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COLUMBIA – Charles Bolden has sent a message to those who wonder if the National Aeronautics and Space Administration is still relevant in the era of private space exploration: NASA is not dead.
Bolden, who headed the agency under the administration of President Barack Obama, said that this agency, though alive, had seen its mission change dramatically since the time of "The Right Stuff" and the Arrival of the first man on the moon.
NASA is now working in partnership with companies such as SpaceX's Elon Musk, Blue Origin's Jeff Bezos and Boeing's aerospace giant, to develop technologies that will allow America to stay in business. the tip of a new race to space. A race that will be funded largely by entrepreneurs rather than by taxpayers' money.
"NASA is not doing anything alone," Bolden said. "We are not sending more people into space aboard NASA spacecraft, we are sending more cargo into NASA spacecraft and they are going into spaceships built by NASA. our international partners and the American industry, and they do it incredibly well. "
Bolden, who grew up in Colombia, returned this week to deliver the keynote address at the South Carolina Aerospace Conference & Expo.
At the end of the month, Bolden announced that NASA would help test two commercial-made spacecraft, one from Boeing and the other from SpaceX, which could send humans back to the moon and then to Mars. Here 20 years.
Other initiatives include: a supersonic aircraft that will not create a sound boom when it exceeds the speed of sound, aircraft powered by electricity and autonomous flight systems.
"By bringing their own funds to their projects, these US companies are joining innovative co-investments to enable NASA's next generation of scientific and human exploration missions," said Steve Jurczyk, director of the Space Technology Mission of NASA, in a statement.
NASA was born during the Cold War, which very early shaped the policies of the agency.
"People ask," Why can not we go back to the time of Apollo? Bolden said, referring to the NASA program that sent astronauts to the moon. "There is a simple reason: There was a geopolitical imperative to do what we had done in the Apollo era.We had a deadly fear that the Soviets would beat us at some point in the world. This driving force does not exist today. "
Indeed, in the last two decades, only two countries have representatives who live constantly aboard the International Space Station orbiting the Earth: the United States and the Soviet Union.
"Even though we can not get along here, we are doing incredibly well in space," Bolden said.
The space agency became more willing to collaborate with the private sector after 2003, when the space shuttle Columbia disintegrated on its return to Earth, killing all seven crew members.
"After the Columbia accident, we stated that NASA should stop owning and operating spacecraft," Bolden said. "We should rely on the US industry, which is the best in the world." NASA's role is now to invest in the private sector, to be the catalyst, the people who take the large risks and make the big initial investments that the private sector "sector, to facilitate their success. "
Both parties have much to gain from such a partnership.
Chris Lewicki, president and CEO of the space exploration company Planetary Resources, told Futurism.com that private companies can generate revenue through government contracts. He said that NASA had contracted with Boeing to take astronauts to the International Space Station and that SpaceX had recently reached an agreement with the Air Force to launch its secret drone.
"This leaves government agencies free to pursue the kind of forward-looking and longer-term research that may not generate immediate revenue, but which could be streamlined and further improved in the private sector," he said. .
The private sector sees many opportunities in space. Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg – whose company is building 787 Dreamliner commercial aircraft in North Charleston – is considering a large market for space tourism and low-orbit zero-gravity factories where structures that can not be built on Earth can be assembled. easily.
"It's not that long," Muilenburg told Washington's Ideas Conference last year. "It's something that's measured in decades, not years, but it's not measured in centuries."
Such a schedule has been a difficult adjustment for some companies accustomed to focusing on the fast turnaround and financial data of the next quarter. But Bolden said progress is underway.
"Is it happening as fast as everyone thought? No," he said. "Why, because everyone was wrong to say that it's hard to access the space." It's really hard. "You can not just say:" OK, I'm going there and go for it, but we're on a road laid out over ten years ago, and we're doing really well. "
Contact David Wren at 843-937-5550 or Twitter @David_Wren_
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