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NASA had a week of big changes after the two senior managers in the agency's human exploration program were reassigned without notice. A few months after NASA was challenged to send people back to the moon by 2024, this was a shocking reshuffle of the staff. Many have concluded that NASA's Moon initiative may not be working as well – or that the White House is getting involved.
The edge he's been talking to Jim Bridenstine, director of NASA, to better understand why these changes have been made and what this means for the future of NASA's lunar initiative, dubbed Artemis. Bridenstine explained that the Artemis program was still virtually intact, but that in the coming months, we will see more and more emphasis on how NASA plans to use Artemis to get to Mars at l & # 39; future.
This interview has been slightly modified for clarity.
I think this decision has taken a lot of people by surprise. Can you tell exactly where the decision came from? Does it come from you or from the White House?
Of me. It came exclusively from me. Bill Gerstenmaier has been a wonderful leader of the Human Exploration and Operations Mission (HEO) for a long time and we love him. We love the work he has done and we are grateful for his service to NASA and to the country.
But I think we are at a time when we need new leadership and I decided we would reassign it and we would have a new leadership at HEO.
I have read today in The New York Times that you have recently spoken with Trump about the Moon and Mars, I simply want to confirm that this decision was not taken during this meeting or with anyone at the White House.
Not at all. Not once.
Can you tell us a bit more about your meeting with Trump and what you talked about?
It was very brief. I had seen a lot of talk in the media on Mars and I just wanted to make sure we were going in the same direction. We want to talk about Mars and we want to go to the moon to go to Mars, because that's the way.
And he said, "Absolutely. You have to go to the moon to get to Mars because I understand it. He also says that he wants us to talk about Mars. He said it was the most inspiring generation that would inspire the country, and he said, "Keep talking about Mars." And that's what we do.
The plans have not changed. We go to the moon and we go to Mars.
Can you give a little more explanation on the explanation of the staff change? What prompted him now exactly?
Our focus is on ensuring that the next man and the first woman on the South Pole of the Moon land in 2024. This means that as an agency, we need to focus on the costs and the calendar. We have a track record of meeting deadlines in terms of cost and schedule, and we are going in a different direction to ensure we can respond to many [Government Accountability Office (GAO)] reports and [Inspector General] reports that have indicated that we have, in the past, been unrealistic in our cost and schedule estimates. And we need to incorporate more realism into the costs and timing of our programs and, of course, make sure we meet those milestones.
Was this motivated by the latest GAO report on the Space Launch System (SLS)?
There is not one. We have to make sure that the costs and the schedule are right, because we will go to the moon by 2024.
How do you think that the change of direction will guarantee the respect of costs and deadlines? Do you think that will have a positive effect on employees? What do you hope these changes bring?
The currently open positions: Human Exploration and Operations, has an Associate Director position that is in charge of NASA's manned space flight elements. And then under this head, there is another position that we call the development of exploration systems. This is the division where SLS and Orion are located, so this position is also open. We will have a new leader who will be in charge of the bridge and the lunar lander. And we are looking to create a new position for a division we call Moon to Mars, because when we think of the bridge and the lunar lander, we want to be able to reproduce them on Mars. So we call this new division Moon to Mars, and it will be within exploration and human operations.
And, of course, we have to make sure we inform the House and Senate appropriation committees before taking these steps. And we're going to do it, but we're looking for a second assistant who can focus on the bridge and the lunar. The three highest positions within HEO are therefore open. And we are looking nationwide for the best talent in the country.
We will let these leaders come in and ensure that we can redefine some of our projects and programs to include SLS, Orion and Commercial Crew. Reset these programs and then ask these leaders to fulfill their commitments and then hold people accountable for their achievement, so that we can reach our ultimate goal, who is the next man and the first woman of the South Pole. of the moon in 2024.
Does it mean …
And by the way, it could be two Women on the Moon in 2024. It does not have to be the next man.
Oh great. Yes, I was wondering because we always hear about a man and a woman. So could it be two women?
Sure!
So, given all these changes, does this mean that we can expect significant structural changes in Artemis' architecture?
No, not for Artemis architecture. All elements are in place. We have SLS and Orion. We will build the bridge, a lander and this architecture does not change.
I wonder what exactly means "redefine the base". Can you point to something specific that you would like to change under this new direction?
We need new dates for SLS, for example. I mean, I was very public about the challenges we faced with the SLS program. We know we will not launch in June 2020 at this point. What we have not done yet is to set a new date, and I would like to bring in a new person who can partner and help us make sure that the date we choose to be next is realistic. , achievable and that we can move on. towards this new date.
Thus, SLS is an example, but it will also redefine the base of the commercial crew. So when I say re-referenced, I mean reprogrammed. People saw that the Dragon's crew had exploded during a test of Super Draco engines used during a launch abandonment, if any. We will have to come up with new dates for this and, of course, make sure that the dates for the Boeing launch are also locked, which may need to be adjusted. But we will also have this evaluation re-evaluated.
I've also wanted to answer some rumors that I've heard about Artemis architecture, there were reactions against the Gateway element. Is there a truth to that? What maybe some people in the White House do not want?
No, there is no truth to that. We are building the bridge because we are going to land on the moon in 2024. There is no way to get to the moon without the bridge. We must have more Delta-v [or change in velocity]. SLS and Orion can bring us into lunar orbit. But once Orion is in the low lunar orbit, there is not enough Delta-v to get out of that orbit and come home. This means that we have to go to this almost straight halo orbit, where the bridge will be, and have an aggregate lorry at the bridge to go down to the surface of the moon.
The architecture has not changed. It will not change. These are abilities that we must absolutely have on the Moon in 2024.
You talked about it earlier, but to be clearer: I heard some discussions that Trump or the vice-chairman might hear soon. about more focus on going to Mars. But the Artemis program is still there, is not it?
Absolutely. The destination is Mars. The Moon is the means by which we prove the technology and capabilities that we can use on Mars. We must learn to live and work in another world using its resources, namely ice-water.
And not only that, but all technologies and capabilities, and that these technologies are developed so that they can be replicated on Mars. The goal of the Moon is that it's a three-day trip to the house. So, if something goes wrong, we can bring it back. We proved it with Apollo 13. If something like that happened on the way to Mars, it was over. The Moon is the testing ground. Mars is the destination.
If we are still at full speed on the Moon, when does planning for the Mars mission begin?
In the coming months, you will see more details on a plan for Mars that I think people will be very supportive of. It will be a big problem.
But there has been a lot of talk about sustainability on the moon. Do we want to create a sustainable outpost on the moon or is it going to be a long-term project?
Gateway will be an orbit around the moon for 15 years, and the lander will be able to move again and again on the moon, and we will have access to any part of the moon at any time. That's the point. And in fact, if we want to have people on the surface of the moon for long periods, we could do it too. And we will probably have to do it to prove Mars' technologies and capabilities.
But the goal is to get to Mars, and we need to know what we need to do on the Moon for Mars mission. It is also true that, due to the presence of international and commercial partners, they could want to establish themselves on the surface of the Moon. We would like that.
But what we are focusing on and what we are going to do is build capacity to get to Mars and partner with sales people to do that. And if they want to do things on the moon that may have commercial interest but not necessarily NASA, we welcome that.
It is important to remember that if we build at a place on the surface of the Moon, we will have a lot of information about where we landed. That's what we did at Apollo. We landed six times on the moon and we know a lot about the six places we landed. What we missed for 40 years is the fact that there are hundreds of millions of tons of water ice on the South Pole of the Moon. So what we do not want is to limit our ability to access the entire moon. We not only want to go to the Moon in a sustainable way, but also to go in a sustainable way and have access to any part of the Moon at any time in our lives, using technology that will take us to Mars.
And if an industry partner or an international partner wants to build a certain part of the Moon in partnership with us on architecture, we welcome it.
I see, but for NASA in particular, building an outpost on the surface of the moon is not a priority at the moment?
It depends on what you mean by outpost. We could have many missions on the surface of the moon, all at the same time. But are we trying to build a base on the moon? This is not necessarily the order of the day. I'm not saying that this can not be done or should not be done or that our trading partners would not want to do it. All I'm saying is that our goal is to use the moon so that technological capabilities can go to Mars. But you know that when you talk about an outpost or a lunar base, it means 100 different things for 100 different people. It's very difficult for me to say, "No, it's not what we do" or "Yes, that's what we do."
But the goal is to have access to any part of the Moon at any time and to allow business and international partners to join us in this effort. And if some of them want to build their capacity on the surface of the moon, it's great for NASA, for science and for our country.
But we will continue to focus on the capabilities and technology we need to go to Mars.
To be more specific, what parts of Artemis architecture and what technologies do you develop for the program and which will be used to go to Mars in the future?
The gateway is a critical capability. Of course, we will need a gateway capacity on Mars. We will need landers on Mars. Now, the entrance, descent and landing on Mars are very different from the entrance, descent and landing on the moon. But it is also true that a module climbing from Mars to a footbridge around Mars and a vehicle climbing the Moon to a footbridge around the Moon would have very similar capabilities.
Thus, the entry, the descent and the landing would be dissimilar, but the rest of the architecture is very similar, even identical.
You said we could expect to know more about the Mars plan in the coming months. When do you plan to fill these positions that have just been released?
We will fill these positions quickly. I do not want to put a date, but it will happen very quickly.
These staff changes are also coming soon after the departure of Mark Sirangelo. [Sirangelo is a former NASA official who was selected to run a new Moon to Mars directorate at NASA, but he left after a month.] This could lead some to think that the agency is in turmoil. I would like to give you a chance to answer that. How is NASA going as you try to meet this ambitious deadline?
NASA is an amazing agency with 17,500 employees and thousands of subcontractors. An individual is not the key to a particular element or mission.
We love Gerstenmaier. Bill is an extraordinary American and has done wonders for NASA and the United States. But we are moving in a different direction in order to be able to meet costs and schedule. There are no troubles at all.
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