Fwd: Space Command chief: SpaceX certification looming

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From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: September 17, 2014 9:11:31 AM CDT
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: Space Command chief: SpaceX certification looming

 

 

Space Command chief: SpaceX certification looming

Sep. 16, 2014 - 06:47PM   |  

 

Gen. John E. Hyten, commander of Air Force Space Command, speaks Sept. 16 during the Air Force Association's Air & Space Conference,. (Rob Curtis/Staff / Staff)

By Aaron Mehta
Staff writer

NATIONAL HARBOR, MD. — SpaceX is getting close to certification for military launches, perhaps as soon as the start of December, the new head of Air Force Space Command said today.

"Like every American, I love competition. I love entrepreneurs who take chances and put out the risk," Gen. John Hyten told an audience at the Air Force Association's Air and Space conference Tuesday. "And I want you to know I root for SpaceX to come into the competition."

"The certification of SpaceX, hopefully by December the first, is a big event," he said. "But if they're not ready on December the first, we have to stand up and say that."

For some time, Air Force officials have said SpaceX certification could come by the end of this year, so while plausible, the Dec. 1 date would be somewhat optimistic for the certification process.

Speaking later in the day, Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James noted that "aggressive" date.

"What I know about this is: Of course there is a certification process, and the target time's you have heard for when SpaceX will hopefully be ready is anywhere from the end of the year into the first quarter of next year," James said.

"I didn't hear specifically what Gen. Hyten said today but that sounds a little bit aggressive," James added. "It's sort of a window for when we were all hoping the certification could occur."

The certification process for launch under the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) program has been a time consuming process for SpaceX, one the company has derided as unnecessarily laborious. The Air Force has countered that the process is working itself out and was a necessary process to ensure secure military launch.

Still, despite the disagreements — including SpaceX's move to sue the Air Force over the awarding of a block-buy of launches to competitor United Launch Alliance — the service has maintained that SpaceX is likely to be certified sooner rather than later.

That doesn't mean the service is just going to give SpaceX the go-ahead without doing its due diligence, though.

"Certification is not a done deal. It's not done until it's done," James said. "There are gateways that need to be passed through, there are data that must be analyzed and we must assure ourselves that a new entrant like SpaceX can do the mission and do it in the right way."

SpaceX got some good news today when NASA announced it had downselected both the Elon Musk-backed company and competitor Boeing for its next-generation commercial crew competition.

The contract, which awards SpaceX $2.6 billion, gives two things the upstart company will enjoy: an infusion of cash and an infusion of legitimacy that the company passed certification standards that James notes are tougher than those of the Air Force. However, that will not have any direct impact on the military's certification process.

"The only thing that will make SpaceX certifiable for the types of missions we have in the EELV program is to come through the certification process that we have laid out," James said.

 

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SpaceX must meet high standard to get rocket certified : U.S. officials

By Andrea Shalal 

 

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View photo

An unmanned Falcon 9 rocket blasts off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in this handout photo provided …

By Andrea Shalal

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Senior U.S. Air Force officials on Tuesday said they favored competition for military rocket launches, but the Air Force needed to stick to its high standards in certifying the Falcon 9 rocket, built by privately-held Space Exploration Technologies.

SpaceX is working through a detailed certification process with the Air Force for its Falcon 9 satellite so it can compete with United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture of Boeing Co and Lockheed Martin Corp, to launch a National Reconnaissance Office spy satellite and other satellites.

The company has also sued the Air Force to get a larger share of the 36 launches now promised to ULA.

The issue has taken on new urgency this year after Russia's actions in Ukraine raised concerns about ULA's reliance on Russian-built RD-180 rocket engines for its Atlas 5 rockets.

Air Force officials underscored their determination to end U.S. reliance on the Russian engines, and said they would shape an acquisition strategy in coming months after hearing back from industry about possible solutions in coming days.

"The objective is to get off of the reliance on the RD-180 as soon as practicable," Air Force Secretary Deborah James told reporters at the annual Air Force Association conference.

Air Force officials say one key step is to inject competition into the monopoly now held by ULA.

"Like every American, I love competition ... I root for SpaceX to come into the competition," General John Hyten, commander of Air Force Space Command, told the annual Air Force Association conference. But he also said the United States could not afford to lose any satellite given the fragile state of most systems, outside of the Global Positioning System satellites.

"First do no harm, is my view on this. Then get to competition as fast as we can," Air Force Chief of Staff General Mark Welsh told reporters at the conference.

The U.S. military lost the ability to put satellites in space after the Challenger space shuttle exploded in the 1980s, Hyten said, and again in the late 1990s after a series of other rocket failures. Those problems resulted in "huge voids" in U.S. military capabilities, he said, and the military could not afford to put itself in that position once again.

"The certification of SpaceX, hopefully by Dec. 1, is a big event. But if they're not ready on Dec. 1, we have to stand up and say that, and that's going to be difficult because I want competition," Hyten said.

"My fundamental requirement as the commander of Air Force Space Command ... is to make sure that the United States has access to space, assured, all the time. And that means it has to work every time," Hyten said.

Welsh said SpaceX had been launching rockets, but was behind on some key engineering and design reviews required for the Air Force certification. "It's a very deliberate process," he said.

The comments about the need for 100-percent launch success follow last month's explosion of a SpaceX test rocket. The incident raised concerns among U.S. officials, although the Air Force has declined comment on the consequences of the explosion for the certification process.

The botched test flight involved a Falcon rocket demonstration vehicle known as Falcon 9R that was outfitted with three engines and a prototype landing system the company had been developing to fly its rockets back to the launch site for refurbishment and reuse.

A government official said the explosion could slow the ongoing U.S. certification process because the reason needed to be understood. The destroyed rocket was different than the Falcon 9, but involved the same basic engine, the official said.

NASA on Tuesday awarded both Boeing and SpaceX separate contracts to build commercially owned and operated "space taxis" to fly astronauts to the International Space Station, ending U.S. dependence on Russia for rides.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal, editing by G Crosse)

 

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