The Augustine Commission

It’s not official, but the Orlando Sentinel has some names, including one surprising one:

Christopher Chyba – Professor of Astrophysical Sciences and International Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School, Princeton University. He once held the Carl Sagan Chair for the Study of Life in the Universe at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, Calif.

Sally Ride – Physicist and a former NASA astronaut who, in 1983, became the first American woman and youngest American (at the time) to enter space.

Lester Lyles – Retired Air Force General and NASA administrator candidate. He is an expert in military space issues and is a member of the NASA Advisory Committee.

Edward Crawley – Ford Professor of Engineering at MIT, and a Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics and of Engineering Systems. He is engaged with NASA on the design of its lunar and earth observing systems, and with BP on oil exploration system designs.

Bohdan “Bo” Bejmuk – Respected engineer and executive at Boeing Co. and one-time executive at Sea Launch, where he helped put together and run the company’s unique offshore rocket launch system. He also assembled and led an elite Boeing engineering team to assist leading the integration of Russian elements into the Station. He was also involved in the space shuttle program from its earliest days.

Jeff Greason – President, CEO and founder of XCOR Aerospace and the Personal Spaceflight Federation. He was the team leader for engine development at the now-defunct Rotary Rocket, and previously worked at the computer chip manufacturer Intel. He has been active in lobbying to encourage support for private spaceflight activities.

Wanda Austin — President and CEO of The Aerospace Corp., an independent non-profit dedicated to assisting the nation’s space program. NASA recently commissioned her company to study whether military rockets could lift people and cargo to the international space station and the moon, and the study concluded they could, contrary to NASA’s previous assertions.

Emphasis mine. As confirmation (sort of), Jeff mentioned to me yesterday that he was going to be doing some consulting this summer, which was going to be keeping him very busy. I didn’t ask him what it was at the time, but I think I can guess now.

I think that this is great news (I know Bo Bejmuk, too, from Rockwell days). Jeff will definitely have an oar in the water to steer in a useful direction.

I’m not looking a gift horse in the mouth, but I’d love to know how he was picked, and who suggested him.

16 thoughts on “The Augustine Commission”

  1. Wanda Austin — President and CEO of The Aerospace Corp

    Apparently those people did the study de-bunking NASA’s claim that EELV couldn’t life Orion.

  2. I’d like to see Isakowitz, Worden and Huntress added as well, but there are only two places left…

  3. Bill, it actually mentioned that in the article, but I didn’t realize it at first either because they used the common misnomer of “millitary rockets” for the EELVs.

  4. Orion on EELV, here we come!

    Direct 3.0 will explicitly call for lifting Orion on Delta IV H as well as the Jupiter series of rockets, or so it is claimed at nasaspaceflight dot com

  5. Er…Rand, are you imagining that the recommendations of the commission are going to have any influence at all on the President’s decisions, except insofar as they may provide cover for what he wants to do anyway? I mean, it’s not like Obama doesn’t have a history of listening politely and encouragingly to people whom he intends to fully ignore. You might even say he’s made a career of that.

    I’m not suggesting this means the Obama White House will do something malignant. I’m only suggesting that whatever they do, having a particular someone on the advising commission is likely to alter what they do by some difficult to measure amount between zero and zip.

  6. Carl, ignoring your character assessment, Obama may not have any specific intentions and desires regarding space — he might only have vague aspirations. That’s true of most people who say that space interests and inspires them. Obama might decide to do as the commission recommends on the grounds that all the options on the table meet his vague aspirations, and on the specifics, he will be best served by following expert advice.

  7. Dr Scott Hubbard would be a great in-fill person.

    Dr Alan Stern would also be great.

  8. Someone on nasaspaceflight.com pointed out that the point of having an independent committee is that the members have to be, eh, independent. This rules out Worden and Isakowitz, but not Hubbard, Stern or Huntress, as far as I can tell.

  9. This does look like a promising group. Several with a history of criticizing NASA stay the course attitudes. Sally Ride did a good job charting out a course for NASA – which they utterly ignored. Jeff G. and Wanda A. hardly seem like folks you’ld pick to rubber stamp Aries/Orion.

    The big fear is that Obama will (as is often done) use this group as cover to do what he wanted to do anyway. Certainly he has no intrest in space and wants to move the money somewhere else, and just canceling return to the Moon, manned exploration, and Aries/Orion would save hundreds of billions. COTS-D would handle our ISS options. So that is the fear.

    But Sally Ride was furious after her proposal for NASA future path was tossed on a shelf and forgotten, and I don’t see her or this group as wanting to be a rubber stamp.

    Maybe Obama wants cover that will be a visionary – and far cheaper – path?

  10. I’m thinking Obama will fund asusual so that the people see he’s moving towards (as previously mentioned) his vage aspirations. If something bad happens, its the team’s fault, if something gets accomplished, Obama snags the glory.

  11. This is actually pretty encouraging. Usually you only do commissions if (1) you don’t care about the result so you’re outsourcing your policy to someone else or (2) you have a particular result you want, but its a little radical, so you carefully pick a commission that will recommend it to you. Either way, this looks good.

  12. I have to agree with Adam and Bob-1 – if Obama had a solid plan for space he wouldn’t be forming a panel.

    I don’t know much about the folks on it, but it certainly looks as if it’s a broad spectrum of ideas.

  13. Gee, just what we needed, another picture book, a CD of Powerpoint slides and a lot of time and money that could be better spent on something usefull.

    If your ego needs stroking Hollywood is just down the road. And the atmosphere, as murky as it gets there, is bound to be better than inside the Beltway. And at least you can measure progress via popcorn sales.

    I seem to recall how many of these panels that were going to Make It All Better, and who, in the end, didn’t do the square root of squat.

    How do you say “Please, Sir, will you let me touch your spaceship?” in Chinese?

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