Planetary Radio: Space Exploration, Astronomy and Science - The Planetary Society Goes to Washington

Episode Date: October 27, 2003

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This is Planetary Radio. The Planetary Society goes to Washington. Hello everyone, I'm Matt Kaplan. We'll talk with Lou Friedman about last week's hearings on the future of spaceflight held by the House Science Committee. We'll also hear some of the testimony provided. Bruce Betts has a special guest on What's Up, and Emily is looking for rocks from Venus.

Let's hear the first part of her report right now. Hi, I'm Emily Lakdawalla with questions and answers. A listener asked, A few dozen moon and Mars meteorites have been found on Earth. Have any meteorites been found from Venus, Mercury, or any moons other than our own? There are currently no known meteorites from Venus, Mercury, or moons of other planets. Most of the meteorites that have been found on Earth are presumed to have their origin in the asteroid belt. Most meteorites are stony bodies known as chondrites. Chondrites represent some of the most primitive bodies in the solar system.

Their parent asteroids condensed from the solar nebula about 4.6 billion years ago and have been orbiting the sun ever since. But the most interesting type of meteorites to planetary scientists is a type called achondrites. Achondrites are stony, like chondrites, but they are not so primitive. They are evolved rocks that came from large rocky bodies that had at least a brief volcanic history, large asteroids, moons, or planets. Of these achondrites, 29, or about a tenth of a percent of all meteorite finds, look like the lunar rocks returned by the Apollo astronauts. About the same number, 28, contain

gas bubbles similar to the atmosphere sampled on Mars by the Viking landers. What other bodies have achondrites come from? Stay tuned to Planetary Radio to find out. Dr. Wes Huntress is president of the Planetary Society and a former associate administrator of NASA. On October 16, he sat down with other distinguished space scientists before the full House Committee on Science. Here's a bit of his testimony. I think that the legacy of the Columbia accident should be to create a new pathway

and a sense of purpose for human spaceflight. And if space explorers are to risk their lives, they should do so for challenging reasons, such as exploring the moon, Mars, asteroids, or for constructing and servicing space telescopes. The whole point of leaving home, after all, is to go somewhere, not to endlessly circle the block. What the public wants is clarity of purpose. A space station advertised as the next logical step without filling in that blank to what just doesn't do it. There's a growing consensus that a coherent vision for human spaceflight over the next several decades is required and one that has a

clear sense of purpose and destination. Sooner or later we have to have a clear destination or human spaceflight won't survive and America will be much the poorer for it. A new option doesn't have to be funded like Apollo. It can proceed at a steady pace. The country needs the challenge of grander exploration to justify the risk and to lift our sights, to fuel human dreams, and to advance human discovery and knowledge. We need to go somewhere. Dr. Wes Huntress in Washington last week. Later we'll hear more testimony from Dr. Bruce Murray, the chair of the Planetary

Society's board. First, though, let's talk with someone else who made that trip to D.C. Lou Friedman, the executive director of the Planetary Society, is with us for this edition of Planetary Radio, and he joins us periodically to update us on various issues, and this time, it happens to be not too long after he has made a trip to washington dc yes mister friedman goes to washington and so while you were there lou are you didn't just see the sites that's right to the club of planetary society leaders are president west huntress and our

chairman of the board and co-founder bruce murray testified to congress at the same day on the House Science Committee hearing on the future of spaceflight. The question will be, will we have a new future human spaceflight goal, exploration beyond Earth orbit, or will we remain bogged down in Earth orbit as we have for the past 30 years? The Planetary Society has a pretty clearly stated position on this. Well, I guess the way I phrased that question about being bogged down in Earth orbit made it pretty clear. We have been stuck in Earth orbit since the days of Apollo, since the late 70s. What people don't realize is the shuttle was a very negative space decision. It was a decision to basically stay in Earth orbit. And in fact, we stood

down from sending humans to space from 1975 to 1982 while we developed the shuttle. And then we developed a space architecture, which really didn't have any exploratory goals for humans in space. What the Planetary Society is now urging is that we need to look beyond Earth orbit. We need to have a program and a goal, something that excites the public, that says that this human exploration, which costs a great deal of money and, of course, is very risky, as we've learned, needs to look beyond Earth orbit and a goal that's worth this cost. And that goal would be exploring other worlds.

So not surprisingly, this was the general tone and content of the testimony that everyone gave in D.C. Yes, and you can see this testimony on our website. Both Bruce Murray and Wes Huntress spoke about exploring beyond Earth orbit. Going to other worlds, of course, means Mars. It's the only planet we know of that humans might someday settle on. It's certainly a planet that beckons to us in so many ways for exploration. Whether we do that in one giant step or in a series of steps that lead outward from the space station to higher Earth orbit and then to the moon or the asteroids and then on on to Mars, is somewhat up for debate and is somewhat of secondary consideration.

Even myself, who sees very clearly that going to Mars is the direct kind of goal that should engage us, nonetheless would say that if we at least keep our eye on that goal and work toward it, if we do interim steps, including a very exciting, for example, human mission to an asteroid, landing on an asteroid. That would be an interim goal that certainly would excite the public and would test the engineering systems. A human mission to an asteroid before a trip to Mars, that might sound counterintuitive to a lot of people.

Well, asteroids are easier to get to than Mars. They have lower energy. They're closer to the Earth. Their orbits more closely match the Earth. But more importantly, they're easier to land on. You don't have to have that reentry system that goes through the atmosphere. You don't have to have a landing system. They have no gravity.

So you just kind of creep up on it. You just go slow, nudge up to it, and step out, and you're on the rock. You've got to be careful you don't float away from it either. That's right. The asteroid is small enough where you jump strongly enough and you might float away. But the serious part of this is in terms of engineering systems, it's an easier job than Mars, but still a long-duration, many-month mission that would test your interplanetary systems and your propulsion systems.

So it would be a very useful engineering interim step. Scientifically, I could not argue that a human mission to an asteroid made a lot of sense. You can do it robotically. Perhaps the most important thing is the public would be really engaged with it. You can imagine the astronauts going out to an asteroid, getting off there, saying, here I am, you know, jumping around and doing the things that astronauts would do to first step off onto another small celestial body like that. It would be very exciting.

So if it really is a valid engineering interim milestone, it's also a very valid interim step to keep the public engaged in the program. I would love to see the live television pictures coming back from Vesto or whatever. Let's take it back to D.C. If I'm correct, the testimony came not long after the report of the commission that had been studying the Columbia disaster? Yes. The committee is holding that hearing because they know that the U.S. is going to return to human spaceflight.

The question is, is with what goals? It's a very good question. I'm glad Congress is investigating that. Bruce Murray, who used to be director of JPL and, of course, has enormous experience in the space program, Wes Huntress, who used to be an associate administrator of NASA, we're very lucky to have these leaders in the Planetary Society, and Congress was very lucky to have people like them who are experts come and testify.

There were other panel participants, too. And the idea was, however, to really examine where humans, what the purpose of the human spaceflight program is and where humans should go in space next. And there were a wide range of opinions. Some people think there should be a human lunar base to do astronomy and where humans should go in space next. And there were a wide range of opinions. Some people think there should be a human lunar base to do astronomy or a base even in interplanetary space to build telescopes. But I think there is, nonetheless, even with those differing views, strong consensus on the idea that Mars is the goal.

I should say also that the administration, it's not just Congress, but the Bush administration is conducting its own space policy review with the idea of setting space policy. We hope that that will be a process that will end up in a few months, perhaps with a new human exploration goal. And I met with several of the administration people on this same trip back there in Washington to discuss this space policy issue and to really talk about the rationale for human space exploration. What would you say is the mood in Washington this, what is it, seven or eight months after Columbia?

It's a strange sort of split mood. On the one hand, no one is very satisfied, almost no one is very satisfied with the status quo, with the idea that we were doing everything just right and we should continue doing the same shuttle flights and the same space station program. The purpose of that program is being severely questioned. NASA is forced into a defensive position. They defend the program because they obviously have to defend what they are doing. But I think if you go deep enough into NASA, too, there's dissatisfaction with the idea that human exploration sort of stops at the space station. There's no goal beyond it. Space stations shouldn't exist at all if there's not a goal beyond it. And if you don't admit that, then you end up designing the wrong space station,

which we're in danger of doing it. So the mood in Washington is dissatisfaction with the purposes of human space program and at the same time a reluctance, if you will, to commit a lot of money and a lot of political capital into a we should go to Mars. There's no political consensus on that. There's certainly no international consensus on it. There's nobody leading it. And I think, Matt, that that is the most sorely needed aspect to it is that someone has to

bring together the rationale and the program and start leading to make the case for that. Maybe the Planetary Society can fulfill a mission there. We'll continue our conversation with Lou Friedman, and we'll hear an excerpt of Bruce Murray's testimony after this break. Stay tuned to Planetary Radio. This is Buzz Aldrin. When I walked on the moon, I knew it was just the beginning of humankind's great adventure in the solar system. That's why I'm a member of the Planetary Society, the world's largest space interest group. The Planetary Society is helping to explore Mars.

We're tracking near-Earth asteroids and comets. We sponsor the search for life on other worlds, and we're building the first-ever solar sail. You can learn about these adventures and exciting new discoveries from space exploration in the Planetary Report. The Planetary Report is the Society's full-color magazine. It's just one of many member benefits. You can learn more by calling 1-877-PLANETS. That's toll-free, 1-877-752-6387.

And you can catch up on space exploration news and developments at our exciting and informative website, PlanetarySociety.org. The Planetary Society, exploring new worlds. Here's Dr. Bruce Murray testifying in Washington just a few days ago. So we have to embrace the right reason. We have to embrace the fact that this is something that's going to take a while. You're not going to get it done in two presidential cycles or how many congressional ones. So that means that the program itself has to be composed of a lot of short-term milestones and efforts,

each of which is enabling to the longer goal, each of which is affordable, and each of which is interesting and popular. That's the key to this dilemma. That's how we get out of it. In order for that to happen, NASA is going to have to feel pressure to produce alternatives to the current space station shuttle plan. It's clear they are committed to that, as they have been. They don't see a way out of it and so they're going to sit there and try as best as possible to stay on that track. If they're successful, it means that human

spaceflight will probably disappear either gradually by loss of interest or by catastrophically when the next fatalities occur either on the shuttle or in the station itself. If we're that close, it would be terrible, and it's a horrible legacy of this generation, of this political leadership of which you're a part, that we could lose this wonderful thing we started with, especially Apollo. We could lose it because we didn't have the political courage to recognize that we've gotten ourselves in an unsupportable situation.

I have asked Morley, and I'm looking forward to answering detailed questions on how to do all this, but I leave you with both thanks for having a chance to talk to you and saying that fundamentally the problem is your problem. It's a political leadership problem, a perceptual problem. It's not a financial problem. It's not a technical problem. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Welcome back. That was Bruce Murray, chair of the Society's board and former director of JPL, testifying on October 16 before the House Science Committee in Washington.

We're talking politics, political will, and the future of the space program on today's show. Executive Director Lou Friedman was on the trip, working behind the scenes and talking with both administration and congressional staff. I asked Lou to assess political attitudes toward space exploration as we move closer to an election year. The space program doesn't become a big political issue, and in most cases the politicians will follow and not lead. And so it does become incumbent upon ourselves and others to show them the leadership so

that they can follow. So I don't see space policy being a major international issue. In general, the great space goals that have been accomplished, certainly the first satellite flights of Russia and the United States and now the first manned flight by China, for example, the Apollo goal, and even the space station, not so much as proposed by Ronald Reagan in the 80s, but as carried out in the 90s, were political goals that served a higher political purpose than a space goal. In Apollo case, of course, we all know it was to show technological leadership over the Soviets and in their case over the Americans.

In the case of China, just launching their first man mission, it's to show that they are leaders in Asia in terms of technology and in terms of economic leadership. And players, real players on the global scene. Players on the global stage. Certainly the military implications of having those boosters is not lost. And in the case of the space station, it was to engage the then-emerging Russians, aerospace industry, in an active program that kept them away from nuclear proliferation

and other concerns the United States had in the 90s. So we engaged the Russians as international partners on the space station, and lo and behold, the space station got built. So what I think we have to do now is to make the case that a human mission to Mars, a landing on Mars as a global enterprise engaging the best in talents of countries, of industry, of scientists, of engineers, and of citizens around the world is a valuable political goal for the nations that must make that decision. And that may not be easy.

And on the one hand, on the other, it is the kind of thing that has always brought rich rewards to countries that have made those kinds of decisions. Historically, it is not a hard argument to make that such enterprises bring out the best in us and have the greatest lasting effect for the benefit of the country. The society's concern about robotic exploration knows no limits and I think was well understood, and we made the case very strongly. In fact, Bruce Murray, who's been a leader in this argument, made a strong point that it's not human versus robotic program at all,

and it's not even human program, oh, and then the robotic program. It's really one program. It's really exploration, and the exploration program needs to involve both humans and robots as they always have. And if we could only get NASA and the bureaucracy to stop separating them and to think along those lines, we'd realize that these sets of Mars missions now could be placing infrastructure and building up the knowledge for human missions, and we could be orienting them that way, and the human mission program could be taking advantage of what we're learning in them in order to construct the kinds of experiments they need to do to prepare humans for the long flight

to Mars. With only two or three minutes left, talk a little bit more about the society's stance and role in all of this. Well, the society is definitely trying to promote a human exploration goal and to have our human space program be much more purposeful than it is. That could mean development of new in-situ propulsion for deep space missions, but it could also mean a stand down in human flights for a few years while we reoriented the program toward a direction that really would take us beyond Earth orbit. We're working on this.

We've had one workshop. People can see the results of that workshop on our website. We'll probably have a couple more. We'll probably be engaging the public a great deal more in these questions of how to build up a Mars program and to build a political constituency for a Mars program. Slight change of subject. We've already mentioned the Chinese, their great success last week.

Of course, as you know, last week's show was devoted mostly to the success of this Shenzhou vehicle in China. Where does the Planetary Society stand there? Well, we welcome all nations into conducting space missions, certainly consistent with the peaceful and global enterprise of space exploration. To the extent that the Chinese manned program is going to be a partner in future human exploration of space, peaceful and international cooperation, cooperation. We think it's a terrific addition to the world's scene or to Earth's capability for exploring the universe. The Chinese will have the same problems the United States and the Soviet Union and now Russia has, which is what is the purpose of a human spaceflight

that justifies the risk and the cost? After the initial success, you have to decide why you were doing this and what you want to do there. I hope that, I expect they'll find the same things we do. And in that case, I hope to see them as great partners in the venture that takes us to Mars. We'll have to call it quits there. Lou, thank you very much for the update and we'll look forward to talking to you about other topics

related to the Planetary Society and some that are only indirectly related in future editions of Planetary Radio. And I'll be back with Bruce Fetz and What's Up in just a moment. I'm Emily Lakdawalla, back with Q&A. Achondrites are meteorites that had to come from large rocky bodies that had volcanic activity at least briefly in their history. About 60 achondrites have been identified as lunar and Martian rocks,

but the most common group of achondrites, known as the Eukrites, didn't come from either place. Eukrites look a lot like volcanic rocks found on Earth, so they must have come from a large body at least several hundred kilometers in diameter. The current working hypothesis for the origin of Eukrites is that they came from the asteroid Vesta. Vesta, the second largest known asteroid after Ceres, is about 530 kilometers across, about one-sixth the size of the Moon. Scientists have compared the properties of Vesta observed from Earth with the Eukrites

and found many similarities. However, some scientists suggest that the Eukrites might be from Venus. Unfortunately, until we send a mission to gather samples of the rocks or atmosphere from Venus and Vesta, we won't be able to say for sure. Got a question about the universe? Send it to us at planetaryradio at planetary.org. And now, here's Matt with more Planetary Radio. It is time for What's Up with the Planetary Society's Director of Projects, Bruce Batts,

and he is here with us in person, fully restored to robust health. Thank you, everyone, for all of your wonderful wishes. Yeah, right. Please, the post office is really upset with us. We're just being inundated with those cards. Could you stop now? He's fine. I am healthy. What do you have for us?

Okay, well, in the night sky, we've got Mars in the southeast after sunset, still bright reddish, and as I keep saying, fading fast, so don't miss it. Venus setting about an hour after the sun in the west-southwest. Saturn in the east-northeast about four hours after sunset. It'll be rising and high in the sky at dawn. And Jupiter in the east-northeast about four hours after sunset, it'll be rising and high in the sky at dawn, and Jupiter in the southeast at dawn. We've also got This Week in Space History on November 2, 1917. Something happened very near where we are right now, which was first light of the Mount

Wilson 100-inch telescope. Oh, a great day for astronomy. It was indeed that led to some revolutions in astronomy. We also had on October 29, 1991, the Galileo spacecraft flew past the asteroid Gaspra and gave us some fabulous images of an asteroid. Another great day for astronomy. You know what? Now that I notice it, now that you're on the microphone, you do sound a little bit hoarse.

I think you should get some help with this. I should definitely get help in so many ways. But you're right. I'm going to need help with this broadcast because although I feel much better, I still am having a little bit of voice health problems. You might want to watch the microphone afterwards. I will. Okay.

So maybe can you help me, sir? Just picking someone randomly off the street here. Randomly out of the audience. Daddy? Yes? Is this actually the real time? Yeah, this is the real time. Okay.

Okay, ready? Random Space Facts! Well done. Who is the name of this handsome young stranger? The handsome young stranger is Daniel Joseph Beck, son of me. Okay. Random space fact. The atmospheric pressure you would experience on the surface of Venus is about 90 times the surface pressure on Earth.

This is about the same as 3,000 feet or about 1 kilometer beneath the Earth's ocean. He just said he's no stranger and he's not. It's true. You're not a stranger. I was only making a joke. That was part of our shtick. Yeah. Oh.

Never mind. All right. On to the trivia question. Last week we asked, who was the last person to fly alone in space before the recent launch of Yang Lui from China. How about this, Daniel? Do you know who was the last person to fly alone in space?

Ronald Evans. Ronald Evans. Very good, Daniel. That's excellent. And, you know, you would be the winner of the trivia contest this week, except that you didn't do it in e-mail. So you'll have to do it in e-mail next time, and then maybe you can be the winner. What if he does it in a British accent?

You can do it in a British accent. How would you do that in a British accent? Ronald Evans. It takes a good deal of thought. He has to get into character. What's his motivation? I don't want to do that right now. Okay, he doesn't want to do that. I don't blame you. All right, I'm sorry. But how do we do with our listeners? All right, I'm sorry. But how do we do with our listeners?

We have the smartest and most detail-minded bunch of listeners out there. It's really pretty amazing. We love you guys. Our winner was Mike McCormick. Mike McCormick of, I put it away, Livingston, New Jersey. Mike had four different answers depending on how we might have meant the question. For example, he said the last solo launch was a Vladimir Shatolov in Soyuz 4 back in 1969. Last solo landing, Boris Volnyov.

And the reason was that the first guy picked up people and the second guy dropped people off. And me, picked up people, and the second guy dropped people off. And then he also mentioned Georgy Berejikov. Can you tell I studied Russian in college? Georgy Berejikov. This guy named George. And he was in Soyuz 3 in 1968. He did the whole thing by himself. Which way did he go? But here's the one I think you were looking for, as you said.

himself. But here's the one I think you were looking for, as you said. As written, Ronald Evans, December 1972, from the time the Lunar Module Challenger undocked until the time it re-docked with Apollo 17, and that was the last time a guy

was sitting by himself in space. Exactly, and it's kind of an interesting little tidbit, because their three-person spacecraft Apollo going off to the moon, but then that one guy sat up and orbited the moon all alone. So, Bruce, we will have a prize, as always, going out in the mail to Mike McCormick. And what do you have for our trivia question for the upcoming week? Come in our new trivia contest, and that is, as of, pay attention here,

this is a timely question, as of October 23, 2003, how many moons is Uranus known to have? Note that some were just discovered, so you'll have to find some website or other location that provides the most current information. Huh, I wonder what website might provide the most current information on things like moons. Well, anyway, to enter our contest, go to planetary.org. And you can figure out, follow the links to Planetary Radio and find out how to enter our contest. And who knows what else you might learn there on the website.

And I want to add that a staff member here, Melanie, who is the official tracker of moons, she's getting moon fatigue because they just keep popping up. It's true. It's one of the most common questions. How many moons does such and such a planet have? But for the outer planets, there are an awful lot being discovered in recent months and years. Daniel, we are out of time.

Are you going to help us finish off here? Do you want to help us say goodbye? Okay. Okay. Lean right over to the microphone. We're all set. Okay. They should look up at the night sky, don't you think? What should they think about? I don't know.

Maybe Mars? Look up at the night sky and think about Mars. Thank you and good night. Maybe how Galileo crashed. That's a good one, too. Look up at the night sky and think about how Galileo crashed. Okay. That's a good one, too. Look in the night sky and think about how Galileo crashed. We'll give people that choice.

Maybe it even didn't. Maybe it just went past it. I heard it going. I heard on the microphone going, it went past something. Daniel? All right, what do you say goodnight, buddy? Oh, Matt's got some more for you. Thank you very much for helping us out today.

You're welcome. And that's it for What's Up on this edition of Planetary Radio with Bruce Betts and Daniel Betts. There will be lots more to hear on next week's Planetary Radio. I hope you'll join us. Have a great week.