NASA Administrator Bolden: Ending Constellation Was "Purely Budgetary"

February 7, 2010 (LPAC)—Speaking at a press conference Feb. 6 at the Kennedy Space Center, prior to the scheduled Space Shuttle launch later that night, NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden tried to assure the press, angry Members of Congress, and the thousands of now frightened people who work for NASA, that this new direction the White House has given the space agency will not destroy the manned space program. He was unsuccessful.

Numerous reporters described how furious Congress is, since they have twice put into law their support for Constellation. Bolden repeated his view (actually the view of the Augustine panel) that "we could not get where we want to go" with Constellation. But he admitted that the decision to shut it down was "purely budgetary." In other words, if NASA had been given the money, we could have been on or near the original schedule for the 2020 lunar return. "[Former NASA Administrator] Mike Griffin continually said 'I need more money' for Constellation," Bolden said. But Bolden did not then take the logical step from there, which undoubtedly Congress will, which is, to use the $6 billion slated for commercial launchers, and accelerate Constellation. This, Bolden intimated, the OMB will not allow.

One reporter remarked, that with the "commercial" program, and no government back-up, "ten or fifteen years down the road" you may have no vehicle. "I don't think DOD will let us mess with their rockets too much," he concluded.

"You'd be surprised," was Bolden's reply. He cited the need to "regain the [aerospace] business that has gone overseas," as the focus for a healthy industry, as if that could substitute for NASA advances in launch vehicle technology.

Ultimately, the timing of the manned lunar missions comes down to a next-generation heavy-lift vehicle, like Apollo's Saturn V, that can take astronauts and cargo, out of Earth orbit, and to the Moon. Although Bolden assured people that technology already developed for Constellation's lunar mission will be used, pressed more than once on when there will be a heavy-lift vehicle ready to fly, he demurred.

The White House plan to kill Constellation proposes to substitute an open-ended rocket propulsion "R&D program." Bolden said it is his "hope" that "by 2020-2030," a heavy lift vehicle will "start development." This puts a manned lunar mission off at least until the mid-2020s, which was considered an unacceptable, stretched-out timeframe by the Augustine panel for Constellation, which they, therefore, recommended be cancelled.

In reply to a question about the U.S. versus other nations' missions to the Moon, Bolden replied: "Am I concerned that China may have a flag on the Moon soon? They're going to join the six American flags" that are already up there.

Where there is no vision...