Thoughts on NASA Commercial Crew
Posted by Chris Radcliff in Space News on November 18, 2010
Molly McCormick, newspace biomechanical engineer and friend of SD Space, was recently given the task of reviewing NASA’s latest requirements for the Commercial Crew & Cargo Program. She posted her initial thoughts on Twitter, and I just had to share them here:
Having grokked NASA’s ISS Crew Transportation and Services Requirements document, CCT-REQ-1130, for several days, I now have some thoughts:
(This might be a good time to state that all opinions are my own and do not reflect anybody else’s in any way.)
1. It may actually make writing CCDev2 proposals easier; proposals=”what you’ll do/how you’ll do it” & they’re detailing “what you’ll do.”
Corollary: It will therefore have a homogenizing effect on all CCDev2 proposals, so NASA can’t distinguish btw diverse approaches as well.
2. Many of the performance requirements are actually quite reasonable, and even provide great experiential knowledge to leverage. BUT…
3. The testing requirements for verifying performance range from “nitpicky” to “onerous,” and even, in a couple instances, “offensive.”
I can respect nitpicky; that’s another word for thorough and I’m nitpicky myself. It will inflate cost, though. Substantially.
It’s not like NewSpace can’t/won’t meet the req’s; it just costs more/takes longer this way.
Cost more/take longer than it has to, but still cheaper/faster than NASA. :)
What are your thoughts?
Comments
I’d hate to see commercial space opportunities ‘killed’ because of too heavy and expensive requirements levied by NASA. If additional monies are included in these commercial contracts, maybe NewSpace companies will be more willing to take it on.