January 3 News Items

Arizona School Team Wins Aerospace Challenge (Source: Arizona Republic)
A team of five students from the Tempe Tri-City Christian Academy won the 10th annual Honeywell Fiesta Bowl Aerospace Challenge at the Challenger Space Center in Peoria. The team will be recognized on the field during Monday's Fiesta Bowl, and they will travel for free to the Johnson Space Center in Houston. Students presented their models for next-generation space stations to a panel of Honeywell engineers and NASA astronauts who in turn asked questions about the designs. (1/3)

NASA May Face Protest Over Recent Commercial-Cargo Contract (Source: Wall Street Journal)
A possible contract squabble threatens to complicate NASA's plans to rely on commercial-cargo operators who would launch rockets to supply the Space Station. A contractor team led by startup PlanetSpace Inc., which includes Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Alliant Techsystems is considering filing a protest over a contract worth as much as $1.9 billion that was awarded last month to Orbital Sciences Corp., according to people familiar with the details. PlanetSpace hasn't made a final decision, and NASA is slated to brief competitors as early as next on the reasons behind its decision. But PlanetSpace officials, according to these people, already are consulting with lawyers and believe they may have legal grounds to challenge the agency's selection.

A NASA source selection panel ranked Orbital's overall proposal and its projected costs less favorably than bids submitted by the PlanetSpace team and a third bidder, SpaceX, according to one person familiar with the details. But William Gerstenmaier, the senior agency official who made the decision, opted to go against those rankings, according to people familiar with the details. Mr. Gerstenmaier, for example, disregarded the management strengths the selection board said stemmed from the participation of Boeing and Lockheed. Instead, NASA in the end cited PlanetSpace's "complete lack of experience as a prime contractor," according to documents provided to the bidders.

The agency effectively decided against the PlanetSpace team because of Mr. Gerstenmaier's doubts about its ability to manage technical risks and deliver what it promised. But the losing bidder and its partners, for their part, are likely to argue that NASA's fixed-price contract award decision failed to adequately consider the PlanetSpace team's edge in certain areas. (1/2)

Space Florida Editorial: Pursue Commercial Opportunities in Space (Source: Orlando Sentinel)
With satellite-related consumer services on the rise — GPS navigation, satellite TV and radio — there will be increasing interest in launching new generations of satellites from locations like Florida. What may be less obvious are space-related applications for life sciences, biotech and pharmaceuticals. We will aim to pursue more of these types of partnerships in 2009.

Additionally, Space Florida will work to build a launch complex at Cape Canaveral, which should be ready for its first customer by fall 2010. We are already talking with commercial launch providers interested in using this pad. Finally, in 2009, we will work with legislators to designate launch- and payload-processing facilities affiliated with Cape Canaveral Air Force Station as part of a “commercial launch zone” to extend tax benefits, like those of a free trade zone, to customers. This will give Florida an advantage over other states in attracting commercial space interests as the shuttle heads for retirement. (1/2)

Future of Commercial Spaceflight Uncertain, But Promising (Source: Space.com)
This year closed with a volley of seemingly hopeful signs for what's termed by some as "NewSpace" - an entrepreneurial spaceflight trajectory markedly different than NASA and its cabal of mainstream aerospace contractors. Click here to view the article. (1/2)

Shuttle Extension Options Have Common Denominator: High Cost (Source: Space News)
NASA could extend space shuttle operations to 2012 by adding three flights — at a cost of roughly $5 billion — without dramatically affecting the agency's plan to return astronauts to the Moon by 2020, according to a draft internal report on delaying the planned 2010 retirement of the orbiter fleet. However, extending shuttle operations to 2015, when a replacement system is slated to become available, would cost more than $11 billion and have severe impacts on lunar exploration hardware development.

A decision on whether to pursue either extension option is needed by May 2009 to reverse plans to draw down shuttle operations, the draft report said. A two-year shuttle extension offers limited benefits but does not carry significant technical risk. It does not eliminate the gap or solve work-force retention issues, but would benefit the space station and provide an opportunity to use the shuttle to test Constellation hardware. (1/3)

Technical Issues Cause AEHF Cost Growth, Launch Delay (Source: Space News)
Technical issues encountered during testing and the need to swap out some faulty components have delayed the U.S. Air Force's first Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) secure communications satellite and added some $259 million to the program's overall cost. (1/3)

NASA Might Change Hubble Launch Pad Requirement to Keep Ares 1-X On Track (Source: Space News)
NASA officials are weighing whether they need two space shuttle launch pads to support the upcoming Hubble Space Telescope servicing mission or if they can get by with one, a shift that would help keep the planned July test flight of the prototype Ares 1-X launch vehicle on schedule. Before NASA can fly the Ares 1-X, the agency needs to make permanent modifications to one of the two space shuttle launch pads in Florida. However, the Hubble servicing mission as currently planned requires an extra launch pad to be available to launch Endeavour on a rescue mission, should that become necessary. (1/3)

Lowest Rated Proposal Lands Biggest NASA Resupply Contract (Source: Space News)
When choosing among three firms to haul supplies to the space station, NASA's Bill Gerstenmaier faced an unexpected dilemma: whether to make just one contract award to frontrunner SpaceX, or award a second contract to another finalist that happened to have the highest price and lowest score. SpaceX was the clear technical and price winner. The choice between Virginia-based Orbital Sciences Corp. and PlanetSpace of Chicago required more deliberation.

The proposal from start-up PlanetSpace, Gerstenmaier said, relied too heavily on subcontractors Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Alliant Techsystems. "I concluded the proposal from Orbital was superior due to the serious management risks inherent in the PlanetSpace proposal; however I recognized PlanetSpace had a lower overall price than the Orbital proposal...PlanetSpace was the only offeror that proposed a configuration requiring verification and integration of its orbital vehicle with two launch vehicles to meet the requirements of [the commercial resupply services program], which potentially increases the technical and schedule risk to NASA," Gerstenmaier wrote. (1/3)

Griffin Defends Ares-1 as Criticism Intensifies (Source: Space News)
Griffin said existing EELV rockets, the Atlas 5 and Delta 4, are too small to launch Orion as currently designed and that scaling back the capsule will be expensive. He concedes an EELV might be capable of supporting brief excursions to the Moon comparable to the Apollo missions of three decades ago, but said it would not be capable of transporting the mass needed to establish a lunar outpost or support longer missions.

Tight budgets already have pushed back the development schedule of Ares 1 and Orion, widening the gap between the space shuttle's planned retirement and the availability of the replacement system, now scheduled for March 2015. During the interim period, the only means of transporting crews to and from the space station will be Russia's Soyuz capsule.

"I just think it was a mistake to develop two entirely new rockets within a decade," said Jim Muncy, a director and co-founder of the Space Frontier Foundation, an advocacy group based in Nyack, N.Y. "This is not about it being a flawed design. It doesn't fit financially in terms of minimizing the gap, in terms of sending astronauts and large cargo to the space station and enabling a return to the Moon." (1/3)

France To Work with Brazil On Satellite Bus Designs (Source: Space News)
The French and Brazilian governments will cooperate in the development of Brazilian-designed satellite platforms for low Earth orbit science missions and geostationary-bound telecommunications, navigation and meteorological payloads. The agreements were finalized during a bilateral Franco-Brazilian summit. France will aide Brazil in developing a multimission satellite platform to carry a range of science and other payloads in low Earth orbit. France already has developed two platforms, Myriade and Pleiades, for similar purposes. CNES said its work with AEB will focus on in-orbit attitude control and could lead to Franco-Brazilian industrial collaboration. (1/3)