Achieving Mastery of Space Operations by Transforming Space Logistics

International Society of Logistics—Logistics Spectrum Proposed Article, August 2005 Achieving Mastery of Space Operations by Transforming Space Logistics By James Michael Snead, P.E. he American Institute of operations both on the Earth and in consortia, and non-state actors. U.S. Aeronautics and Astronautics’ space that deal with: (1) Design, defense and intelligence activities in (AIAA) Space Logistics development, acquisition, storage, space will become increasingly Technical Committee (SLTC) movement, distribution, maintenance, important to the pursuit of U.S. national T 1 focuses on innovative, near-term space evacuation, and disposition of space security interests. logistics to establish safe and affordable materiel; (2) Movement, evacuation, What the Space Commission human and robotics spacefaring and hospitalization of people in space; focused on with these findings was the operations throughout the Earth-Moon (3) Acquisition or construction, fact that opening new frontiers involves system and beyond. To help accomplish maintenance, operation, and disposition a key transformation in operational this vision, the SLTC and the Space of facilities on the Earth and in space to capabilities. The initial era of Logistics Division of the International support human and robotics space exploration and scientific study does not Society of Logistics (SOLE) are taking operations; and (4) Acquisition or generally emphasize the establishment steps to reestablish a previously furnishing of services to support human of routine, affordable logistics successful partnership between SOLE and robotics space operations. operations to, from, and within the new and the AIAA that as waned in recent frontier. However, with time, as years, perhaps reflecting the recent woes Achieving Mastery of Space economic and other advantages of the of the American space program. Operations new frontier become apparent, Space still has the allure of the The context for understanding the government and private enterprise begin mysterious that provokes a return to the renewed importance of space logistics to make logistics infrastructure imagination of our youth. Yet, while was established in early 2001 by the investments to reap these rewards. This still a new and exciting frontier today, Commission to Assess United States is an important turning point because its future for human civilization National Security Space Management the act of planning and building the revolves around the creation of new and Organization (generally referred to initial logistics infrastructure necessarily space logistics capabilities that will as Space Commission). creates the knowledge, experience, and make human space operations safe and industrial base—how I define mastery The first era of the space age was routine. The focus of this article in on of operations—necessary to establish one of experimentation and discovery. describing how near-term space economically useful, acceptably safe, Telstar, Mercury and Apollo, Voyager logistics capabilities can be achieved and acceptably affordable logistics and Hubble, and the Space Shuttle and, equally important, why building capabilities within the new frontier. taught Americans how to journey into these new capabilities is important. Once these are established, this new space and allowed them to take the first mastery becomes the important tentative steps toward operating in Defining Space Logistics foundation for creating and supporting space while enlarging their knowledge new government and private operations The SLTC has adopted the of the universe. We are now on the in the new frontier. following broad definition of space threshold of a new era of the space age, logistics, based on the generally devoted to mastering operations in accepted definition of military logistics. space. (Emphasis added) Von Braun’s Original Space logistics is the science of Mastering near-earth space Spacefaring Vision planning and carrying out the movement operation is still in its early stages. As As the recent investigations into the of humans and materiel to, from, and mastery over operating in space is technical and economic challenges within space combined with the ability achieved, the value of activity in space necessary to overcome to repair the to maintain human and robotics will grow. Commercial space activity Hubble Space Telescope highlight, we operations within space. In its most will become increasingly important to have not yet achieved an initial mastery comprehensive sense, space logistics the global economy. Civil activity will of space operations. This is a addresses the aspects of space involve more nations, international consequence of decisions made over the 1 International Society of Logistics—Logistics Spectrum Proposed Article, August 2005 course of nearly five decades that 4) Build a permanently inhabited emphasized immediate operational goals space station as a place both to without making necessary investments observe the Earth and from which in space logistics. to launch future expeditions to the In the early 1950s Dr. Wernher Von Moon and planets. Braun, at the time probably the most 5) Undertake human exploration of widely recognized “rocket scientist,” the Moon with the intention of introduced his ideas on how to become a creating Moon bases and eventually spacefaring civilization. This was a permanent colonies. period of significant public interest in 6) Undertake human expeditions to aerospace technology with the breaking Mars and eventually colonize the of the “sound barrier” in 1947, the first planet.”2 western flights of rockets into space, the emergence of peaceful uses of nuclear Acting to fulfill this vision, the energy, rapid progress in aircraft design, United States undertook a wide variety the initial growth of TV, and the initial of technology development programs. In period of sightings of UFOs and related addition to the well known X-15, lesser sci-fi movies. Starting with an initial known programs included the X-20 technical conference in Texas, moving DynaSoar partially reusable Earth-to- on to a series of well-illustrated articles orbit spaceplane, the first in the leading popular magazine of the “aerospaceplane” program, several day, Collier’s, and culminating in two nuclear thermal rockets for to- and in- specials on the Walt Disney TV show, space propulsion, and Project Orion, an Dr. Von Braun explained to a captivated interesting concept for nuclear-powered public how to become spacefaring. interplanetary space propulsion. And all of this within a dozen years of breaking By the end of the 1950s, the the believed to be impenetrable sound essence of Von Braun’s spacefaring barrier! vision was captured in the American space program. Recently, Dr. Roger Being unfamiliar with this initial Launius, previously the chief historian phase of the American space program, of NASA (1990-2002) and currently the many today believe that the human Chair of the Division of Space History space program started with President of the Smithsonian Institute’s National Kennedy’s famous 1961 address to Air and Space Museum), looked back at Congress establishing the goal of these early years. It was viewed as an landing humans on the Moon by the end “integrated space exploration scenario of the decade. What actually happened, centered on human movement beyond as Dr. Launius’ article indicates, is that this planet and involving these basic President Kennedy eliminated steps 3 ingredients accomplished in essentially and 4 of the integrated space exploration this order: scenario to accelerate step 5. This change effectively eliminated building a 1) Earth orbital satellites to learn useful and sustainable space logistics about the requirements for space infrastructure. Referring to comments technology that must operate in a Dr. Hans Mark, director of the NASA hostile environment. Ames Research Center during the 2) Earth orbital flights by humans to 1960s, made in 1987, Dr. Launius determine whether or not it was noted, “Mark suggested that the result really possible for humanity to of Apollo was essentially a explore and settle other places. technological dead end for the space 3) Develop a reusable spacecraft for program. It did not, in his view, foster travel to and from Earth orbit, an orderly development of spaceflight thereby extending the principles of capabilities beyond the lunar atmospheric flight into space and missions.”3 making routine space operations. These remarks are not meant to Figure 1 disparage the remarkable Von Braun’s concepts used in Collier’s Magazine (copyright©Terry Sunday, used with permission). 2 International Society of Logistics—Logistics Spectrum Proposed Article, August 2005 accomplishments of the lunar landing 2) Spacelift for oversize and heavy he argued, identify the third best program. The American space program cargo, space platforms, and solution—“the one that can be validated has always, and still is, part of broader components of space facilities and and deployed without unacceptable cost landscape of national and international large spacecraft. or delay.”4 political activities. What this brief recap 3) Space logistics facilities in low Sir Watson Watt was not arguing of the early years of the American space Earth orbit (LEO). that near-term imperatives prevented the program is meant to highlight is the fact 4) Reusable transportation within use of technologies that had not yet been that the SLTC’s vision is essentially a space for passengers and cargo. operationally deployed. Rather,

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