NASA, XCOR officials support
BY BILL DEAVER
EAST KERN - A plan proposed last week by President George W. Bush to redirect NASA to a goal of reaching Mars via a base on the moon received the support of two leading East Kern aerospace officials.
Kevin Peterson, technical director at NASA-Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base said that although it is too early to know details of how the center will participate in the President's program, he believes Dryden will play a role as it has in the past.
"It's too early yet to tell," Peterson said, noting that Dryden conducted tests of the Lunar Lander and other hardware with the Apollo program, and helped develop the Space Shuttle.
The effect on employment should also be positive he said, and that personnel at Dryden are "excited" by the president's initiative.
Peterson said existing programs including the X-43 could help provide data that could be useful in the new effort.
Asked if the program could have any impact on NASA's partnerships with firms at Mojave Airport Peterson said that was also too early to tell but that Dryden values its partnerships with Mojave Airport businesses.
Mojave Airport
The CEO of one of those space-related businesses said that while he was pleased with the presidents' proposal he doesn't see much of an impact on his firm's business.
Jeff Greason, CEO of XCOR Aerospace, said that while the plan is aimed at putting humans on the Moon and Mars, XCOR's business is developing rocket engines for sub-orbital transportation and special applications in low Earth orbit.
The president's proposal "Is a modest step in a good direction," but Greason does not foresee a substantial effect on XCOR either "pro or con."
New business generated by the plan "will most likely go to current NASA contractors," he said, explaining that the plan isn't doing anything that competes with what XCOR is doing, so we don't see that it's going to diminish prospects for private investment."
"If (the plan) were to show signs of success, I think that would be inspiring to a lot of people and that would be a fine thing, but it's way too early to see if NASA can overcome their organizational challenges to succeed in this endeavor."
Private approach?
Asked if the effort to place humans on Mars is so big that it could not be done privately, Greason said he had a "yes and no" answer.
"In 2004 there are not now private companies that are ready to send human beings to the moon.
"On the other hand, they're talking about ten or more years to do this job, and that's long enough for private companies to go through something like three complete design-build-test-fly and learn cycles," Greason said. "So it's not out of the question that by the time this initiative is scheduled to go to the moon, a private company could do so, and it's certainly not out of the question that by the time this initiative ever actually does go to the moon, that private companies could do that."
"But, it's not as if the government is going to do that. If someone would set up some sort of prize like the X-Prize but a whole lot bigger, I think it's possible that private companies could get there before NASA will, but I think that's unlikely to happen."
Spinoffs?
Would there be spinoffs from NASA or companies like XCOR that could help each other, Greason was asked.
"Not speaking for other companies, but for us the technologies involved are very different. It's the same reason we have not, so far, found an opportunity to do business with NASA. The technology you use to do a high-performance mission a few times is very different from the technology you use to do a low-performance mission many times," which is what XCOR does.
"So I don't see a lot of opportunity for overlap," Greason said.
"But not to be negative about the whole thing, if NASA could do it today, as a citizen I'd love to see our civil space program doing something again. As long as we're going to spend the money, it would be nice if we got something for it, but as a business we don't see a big effect on us."
Asked about the debate between sending humans or robots on space missions,
Greason said "the whole debate about how expensive one versus another NASA
mission is beside the point. NASA has a certain budget, and that budget
is driven by politics, and they are going to spend that money on something.
So you don't save money by wishing for them to spend it on something else.
I would just as soon see them spend it on this as something else, if it
works.
More California City News Events
California City Economic Development Corporation Homepage
Check out California City the best known secret in the High Desert!!!!!!!!