguish the second largest letter in that eye board)... but I'd still want to work in the space exploration area... and I want it to succeed. So, really hoping this works.

[davidrobinsonjr]

Interesting article:

http://www.cnn.com/2010/TECH/space/02/06/nasa.jobs/index.html#cnnSTCText

Maybe there is hope.

[Admin]

Well I guess it is time to rename SSM2010 project to Space Shuttle: The Legacy
..SNIP..

LOL! The "SSM2010" is only a project name at this stage. We haven't decided on the name yet.

Check this thread if you have any suggestions.

http://www.space-shuttle-mission.com/forum/index.php?topic=3975.0

/Admin