Jim Dunstan is giving a talk on acceptable levels of risk for various transportation modes. Case in point, we could reduce our forty-thousand traffic deaths but aren’t willing to pay the cost. We accepted significant loss of life for early aviation. It was recognized in developing the Warsaw Convention that we had to “do for law what the engineers were doing for machines,” which meant we needed a liability regime. Aviation has strict liability, with a cap per the convention. Space currently has an uncapped liability, driven by the 1967 Outer Space Treaty and the 1972 liability convention.

He thinks that he’s perhaps found a loophole in the liability convention for spaceflight participant, though it’s not clear whether “participant” means “crew” or “passengers” (or both). Unfortunately there’s enough wiggle room for plaintiff’s lawyers to have a field day.

He is still amazed that we won the battle a couple years ago in getting the FAA to keep hands off passenger safety regs for now, but the battle isn’t over. It established a “Informed Risk Regime” for spaceflight participants. Implication for this is that, since there is no federal tort law, it will be matter for state laws (at least in the states in which people operate, if not in all fifty, just to be safe). This is the “next frontier” for space lawyers. Gaol is to provide immunity for operators who have FAA licenses and have obtained “informed consent,” based on extreme sports, such as helicopter skiing.

Virginia has passed such a law, though it needs to have a governor’s amendment with help from the space lawyers, because original law was based on an agricultural tourism bill to protect farmers on historical farms. Tractors and spaceships aren’t quite the same thing, so they took the existing language and tied it back into the FAA regulations as much as possible. Virginia needed to do this early, because they have a spaceport at Wallops, and they also have a common law that says that citizens cannot waive right to sue in prospect. The law had to be amended to override this. It has been submitted to the governor, who accepted the amended language, and it’s hoped that it will be repassed in April. He is giving credit to Jack Kennedy to make this happen (in the face of opposition from the Trial Lawyers Association). Still problems with the bill–could be better from a clean sheet of paper, but it’s good enough for now.

Next targets–Oklahoma, New Mexico, and California (which might require a state constitutional amendment).

Another concern is if someone comes down with cancer after flying and attempts to blame it on the flight. Need to characterize environment of vehicles during testing to help fight this.

And somehow, it seems appropriate to point to this article that describes how lousy the human mind is at assessing risk. This may be one of the biggest problems with this industry.

[Update at 5 PM MST]

Jack Kennedy checks in in comments with a link to the latest version of the bill.

Henry Cate, who normally blogs about home schooling is also live blogging the conference. Just keep scrolling.

Michelle Murray of FAA-AST gave a presentation on what the office has been up to for the past year since the last Space Access meeting. In the process, she announced that Blue Origin had a successful test flight yesterday. She’s probably not at liberty to say much more than that, but perhaps they will have something at their site about it soon (they don’t yet). Then again, perhaps not.

Kerry Scarlott, an attorney who specializes in ITAR, will be talking on it. Following that, there will a panel on it, on which I’ll be sitting, so don’t expect me to blog it.

Introduction, saying it is what it is, rather than what we can do to change it. It is effective when talking about guns and bullets and missile technology, but it’s questionable whether it is with this community, and there is hope that it may change, but right now, it’s something we have to live with. Explaining some of the nuts and bolts of how it works, then put together the panel, where he can respond to issues that the rest of us bring up.

The acronym is the Advisory Committee on Entrepreneurial Space Access. Charles Miller, who is currently consulting to the Air Force Research Lab at Wright-Patt, is providing a status report on the progress in terms of developing means by which the DoD and the entrepreneurial space community can mutually interact, to focus on Operationally Responsive Space. One of the ideas was “a NACA for the twenty-first century,” hence the name. AFRL supports this concept. He’s been briefing many people on this, and there’s support from other elements of the DoD, and there may be a major meeting on this before the end of Fiscal 2007 (i.e., September).

Notes that we are vulnerable to asymmetric attacks in space. This isn’t new, but Iraq insurgency has taught much of the world that asymmetry works against the US, and China recently demonstrated that it could work in space, with their ASAR test, people are now taking it seriously. We are much more sensitive to this than the other guy–our entire force structure is now based on space. We become dumb, deaf and blind absent our orbital assets, whereas the enemy isn’t bothered at all. Solution is rapid relauch of assets, which capability could give an enemy pause because it reduces the value of attacking us. The systems needed to do this have other benefits, of reducing cost of space in general, reducing the cost of the satellites, commercial spinoff, etc. Need to break out of the cycle of complex, expensive long-lead satellites and more into a more responsive procurement and deployment environment. More from a vicious cycle to a virtuous one. Go with shorter-lived, smaller, more satellites, more consistently on the leading edge, with higher rates that bring down costs.

Describing what NACA did that made things happen, cost effectively, in aviation. Helped coordinate industry and government, helped mitigate disputes between Curtis and Wrights, early advocates for the airmail service. Performed technology development for aircraft that were generically applicable.

We currently have some coordinating bodies, but none that cross the boundary between industry and government. Need annual reports on what barriers are (technology, regulatory, etc.). Need to have internships and cross pollenization, perhaps through vouchers to industry, and stimulate ideas for new markets and perhaps

Commercial spaceplane day on July 19th, supported by AFRL, and a Reusable Access to Space Exchange will be in late August in Dayton.

Dana finished early, so an unscheduled speaker, Bruce Pittman, is giving a talk on the NASA Ames Space Portal, which was established by Pete Worden (Ames center director) to set up a way for private industry to more easily interface with NASA.

“If space is so great, why aren’t we using it more”? You’d think we’d be smarter than we are after fifty years. Held a series of workshops to figure out what’s missing to bring the full potential of commercial space to fruition. Time scales too long on research, space not routine enough, no clear demand model. Need to find more robust customer base. Also need to find business cases that will close in order to raise money.

They decided that this is actually a pretty good time to get into the space business. Helping support COTS (which is not a contract–it’s a public/private partnership via a Space Act Agreement). We should recognize that this is a very difficult thing for NASA, because they don’t like to relinquish control, and if they’re not doing as good a job of it as they can, be happy that they’re doing it at all, and hope that they get better at it. Pointing out the difficulties of NASA’s “visiting vehicle” policy, and need to make this easier, as well as making it easier to do things on the station itself.

They’re trying to learn from history, based on NACA (I think that Charles Miller will be talking about this as well, after the break). NACA formed to help regain the lead from the Europeans in aviation early in the century. We need a NACA-like entity for space, resurrecting the good things that NACA did right up until NASA was formed that created the aviation industry. In keeping with the National Space Act, but NASA has done a poor job of implementation.

Goal of the portal is to help NASA meet these legislative obligations, by helping build customer base for space services, and providing a “friendly front door” for the agency.

Working with NASA on COTS, looking for ideas for COTS follow ons. Working on Virtual Reality and simspace (working with Second Life) to see how to apply to the real space world. Commercial workshop results available on the web.

[Stuff coming too fast to capture–recommend going to Ames Space Portal web site for more information.]

Dana Andrews talking about the company (founded by his son). “Largest unheard-of aerospace company.” Now at seventy people, and growing fast.

Lot of work for a lot of people. Formed in 1999. Got started without investors, by doing small contracts for NASA and the Air Force. Double in size and revenue every year. Between fifteen and twenty million in revenue expected this year. They are hiring.

They have a system for going to the moon and Mars that would cost roughly half of ESAS. NASA’s Orion module that they show the press was actually built by Andrews, by removing their logo and replacing it with the meatball. Mix of old Boeing veterans with young “computer wizards” who are being mentored. Work NASA, commercial, DoD, split equally, with all three expanding. Woman-owned disadvantaged business (his daughter-in-law is CEO, and Korean–woman who raised Kistler’s first major funding).

Share a building with Paul Allen in downtown Seattle. Work well with both big and small companies.

One of the projects is Peregrin, a horizontal takeoff, horizontal landing rapid-response launcher, in which the recent Chinese ASAT test has aroused Pentagon interest. They supported both teams in CEV (firewalled off with different wings). Assisting ATK in Ares 1 first stage. Supporting RpK on COTS, capable of rapid prototyping.

They believe they now have the critical mass of people and resources to go out and design a system that can reduce cost of access to space. They’re just waiting for the right opportunity.

Dana Andrews talking about the company (founded by his son). “Largest unheard-of aerospace company.” Now at seventy people, and growing fast.

Lot of work for a lot of people. Formed in 1999. Got started without investors, by doing small contracts for NASA and the Air Force. Double in size and revenue every year. Between fifteen and twenty million in revenue expected this year. They are hiring.

They have a system for going to the moon and Mars that would cost roughly half of ESAS. NASA’s Orion module that they show the press was actually built by Andrews, by removing their logo and replacing it with the meatball. Mix of old Boeing veterans with young “computer wizards” who are being mentored. Work NASA, commercial, DoD, split equally, with all three expanding. Woman-owned disadvantaged business (his daughter-in-law is CEO, and Korean–woman who raised Kistler’s first major funding).

The first session on Friday morning will be kicked off by Chuck Lauer from RpK, and Dana Andrews of Andrews Aerospace.

[Update]

Chuck is introducing George French, III (son of RpK chairman) to give the talk. Describing how he got interested in space when he went to Space Camp at age 9 with his father, where they both became committed to it. He also realized at that age that he wasn’t going to become an astronaut. Was the only ten-year-old kid with a mockup of the solar system, including every exploratory probe with descriptions. Got into an argument with his science teacher about how the moon wasn’t habitable. He brought in the space binder that he and his dad had been collecting and presented it to the class. George the second started investing in various companies–OSC, Pioneer Rocketplane, Kistler–and the original Space Camp trip eventually led to him becoming CEO of RpK.

RpK only company with two separate reusable concepts–one suborbital and one orbital. On schedule for first suborbital flight in 2009. Same date for orbital system. Finishing CDR on engine injector for suborbital XP by end of March, avionics defined and under design, at PDR level for ECLSS. Moog doing actuators for flight control system. Built six models for wind-tunnel testing. Well along through AST licensing process, just need to do safety review and expected casualty calculation–don’t think that licensing is on the current critical path. Will be able to handle payload modules for microgravity experiments as well as passengers.

Both their launch sites–Burns Flat, OK for XP and Woomera (Down Under) for the orbital K-1–are very flat. Still looking around for spaceport for K-1 in the US. K-1 is meeting COTS milestones, though no details provided in this talk (will provide information later if asked). Structural fab nearly complete.

Will be able to deliver payloads to and from space, unlike most launch systems. Will be able to carry both pressurized and unpressurized cargo.

Here’s news: they’ve signed a letter of intent with Bigelow to carry passengers by 2012. Also have a deal with Microsoft to give away an XP ride as a prize associated with their Vanishing Point game (part of the Vista rollout). Using Abercrombie and Kent to market their services.

Summary–they believe that they will help peoples’ dreams of traveling in space come true.

Charles Lurio asks if they can complete the program if NASA fails to complete funding on COTS. Answer is that they have other funding sources, sufficient to complete K-1, even if NASA reneges. Good news, if true. When asked about the Bigelow deal, don’t want to give any more details, because Bigelow will be making an announcement at the National Space Symposium in early April.

I got here late yesterday, and there was a shortage of space at the bloggers row, so I didn’t bother to live blog anything. But Jeff Foust has a report on perhaps the most interesting talk, by Steve Cook, on something that has little relationship to cheap access to space (and represents in fact the opposite)–Ares 1 and Ares 5. As Jeff notes, there was disputation over costs, and he was (understandably) evasive, though it’s almost certainly true that even NASA doesn’t know (they never really do, the way they keep books). And it’s difficult, and even arbitrary to attempt to allocate fixed and development costs of a program like this that has common elements, so people tend to jigger the numbers to make the case they want to make. Steve deserves kudos for walking into the lion’s den and doing what is, after all, only his job, as best it can be done.

The morning session begins in half an hour or so.