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WASHINGTON – Jim Bridenstine used part of his last full day as a NASA administrator to call on the incoming administration to continue the Artemis program and bring humans back to the moon.
A January 19 briefing on the Green Run static firing test of the space launch system three days earlier provided an opportunity for Bridenstine, who left the agency on January 20 at the end of the Trump administration, to reflect on its almost three years old. the work and his desire to see the agency’s human space exploration program continue.
“How can we create a program that can stand the test of time?” he said, noting the beginnings and stops of efforts dating back to the Space Exploration Initiative three decades ago. “We need our Artemis program, we need our Moon-Mars program, to span generations.”
Failures of past efforts mean that Bridenstine, born in 1975, is the first NASA administrator not alive the last time people walked on the moon. “I think it’s important that I’m the last NASA administrator in history not to be alive when people lived and worked on the moon,” he said. “It is a failure of the United States and of humanity. We need to make sure that we are leading the world back to the Moon and Mars. “
The incoming Biden administration has not detailed its plans for the space agency. A passage from the Democratic Party platform published last July indicated support for a human return to the moon, but did not endorse the Trump administration’s 2024 target for doing so, a deadline that most industry players now consider it impractical in view of limited funding and technical challenges.
“NASA needs to go back and look at what the options are for getting to the moon as quickly as possible,” Bridenstine said in an interview after the Jan. 16 Green Run test at the Stennis Space Center. This is made more difficult, he acknowledged, by the lack of funding for the Human Landing System (HLS) program for the development of manned lunar landers, which received only about a quarter of the 3, $ 3 billion sought by NASA for fiscal 2021.
In the appeal, Bridenstine said NASA is still analyzing the impact of the reduction in HLS funding for this 2024 target, given that the spending omnibus bill was enacted less than a month ago. “NASA is doing its job to determine, in the first place, if we need to change the plan,” he said. “I have no doubt that the amazing people at NASA are going to present a range of options for our return to the moon that the next administration can fully endorse and support.”
Those plans, he said in the previous interview, should include SLS. “If we’re talking about sending humans to the moon, that’s the highest probability of success as early as possible,” he said. “Considering the effort, time and investment already made, let’s just cross the finish line and start from there.”
Bridenstine’s successor
Bridenstine leaves NASA with relatively little fanfare, like a farewell ceremony. Jim Morhard, the outgoing deputy administrator, posted a tribute video to Bridenstine on Twitter on January 19, thanking him for his work as head of the agency.
.@JimBridenstine served @NASA with determination and passion. This agency has accomplished breathtaking feats under his leadership and made history on several occasions. Thanks and Ad Astra! pic.twitter.com/kFVvbJPn7E
– Jim Morhard (@jmorhard) January 19, 2021
“It has been an emotional week,” Bridenstine said in the interview. He said he was in Washington just before the Green Run test “to say goodbye to people.”
With the departure of Bridenstine and Morhard, Steve Jurczyk, associate administrator of NASA, will serve as interim administrator until the Biden administration appoints, and the Senate confirms, a permanent successor. The new administration did not say when it planned to announce a candidate, but announced its “science team” on January 15, including the appointment of geneticist Eric Lander as director of the Office for Science and Technology Policy.
Shortly after the election, several potential candidates for the post of NASA administrator emerged, mostly women. They included former astronaut Pam Melroy, former CEO of the aerospace company Wanda Austin and Kendra Horn, a former congresswoman who chaired the House space subcommittee at the previous Congress.
“I think the Biden-Harris administration would very much like to name, from what I understand, the first female administrator of NASA,” said Jack Burns, professor of astronomy at the University of Colorado who did part of the NASA Transition Team for Trump. administration four years ago, in a session of the 237th meeting of the American Astronomical Society on Jan. 14. “Some of the names that have been suggested are extremely qualified.
Bridenstine, during the interview, offered a similar assessment, but without identifying any particular candidates. “I have heard names, all very qualified, very competent people,” he said. “I am convinced that the future is bright.”
This transitional work has proceeded quietly, and without some of the conflict and drama seen in other agencies where the outgoing Trump administration has been uncooperative. “The situation at NASA, both in the last transition and this transition, has actually been much closer to normal,” Burns said. “Speaking to the Biden-Harris transition team for NASA, I have a feeling there has been a good collaboration.”
Bridenstine said he made no plans for his future after NASA, other than returning to Oklahoma and spending time with his family there. “I love the space, but I don’t know what the future holds for us there,” he said when asked if he would like to stay in the industry in a way. or another. “We will have to see.”
Bridenstine said he would follow the agency closely, planning to watch the rover’s landing in March 2020 and the launch of Artemis 1 next month. He also pledged to support anyone who will succeed him as head of NASA. “Whoever NASA’s next administrator is, I’m going to be all-in,” he said in the interview. “However I can help them, I want to help them.”
He reiterated this point at the end of the Green Run briefing. “I will watch with a lot of interest,” he said. “There will be a new administrator from NASA, and when that person arrives, they will have my full support to do the amazing things that NASA is doing.”
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