With the Shuttle gone...

On Wed, 20 Jul 2011 17:34:53 -0400, Jeff Findley
wrote:


Nomen Nescio formuleerde op woensdag :
..for the first time in my life I am truly ashamed to be an American. We're
turning into a third world country.

If you mean manned spaceflight... I agree

Considering what is currently happening in the US with respect to
commercial crew, I disagree.

If I wasn't close to 100% certain NASA's commercial crew funding is
going to vanish to pay for James Webb and SLS/Orion, I'd agree with
you. But in a few months, we'll see commercial crew zeroed from the
budget. Congress is thoroughly and hopeless addicted to its pork, Webb
and SLS provide that, Dragon and CST-100 don't.

Just like the last five years were wasted on the hopelss Ares I/Ares
V, the next three or four years will be wasted on SLS/Orion, at the
end of which we'll still be three or four years and $10 billion from
flying anything. Only then, maybe, will Congress give up on PorkSpace
and let NASA buy from the commercial sector. At which point we'll have
to wait another three or four years for the Congressionally mandated
design competition and the winner to actually build a spacecraft.

So no indigenous U.S. manned orbital spaceflight until 2017-18, in my
opinion.

Brian