[This is the "forecast and inventory" issue, light on current news.]
Editorial suggesting that the best way to sort out US space policy, and lack thereof, is to substitute the word "purpose" for "policy".
NRC Space Studies Board criticizes current space station design as being ill-suited for either life-science or materials microgravity work.
Workforce reductions at Reston as station cuts sink in.
DoD re-warms to NASP, saying technical progress has been remarkable and several military applications for hypersonic cruise are now seen.
Stafford group will strongly back restarting nuclear-rocket programs for use in Mars exploration. Both nuclear-thermal and nuclear-electric systems are of interest, but nuclear-thermal looks most promising for openers: it offers a high enough exhaust velocity to make fast trajectories possible, greatly reducing worries about radiation and free-fall effects, and it has enough thrust to make far more abort modes available in case of trouble.
The downside of all this is public antinuclear hysteria and its political effects, very uncertain costs, the possibility that the push for high performance may lead to exotic designs that worsen development problems (in particular, sources say "They're doing a lot of evaluation by rocket people and not enough by nuclear people"), and lack of effort on important but unglamorous supporting technologies ("either way you go, chemical or nuclear, you're going to need new ways to store and handle liquid hydrogen... but what's the funding for cryogenic technology? Zero!").
The Stafford group reportedly will reject the Augustine commission's open- ended approach, and urge setting a specific schedule for a return to the Moon and an expedition to Mars.
First Titan IV launch from Vandenberg March 8, probably carrying a Lacrosse military radarsat.
Titan IV launch schedule to be cut about 30% during the rest of this decade due to tight budgets and reduced payload requirements. One problem is what effect this will have on the work to convert the Vandenberg shuttle pad to a Titan IV pad: the new schedule is probably too busy for one Vandenberg pad but will come nowhere near full use of two.
Big excitement about tactical missile defence in the aftermath of the Gulf War: it now seems indisputable that the missile threat is real, US nuclear forces cannot deter it, US conventional forces are not good at finding and destroying missiles before launch, and missiles can be intercepted. What sort of hardware this translates into is another question. SDIO is basically reshuffling its organization to bring as much of it as possible under the new hot "tactical" label, but Congress probably won't buy the same old programs with only the labels new. One area where real changes are likely is sensor satellites. Another is that SDIO has now formally abandoned the 1993 target date for a decision on major SDI deployment; Congress has always considered this deadline early and arbitrary anyway.
Long overview story on new space-technology efforts. Current efforts are pretty small; one of note is a project looking at monitoring rocket-engine health by optical sensors looking at the exhaust plume, which seems to have some predictive value and could perhaps detect impending engine failure ahead of time. Near-future efforts are planned to emphasize funding for a small number of major topics: an advanced space engine to replace the RL-10 oxyhydrogen rocket motor, planetary rover technology, nuclear propulsion, and life support (particularly radiation protection).
Story about planned upgrades and possible future directions at the Cape. Current approaches to launcher and payload processing, and current launchers themselves, are considered inadequate for future activity. "We've forgotten that launch vehicles are transportation systems."
Soviet space program facing budget difficulties. In particular, the future of the "Mir 2" efforts is now uncertain.
And the bean-counter replied, | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology "beans are more important". | henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry