HUNTSVILLE, Alabama -- Space Launch System (SLS) Program Manager Todd May said the massive effort to design and build the next U.S. heavy lift rocket, NASA's largest development program, is on schedule and on track to meet the 2017 first mission launch.
Speaking to the Marshall Association Tuesday, May said that despite the debate on the U.S. space program, NASA has a strategy and a program to carry it out.
"Some say there is no plan. But there is a strategy and a mission," he said.
May sees that mission on several levels, viewing it in both space exploration leadership as well as national security. "We're losing the market, taking it on the chin from the Chinese and the Russians," he commented. "But as a nation we don't want to retreat from space exploration. We're focusing on beyond Earth orbit so what we learn will benefit all mankind."
He cautioned against buying into the notion that NASA has lost its relevance. "NASA has taken blows to its image, but don't you believe it," he said. "We're about to land a Mini-Cooper on Mars. The Russians tried and they couldn't do it."
May repeated a key NASA talking point - SLS has to be affordable in a time of budget constraints. He said NASA's budget, projected to decrease slightly in FY 2013, does not allow for development to proceed on the lines of the Shuttle program. "We won't be able to nail every problem flat," he said. "If you're used to Space Shuttle, this will be tough for you," he challenged his listeners.
He pointed to cost projections showing a flat cost curve after initial program startup, rather than the spiked curve with costs leveling out afterwards.
"The budget environment made the difference. We had to start with what we had."
The necessity to use largely existing hardware prompted a review of nearly 2000 rocket designs from around the world, he said. NASA at one time considered a design that would have used solid boosters and two different types of liquid-fueled boosters.
"You'd have to fire 13 different engines at simutaneously at launch. That just wasn't feasible," he said.
Use of existing engine designs for the first stage - the RS-25 liguid engines being recycled from Shuttle as well as modified versions of the solid rocket boosters - is one way the program is saving money and staying on its development schedule.
The upper stage will be powered by a new J2-X engine now under development, and being tested at Stennis Space Center in Mississippi.
The first phase of the SLS program will produce a rocket capable of carrying a 70 ton payload by the year 2017, with payload capacity of later versions slated to rise to 130 tons by 2021.
May said two primary missions are planned. The first, dubbed EM-1, will be an uncrewed flight around the Moon planned for 2017. The EM-2 mission will carry U.S. astronauts back to the Moon in 2021.
A major challenge, he said, has been combining Shuttle and Ares personnel, who together make up nearly 90% of the SLS development workforce, and their cultures they bring with them. Shuttle personnel, he said, bring a more operationally-focused mentality, which has clashed at times with Ares more development-oriented culture.
"Managing these cultures has been a big part of the dynamic," he admitted.
May said the program is now in the middle of its System Requirements Review, and heading towards the first of two board reviews on March 29.
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