WASHINGTON As the 747 carrying the retired space shuttle Discovery circled the capital last week, my mind flashed back to the sole encounter I ever had as a reporter with the space program.

An editor at the old Buffalo Courier- Express assigned me to interview a fellow named Walter Dornberger, whom he described as a German space visionary who had fled from the Iron Curtain.

It was the late 1950s, and so-called refugees from Germany, like Wernher von Braun, who was guiding Americas struggling manned flight program, were in vogue.

They were refugees, all right; but as researchers who dug into the archives learned decades later, they fled not just the Soviet Union, but also the upcoming war crimes trials in Nuremberg.

The Dornberger interview was a venture by the public relations people at Buffalos Bell Aircraft, the World War II producer of warplanes in plants in Buffalo and Wheatfield.

They presented him as Dr. Dornberger, an engineer. Certainly not as Maj. Gen. Dornberger, a top artillery officer at the launching sites of rockets that terrorized London and Brussels, killing thousands of civilians.

Not long after my interview, which was a wooden flop, Dornbergers military record was gently broached. The PR people claimed he was nothing more than a professional soldier after all; not a war criminal. Bell made him a vice president and nominal head of research. But he was really hired as part of Bells attempts to get its hooks into the money being spent on the space race with Russia.

After Bell folded as a space company and Dornberger returned to Germany, researchers began to link him and von Braun to the infamous underground rocket factory called Dora in the German Hartz Mountains. Here, inmates from the concentration camps at Dachau, Flossenberg and Sachsenhausen were literally worked to death.

Gretchen Engle Schafft of American University, in The Public Memory of Mittelbau- Dora, quotes Hitler production chief Albert Speer calling conditions there barbarous. In all, more than 30,000 starved souls died in that place.

Dornberger was much more than a professional soldier, according to author Arch B. Taylor Jr. Dornberger was a personal aide to Hitler, the liaison between the Fuhrer and von Braun. In his book, Pearl Harbor, Hiroshima and Beyond, Taylor reported that Dornberger and von Braun met with Hitler many times to lobby for money and more slave labor for Dora replacement recruits from France, Poland and Czechoslovakia, as well as the death camps. The two entertained Hitler with films of rocket launchings.

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High moral cost paid for manned space flight

The space shuttle Enterprise, which has been a museum display in the Smithsonian for the past 25 years, is about to take to the skies once again.

The Enterprise was never flown in space, but rather served as NASAs test shuttle for approaches and landings in the 70s. If the weather cooperates, it will fly once again this Friday on a trip from Washington, D.C. to New York. Because it was stripped of its instrument panel years ago, the shuttle will be attached to a 747 for the flight and will land at JFK airport to an eager crowd. It will later be transported to the citys Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum to be put back on display.

Originally named Constitution, the shuttle was dubbed Enterprise after a petition came to the White House from Star Trek fans, urging them to change the name. Built in 1976, the shuttle didnt complete a successful flight on its own until a year later. In 1979, it was tested in a launch at Kennedy Space Center, and went on to become the property of the Smithsonian after it was put into retirement in 1985.

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Space Shuttle Enterprise Set For One Last Flight

A May 7 liftoff is the new official target for the historic first flight of a private spaceship to the International Space Station, the vehicle's builder announced today (April 24).

Read the original:

1st Private Spaceship to Visit Space Station Aims for May 7 Launch

WASHINGTON (dpa) The first commercial spacecraft due to dock with the International Space Station could be delayed by as much as a week to allow more testing, the chief of private venture Space X said Monday.

Chief executive Elon Musk said on Twitter that the planned April 30 launch would be pushed back approximately one week to allow the company time to test the systems that it will use to dock with the station. A new launch date would be set in coordination with US space agency NASA.

Space X's Dragon spacecraft is to take a three-day flight to the ISS and undertake a series of complicated docking maneuvers and tests designed to prove it can safely latch onto the orbiting station.

The Dragon capsule will launch atop a Falcon 9 rocket from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida and carry 521 kilograms of cargo, mainly food for astronauts living on the station. If all goes as planned it will return to Earth with 660 kilograms of discarded cargo.

At a media briefing last week, NASA and Space X said they were confident about the mission, but stressed it was a test flight and the docking to the station would be particularly difficult.

The Dragon is to remain at the station for several weeks to unload cargo before returning home and splashing down off the coast of California.

The move is seen as a landmark in the development of a commercial spaceflight industry that is to eventually carry astronauts aloft in coming years.

NASA retired its ageing space shuttle fleet last year and plans to focus on developing craft to travel on longer missions, with their sights eventually set on Mars. It hopes to shift short-range flights to the ISS and elsewhere to the commercial space industry, but until then is reliant on Russian Soyuz craft to carry astronauts aloft.

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First Comm’l Flight To Space Station Delayed, More Tests Scheduled

SpaceX confirmed it plans to launch a rocket and capsule on May 7 in a historic first flight of a private spaceship to the International Space Station.

Originally posted here:

SpaceX plans historic first flight on May 7

With NASA's space shuttle fleet now permanently grounded, aerospace giant Boeing is aiming to fly astronauts to the International Space Station aboard a new private spaceship as early as 2015 or 2016, company officials say.

Boeing's CST-100 capsule (short for Commercial Space Transportation-100) is being designed to ferry astronauts to and from the space station and other destinations in low-Earth orbit. The spacecraft will initially launch from Florida atop United Launch Alliance's Atlas 5 rocket, but the company is not ruling out other booster options in the future, officials have said.

The capsule is being designed as part of a NASA program that supports the development of a new fleet of commercially built spaceships to fill the gap made by the retirement of the shuttle program.

"It's been an interesting last couple of years for us," Roger Krone, president of Boeing's network and space systems, told reporters this month. "I think many people in the industry associate Boeing with the shuttle program and the International Space Station. [This is] kind of a chance for us to rethink what our space strategy is."

Boeing is one of several competitors, including SpaceX and Sierra Nevada, who are engaged in a private space race to build new manned space taxis. Boeing is aiming to have the CST-100 ready to launch the first crew in 2015, but this is heavily dependent on the amount of funding received by NASA, said John Elbon, vice president and general manager of Boeing's space exploration division. [Photos: Boeing's Space Capsule CST-100]

"We could launch as early as 2015, depending on funding, but the way the budget is laid out, it most likely will be 2016," Elbon said.

Over the last two years, NASA's Commercial Crew Development program has divided $320 million among four American spacecraft builders: SpaceX, Blue Origin, Sierra Nevada and Boeing. So far, the agency has awarded Boeing with approximately $120 million for the company's work on the CST-100 capsule.

But funding for the program has been an ongoing challenge.

In 2012, Congress gave just $406 million for commercial crew development in 2012, which was less than half of the $850 million originally requested by NASA.

The bleak budget environment has already delayed NASA's first planned launch aboard a commercial spacecraft by two years, and the agency will likely face more financial constraints going forward.

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Boeing's Private Space Taxi to Take Flight by 2016

Parker Bott (center) of Chincoteague looks to the sky with Jake Benjamins (right) and Sam Stanfield (left) for a fellow camper's single-stage model rocket at the Wallops NASA Visitors Center at a past Virginia Space Flight Academy launch.

Original post:

WALLOPS: Space Academy takes flight

Recent Statements by Senators and Representatives Underscore Importance of Program for America’s Continued Leadership in Space

Washington, D.C., Wednesday, November 2, 2011 – The Commercial Spaceflight Federation is pleased to welcome recent expressions of growing support for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program in hearings and other events held over the last week, including the following:

Rep. Ralph Hall (R-Texas), Chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology: In a hearing last week on NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, Congressman Hall stated, “NASA’s in an emergency; our space program’s in an emergency.  We can do better than those dates, I think … Somebody just needs to say… “let’s go” and I think you [commercial companies] all are the ones to do it and I hope you will.” [Oct 26]

Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-California): In that same hearing, Congresswoman Lofgren stated, “I’ve been enthusiastically supporting this effort” and “the payoff is so enormous.”  Later, Congresswoman Lofgren asked, “Is there any possibility that we could significantly reduce that timeframe [for flight] … with the private sector involvement that we have?”  The companies in attendance stated they could have crew transportation capability by 2015 with sufficient support from NASA. [Oct 26]

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Florida), Chairman of the Science and Space Subcommittee of the Senate Commerce, Science, Transportation Committee: In an event in Florida earlier this week, Senator Nelson stated, “This is just the first of much to come.  You just wait until you see what’s coming here to the Kennedy Space Center in the future in the way of public/private partnerships.”  He then added, “This marks the beginning of the vibrance of the economy of the Space Coast, the return of new and exciting jobs.” [Oct 31]

Rep. Sandy Adams (R-Florida): At that same event, Congresswoman Adams stated, “The Commercial Crew Development program is the best near term hope we have for getting American astronauts, on American rockets, built by an American aerospace workforce to the International Space Station.  The recent failure of a Russian cargo mission highlights the problems associated with relying on foreign countries for access to the ISS. …  As America takes steps towards the next chapter of space exploration, it is imperative that Congress remains vigilant in its support of the efforts of the Commercial Crew and COTS program. It is imperative that Congress ensure that they have the tools they need to be ready to carry crew to station as soon as is practically possible without sacrificing safety.” [Oct 31]

Rep. Bill Posey (R-Florida): At that same event, Congressman Posey stated, “The Commercial Crew Program represents our greatest near term hope for returning our astronauts to Low Earth Orbit and the International Space Station aboard American made vehicles. This capability will allow NASA to focus on exploring deeper into our solar system and beyond.” [Oct 31]

Video links:
Commercial Crew hearing in Congress last week: http://science.house.gov/hearing/full-committee-%E2%80%93-hearing
Florida event on Commercial Crew this week: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ekh_fKK0e8&feature=related

About the Commercial Spaceflight Federation
The mission of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation (CSF) is to promote the development of commercial human spaceflight, pursue ever-higher levels of safety, and share best practices and expertise throughout the industry. The CSF’s member companies – which include commercial spaceflight developers, operators, spaceports, suppliers and service providers – are creating thousands of high-tech jobs nationwide, working to preserve American leadership in aerospace through technology innovation, and inspiring young people to pursue careers in science and engineering. For more information please visit http://www.commercialspaceflight.org or contact Executive Director John Gedmark at john@commercialspaceflight.org or at 202.349.1121.

Founding Executive Director John Gedmark Welcomes His Successor Onboard

Washington, D.C., Thursday, November 3, 2011 – Eric Anderson, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation, is pleased to announce that the Federation has selected Dr. Alexander Saltman as the organization’s Executive Director.  Saltman is a physicist who has most recently served as the Legislative Director for Congressman Adam Schiff of California.  His appointment will be effective November 14.  Saltman succeeds John Gedmark, the organization’s founding Executive Director, who is departing to pursue a new opportunity.

Separately, the Commercial Spaceflight Federation is currently conducting an executive search for a new President to replace Rear Admiral Craig Steidle, who stepped down earlier this fall for medical reasons.

John Gedmark said, “I’ve had the privilege to know Alex for several years now, and he is a talented leader with a diverse technical, management, and public policy background.  Alex is the perfect candidate to continue and expand the achievements of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation as we move into the industry’s next phase of development and operations.”

Alex Saltman stated, “I feel privileged to join CSF as Executive Director, where I will have the unparalleled opportunity to help create a new industry–one that will open a new frontier to Americans and people around the world.  Commercial spaceflight has the potential to transform our world the way the automobile and the airplane did in years past.  John Gedmark has done an outstanding job helping to create and grow this organization, and I look forward to adding to his record of accomplishment.”

Eric Anderson, Chairman of the Federation, said, “We have a very exciting future ahead for all of us in the commercial space industry.  John Gedmark has assisted in building and leading this organization for the last five years, and has achieved a long list of successes. I am delighted to welcome Alex Saltman on board as our new Executive Director.  His talents and the passion he shares for opening space to everyone will serve the Federation well.  As commercial space vehicles begin filling the skies, the Federation will continue to become ever more important in the future of human spaceflight.”

Gedmark has served as Executive Director of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation since the organization was incorporated in 2006 and has overseen the growth of the Federation from the original 10 companies to over 50 members today.  The Federation has become well-known to the press, the public, and to policymakers as a leading resource on the growing commercial spaceflight industry, and has presided over 12 CEO-level meetings of the Federation members since 2006.

During Gedmark’s tenure, the Federation played a lead role in the establishment of a number of major space policy changes and new programs, including the United States Government’s policy that commercial spaceflight providers shall be the primary means for transporting American astronauts to Earth orbit.  The Federation also played a lead role in the adoption of new FAA regulations for commercial human spaceflight, the establishment of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program and Commercial Reusable Suborbital Research (CRuSR) Program, as well as funding for the FAA’s spaceport infrastructure program.  In addition, state legislation on spaceflight liability has become law in Virginia, Florida, Texas, and New Mexico.

Saltman has a wide range of experience in space policy, government, and scientific research. He most recently served as the Legislative Director for Congressman Schiff, who represents an area of Southern California that includes NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and who, as a member of the House Appropriations Committee, has been a leading figure in space policy and NASA appropriations issues.  In that capacity Saltman oversaw a staff of five and led legislative efforts from conception to enactment, while advising the Congressman on science, space, energy, environment, and nonproliferation issues, as well as on relevant appropriations matters.

Saltman joined the Congressional office after receiving an American Physical Society Congressional Fellowship, having previously worked as a scientific researcher at the Stanford Linear Accelerator National Laboratory.  Saltman has also worked for Wired Magazine and contributed freelance articles to the publication.  A native of Texas, Saltman earned his bachelor’s degree in physics from Harvard University and his doctorate degree in physics from Stanford University.

About the Commercial Spaceflight Federation

The mission of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation (CSF) is to promote the development of commercial human spaceflight, pursue ever-higher levels of safety, and share best practices and expertise throughout the industry. The CSF’s member companies – which include commercial spaceflight developers, operators, spaceports, suppliers and service providers – are creating thousands of high-tech jobs nationwide, working to preserve American leadership in aerospace through technology innovation, and inspiring young people to pursue careers in science and engineering. For more information please visit http://www.commercialspaceflight.org or contact Executive Director John Gedmark at john@commercialspaceflight.org or at 202.349.1121.

# # #

Griffin Communications Group joins CSF as partner and Associate Member

Washington, D.C., Wednesday, October 26, 2011 – Officials with the Commercial Spaceflight Federation (CSF) today announced that the Federation has partnered with Griffin Communications Group to help increase awareness of the benefits and importance of commercial spaceflight among the public, media, government and other stakeholders.  As part of the partnership, Griffin Communications Group has joined the CSF as an Associate Member.

Griffin Communications Group will provide ongoing expertise to put “best practice” communications tools and processes in place to better serve the mission of the Federation and its members.

CSF Executive Director John Gedmark said, “Griffin Communications Group is well-known throughout the commercial spaceflight industry for its deep understanding of this sector.  We look forward to our partnership with this organization as the industry continues to advance.”

“We consider ourselves stakeholders in this industry as much as service providers,” said Jeff Carr, Griffin Communications Group’s Vice President, Aerospace Communications. “We share a strong desire to help advance the state of the space industry. We believe that lending our talents and experience in strategic communications and marketing to industry leaders who are shaping the marketplace is the best way for us to contribute.”

About the Commercial Spaceflight Federation

The mission of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation (CSF) is to promote the development of commercial human spaceflight, pursue ever-higher levels of safety, and share best practices and expertise throughout the industry. The CSF’s member companies – which include commercial spaceflight developers, operators, spaceports, suppliers and service providers – are creating thousands of high-tech jobs nationwide, working to preserve American leadership in aerospace through technology innovation, and inspiring young people to pursue careers in science and engineering.

About Griffin Communications Group

Griffin Communications Group is a global, full-service firm specializing in strategic communications programs for its clients, with a primary focus on aerospace. For more than a decade, the firm has helped its clients develop, communicate, protect and expand their brands in a complex, global marketplace. The agency was founded by Gwen Griffin in 1997 and is headquartered in Houston with team members located in Los Angeles, Indianapolis and central Florida.  Her career in marketing and PR spans 25 years, serving in a variety of key corporate and agency roles. A 30-year veteran in the space industry with NASA and United Space Alliance, Jeff Carr heads up Griffin’s aerospace communications practice.  Griffin senior counsel Bruce Hicks, a former VP of Corporate Communications for Continental Airlines, is a recognized expert in crisis communications and issues management in the industry.

Here are the first two paragraphs of a Wall Street Journal article about Virgin Galactic, published last night:

Sir Richard Branson’s space-tourism company won’t start passenger flights for at least two more years and operations will ramp up significantly more slowly than previously anticipated, according to its chief pilot.

In an interview, David Mackay said Virgin Galactic, the venture controlled by the British billionaire, likely won’t begin commercial flights until 2013.

First of all, the two paragraphs are at least potentially contradictory. Starting commercial flights in 2013 doesn’t necessarily mean that they won’t start “for at least two more years”, given it’s October 2011: it’s entirely possible that they could start in early 2013, which would imply a delay of a little over one year, not at least two years. (They could, of course, start in late 2013, which would be closer to two years, but Mackay doesn’t provide a specific enough date to make the conclusion in the article’s lede.)

The second issue is that this delay should not be considered a surprise. Pronouncements in recent weeks and months indicated that commercial service would start, at best, in late 2012, with 2013 as a more likely date. For example, Virgin Galactic president and CEO George Whitesides said at the beginning of this month that the company would “try to get to some definition of space by the end of next year”, implying that they would still be performing test flights at the end of 2012.

What is true is that Virgin’s announced date for the beginning of commercial service has been a moving target, one that has been regularly moving to the right. When Virgin’s partnership with Scaled Composites was announced on the eve of Scaled’s X PRIZE-winning flights in September 2004, Virgin was expected to begin commercial flight by2007, a date that has gradually slipped to now 2013. That delay likely has several reasons, including the decision to develop a larger SpaceShipTwo as opposed to a version of the original SpaceShipOne, the July 2007 engine test accident in Mojave that killed three Scaled employees, and usual development delays. (Funding, presumably, has been less of an issue, given Virgin’s resources and outside investment from Aabar.) However, should those schedule slips continue, there will be new questions about Virgin’s ability to follow through on its commercial suborbital plans, and those delays create new opportunities for competitors, like XCOR Aerospace, to close the gap and even begin flights before Virgin.

The ranks of companies with Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) awards from NASA has quietly grown by one. The charter for a hearing on the program today by the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee reveals that NASA has signed an unfunded Space Act Agreement with Excalibur Almaz on October 17. There are no other details about the contents of the agreement, including what work it covers and over what schedule.

Excalibur Almaz is now the third company with an unfunded SAA, after NASA signed similar agreements with United Launch Alliance in July and with ATK in September. Both of those were greeted with press releases by NASA and the companies, as well as press conferences. There has yet been no formal announcement about this new agreement by either NASA or Excalibur Almaz.

SpaceShipTwo is nestled between the twin fuselages of WhiteKnightTwo during a flyby at Spaceport America in New Mexico on October 17.

On September 29th, SpaceShipTwo made its 16th glide flight, and first in three months, in the skies above Mojave Air and Space Port in California. The SpaceShipTwo test flight log at Scaled Composites indicates that the flight did not go exactly as planned:

Test card called for releasing the Spaceship from WhiteKnightTwo and immediately entering a rapid descent. Upon release, the Spaceship experienced a downward pitch rate that caused a stall of the tails. The crew followed procedure, selecting the feather mode to revert to a benign condition. The crew then defeathered and had a nominal return to base. Great flying by the team and good demo of feather system.

Earlier this week, SPACE.com’s Leonard David provided a little more information about that glide test. That discussion makes the flight sound a little more harrowing than the writeup in the official log, with one observer claiming that the vehicle “dropped like a rock and went straight down”.

Scott Ostrem, chief engineer at The Spaceship Company, the Scaled-Virgin Galactic joint venture that will be manufacturing SpaceShipTwo and WhiteKnightTwo, offered an explanation at the International Symposium for Personal and Commercial Spaceflight (ISPCS) in Las Cruces, New Mexico, on Wednesday. “You come off the WhiteKnight and quickly going into a pitch-down attitude by design,” he said. “We pitched down a little too steeply on that flight and experienced a tail stall.”

There are several options to recover from such a stall, he said, one of them being using the vehicle’s unique feathering mechanism, designed to provide stability during reentry. “Our pilot chose to feather it. It’s an incredible testament to the feather design: instantly the vehicle stabilized at about 20, 30,000 feet,” Ostrem said. “We just then de-feathered and glided back down safely. It was a unique opportunity for us to prove out the feather design ata point where we weren’t necessarily intending to do it.”

That, however, has not stopped a series of rumors, whispered during breaks at the ISPCS and on the Internet, that the incident was more serious than what the companies have reported. Those include rumors that they were testing a maneuver in order to perform a drop test at the Spaceport America terminal dedication event held Monday. No such drop test took place, of course, but whatever happened did not prevent Virgin and Scaled from ferrying SpaceShipTwo from Mojave to the spaceport for the event.

Sir Richard Branson, dangling from the top of Spaceport America's new terminal building, dedicates the building with a bottle of champagne. (credit: J. Foust)

It was the biggest line of the day—and Sir Richard Branson flubbed it.

Branson was dangling from the balcony Spaceport America’s new terminal building, halfway down the building’s glass wall. He and his son and daughter had joined a dance company, Project Bandaloop, for their performance on the building’s wall. After the dancers and Branson’s children rappelled down to the ground, Branson remained in place, and then had an oversized champagne bottle lowered to him so he could formally dedicate, and name, the building. “And, the name is, whoa!” he said as he uncorked the bottle, “Virgin Galactic Galactic.” And then, after a six-second pause, “Gateway to Space!”

While there was laughter and cheers from the several hundred people in attendance (“more than 800″, according to Virgin), some were left scratching their heads. “What did he say the name was?” one person in the media section asked. “Something about a gateway to space, I think,” said another. The building’s name, in fact, is now officially the “Virgin Galactic Gateway to Space.”

That, though, was a minor glitch in an event designed primarily to show off the spaceport and demonstrate Virgin’s continued commitment to flying SpaceShipTwo from the spaceport in the near future. The new name for the terminal building was one of the few new developments from the event. Virgin did announce some new research customers, including the Challenger Center (whose founder, June Scobee Rodgers, was in attendance). Virgin also announced its first hire for a new group of commercial pilots who will fly WK2 and SS2: Keith Colmer, an Air Force pilot who had previously applied to NASA’s astronaut corps but just missed the cut.

WhiteKnightTwo and SpaceShipTwo take off from Spaceport America's runway on a brief captive carry flight over the spaceport. (credit: J. Foust)

At a “press conference” during the event (which, despite the name, did not allow any questions from the media), Virgin Galactic officials played up the progress they’ve made in the last year and sought to set themselves apart from the competition. “There is no other company that is as close to flying people to space as Galactic,” said Virgin Galactic president and CEO George Whitesides. “There is no one else test flying vehicles that can take you and me into space. And there is no one whose vehicles are based on a design that has already been safely to space to people,” a reference to SS2′s precursor, SpaceShipOne.

WK2 and SS2 soar over Spaceport America's new terminal building. (credit: J. Foust)

New Mexico officials at the event, including Governor Susana Martinez and Congressman Steve Pearce, focused on the economic benefits of the spaceport, including both the jobs created during the spaceport’s construction and those that will be created when the spaceport begins operations. Martinez in particular saw the spaceport as both a way to inspire the state’s youth to study science and engineering, as well as a source of high-tech jobs. “As a young child, what could be more exciting than space travel?” she asked. “We want these new jobs to be created right here so that young New Mexicans don’t have to leave the state to find fulfilling work.”

Martinez, who past comments suggested she was at least somewhat skeptical about the $200-million investment in the spaceport, sounded a little excited herself about the spaceport. “I look forward to strengthening the partnership between the state and Virgin Galactic,” she said. Turning to Branson, she added, “And Richard, today I may have to add it to my bucket list.”

Virgin didn’t offer any new clues yesterday on when it will begin flights from Spaceport America. “Our contractors are working hard now to get the system ready for the first powered flights next year,” Whitesides said, a timeline similar to what he said early this month. He did add that another full-scale ground test of SpaceShipTwo’s rocket motor is planned “very soon”.

Virgin Galactic Gateway to Space, the new terminal building at Spaceport America. (credit: J. Foust)

The fact that Virgin is still some time from beginning flights at Spaceport America is perhaps a relief to New Mexico, since the “Virgin Galactic Gateway to Space”, while formally dedicated yesterday, isn’t quite done. Walk up to that distinctive glass wall—which, in the bright sunlight, acts like a mirror—and peer inside, and you see that the interior rooms that will host Virgin Galactic’s operations, astronaut lounge, and other facilities, are still unfurnished, with the walls and floors completely bare. In one case, a door leading into the building was still lacking a handle. However, the building can already serve one its primary purposes: serving as a hangar for WK2 and SS2, which is where they vehicles were housed Sunday when spaceport executive director Christine Anderson saw them for the first time. “It was so awesome to see that,” she said. “Then I thought, ‘Wow, it fits in the hangar. Super!’”

Virgin appeared very pleased with the building and its unique design, as well as its environmentally-friendly characteristics that won it a LEED Gold rating. “Simply put,” Branson said, “it is a 21st century building for a 21st century business.”

Below is a brief video I shot of WhiteKnightTwo and SpaceShipTwo flying over the “Virgin Galactic Gateway to Space” terminal building at Spaceport America on Monday. You’ll see it coming in from the right in the distance, they going over the terminal building and almost straight overhead.

In a press release Thursday about NASA’s purchase of a SpaceShipTwo flight for research activities, Virgin Galactic provided an update on sales for its primary market, space tourism. “Virgin Galactic has already collected more than $58 million in deposits from 455 future tourist astronauts,” the release noted. Those are the largest figures that the company has cited for both customers and deposits to date. But how has its backlog grown in recent years?

To try to answer this, I dug through several years of my own notes as well as media reports and press releases. The result is the chart below, showing the number of customers Virgin Galactic has reported since the beginning of 2008:

It’s worth noting that in many cases the numbers given by the company are approximate: “nearly 300″, “over 350″, etc. For the purposes of the chart I’ve rounded up or down accordingly; in the case of the previous examples, they would be 300 and 350, respectively, in the chart. (Ideally I’d put in some error bars, but Google doesn’t support them in this chart.)

What this shows is that after a relatively flat 2009, Virgin has seen a steady increase in customers. (2009, it should be noted, is not as flat as the chart suggests, because of the rounding described above: the company reported “nearly 300″ in early 2009 and “over 300″ late in the year.) Over the last 17 months, from mid-May 2010 to Thursday, the company had seen an increase of 120 customers, a rate of a new customer every 4.3 days. During the nearly 22 months prior to that, from late July 2008 to mid-May 2010, the company had reported an increase of only 65 new customers, or one every 10.1 days. The sluggish growth then is not surprising given the economic crisis that started in 2008. Meanwhile, as the economy slowly improves Virgin is inching closer to flight, which may increase the interest among prospective customers.

This data set is certainly incomplete, based on a limited amount of research. If you’re aware of new or more accurate data, please let me know and I’ll update this chart accordingly.

Virgin Galactic president and CEO George Whitesides offered Saturday some clarity on the company’s plans to move ahead with the next phase of test flights of its SpaceShipTwo suborbital vehicle. Speaking at the 100 Year Starship Study Symposium in Orlando, Florida, Whitesides noted that SpaceShipTwo has not been in active test flights in recent months (the last test flight in Scaled’s SS2 flight log is from June 27.) “We’ve had the vehicle basically in the hangar for the last couple months… working on some mods,” he said. “Now, you’ll I think over the next couple months greater activity of both vehicles,” referring SpaceShipTwo and WhiteKnightTwo.

Those upcoming flights through the rest of this year will still be unpowered, though, he said. Plans call for integrating SpaceShipTwo’s hybrid rocket motor into the vehicle early next year and start rocket-powered flight tests. “Our current aspiration is to try to get to some definition of space by the end of next year,” he said. He was vague on what “some definition” is; while the Kármán line, a widely-used definition of space is 100 kilometers, US government agencies award astronaut wings for flights to 50 miles (80 kilometers).

After that, he said, entering commercial operations will depend on two “big tasks”: transferring flight operations form Mojave to Spaceport America in New Mexico (a formal dedication of the spaceport’s main terminal building is planned for October 17), and getting a launch license from the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation. “We don’t release a more precise public schedule” for beginning commercial operations, he added, to avoid putting schedule pressure on their engineers, he said. That’s consistent with past comments by Virgin officials that they’ll be ready to fly when it’s safe to do so, and not before.

Whitesides’ comments about SpaceShipTwo testing was part of a broader keynote at the conference, which is focusing on what technological and other breakthroughs are needed to develop an interstellar mission in the next century. His focus, by comparison, was on the near term. “We’re trying to do something, when it comes to suborbital space, that is doable today. That’s what’s exciting about Galactic and some of the other companies out there,” he said. “We’re trying to tackle a problem that is doable today.”

Still, he and others are supporting of the long-term vision at the conference. His talk included a video from Sir Richard Branson. “I think what you’re doing here is both important and absolutely fascinating,” Branson said.

As expected, NASA released on Monday a draft request for proposals (RFP) for the next phase of the Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) program, known as the Integrated Design Phase. With the shift to a contract based on Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR), with some elements of the Space Act Agreements used for the first two CCDev rounds, there’s a lot more documentation and administrivia in this solicitation. Those who have plowed through the documents have raised concern about one passage in main draft RFP document [Microsoft Word .docx format] on pages 52–53 of the 105-page document, a section titled “Phased Acquisition Using Down-Selection Procedures”. It reads:

(a) This solicitation is for the Commercial Crew Program’s acquisition to facilitate the development of a U.S. commercial crew space transportation capability with the goal of achieving safe, reliable and cost effective access to and from low earth orbit (LEO) including the International Space Station (ISS). The acquisition will be conducted as a two-phased procurement using a competitive down-selection technique between phases. In this technique, two or more contractors will be selected for Phase 1. It is expected that the single contractor for Phase 2 will be chosen from among these contractors after a competitive down-selection.

“Phase 1″ refers to the Integrated Design Phase, the next CCDev round, while Phase 2 refers to the follow-on “Development, Test, Evaluation and Certification” phase, which covers the actual construction and testing of a commercial crewed spacecraft. The passage above appears to indicate that NASA will select only one company for Phase 2, contrary to past claims that the agency planned to support the development of multiple providers. Does this represent a change in plans?

Probably not. One thing to keep in mind is a passage later in that same section: “Notwithstanding paragraph (a), the competition in Phase 2 may result in the award of multiple contracts if budget allows.” That indicates that the agency remains open to providing multiple awards in the following CCDev phase. In addition, when talking to Florida Today reporter James Dean yesterday for an article he wrote about CCDev, he shared with me a clarification he received from NASA on that issue. It turns out that the clause in question is a standard one in FAR-based contracts, and that the Commercial Crew Program was “investigating getting a waiver or deviation from this standard clause language for the final RFP.”

So, while NASA seems committed to continuing to support multiple providers throughout the CCDev program, funding permitting, this case is a reminder that the shift from Space Act Agreements to FAR-based contracts could create some issues that both NASA and industry need to be aware of.

Washington, D.C. – The Commercial Spaceflight Federation is pleased to support a letter on NASA Space Technology funding, signed by 45 companies, nonprofits, and research universities, which was delivered to Congress last week.

The letter states, “The Space Technology program is a critical investment in NASA’s future, our nation’s future in space, and America’s technology leadership position in the world.” The letter notes, “We write in support of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Space Technology program for fiscal year (FY) 2012. We urge you to support the program at a level of at least $535 million plus costs to cover the NASA labor transition. … As recognized by Congress in the America COMPETES Act, our nation’s economic competitiveness and high standard of living are based on decades of investment in innovation, research, and technology. Through space technology, NASA will stimulate the economy and build America’s global economic competitiveness through the creation of new products and services, new businesses and industries, and high?quality, sustainable jobs across NASA Centers, universities, and both small and large businesses.”

The full text of the letter can be found at:
http://commercialspaceflight.org/Other%20Content/NASA%20Space%20Technology%20Letter%20of%20Support,%20Senate.pdf

Copies of the letter were sent to both the House and Senate.

About the Commercial Spaceflight Federation
The mission of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation (CSF) is to promote the development of commercial human spaceflight, pursue ever-higher levels of safety, and share best practices and expertise throughout the industry. The Commercial Spaceflight Federation’s member companies, which include commercial spaceflight developers, operators, spaceports, suppliers, and service providers, are creating thousands of high-tech jobs nationwide, working to preserve American leadership in aerospace through technology innovation, and inspiring young people to pursue careers in science and engineering. For more information please visit http://www.commercialspaceflight.org or contact Executive Director John Gedmark at john@commercialspaceflight.org or at 202.349.1121.

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Last Friday NASA announced that the space agency and ATK would announce an agreement this Tuesday “that could accelerate the availability of U.S. commercial crew transportation capabilities”. (The announcement was originally going to be only available to media calling into a telecon line, but NASA said Monday the announcement will be on NASA TV at 3 pm EDT.) The announcement has generated various degrees of glee or despair, depending on one’s opinions about ATK’s work on solid rocket motors it has proposed for its Liberty rocket and is seeking to have incorporated into NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) heavy-lift rocket.

What seems likely to be announced tomorrow, though, is some kind of unfunded Space Act Agreement that is part of NASA’s second-round Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) program. NASA already has one such unfunded CCDev-2 agreement, with United Launch Alliance (ULA); when that agreement was announced in July, NASA administrator Charles Bolden said that it “may speed the development of a commercial crew transportation system for the International Space Station”, language similar to the announcement last week. Given that the funded CCDev-2 awards focused on spacecraft development, unfunded agreements allow companies like ULA and ATK to keep their launch vehicle efforts on track, although they get no funding from NASA.

The announcement comes just after ATK performed the third successful test-firing of its five-segment solid rocket motor, originally intended for the Ares 1 and Ares 5 but now proposed for Liberty and SLS. An unfunded CCDev-2 award would help ATK keep the Liberty vehicle on track. There’s one problem, though: right now there’s no obvious commercial crew customer for Liberty. Of the four funded CCDev-2 vehicle developers, three (Blue Origin, Sierra Nevada, and, most recently, Boeing) have selected ULA’s Atlas 5, while SpaceX, not surprisingly, is sticking with its own Falcon 9 rocket. Unless another company enters the commercial crew competition down the road, or one of ULA’s customers have second thoughts, Liberty may remain on the outside looking in.