rcpilz@ablnc.ATT.COM (Robert C. Pilz) (01/28/89)
Why is there all this jabber about NASA this and NASA that? Blaming and expecting everything from NASA? According to U.S. Representative Bill Nelson (I forget which Shuttle flight he was on.) from Melbourne FL (just South of the Cape), "We can now say that the U.S. commercial space launching industry is on a roll" What he meant by that is that the big 3 (McDonnell Douglas Corp., General Dynamics Corp., and (Orlando's) Martin Marietta have increased the number of commercial payload contracts from 2 in 1987 to the current number of 26. (11 of these are for foreign companies). The commercial space industry is alive and well. What the 1988 act did is set up guidelines for prices at Cape Canaveral launch pads, make the government a co-insurer of the flights, and protect the companies from arbitrary changes in launch dates. Let's let free enterprise bring space into the next century and stop knocking/depending on NASA! R. C. Pilz AT&T IMS Orlando FL
alastair@geovision.uucp (Alastair Mayer) (01/31/89)
In article <672@ablnc.ATT.COM> rcpilz@ablnc.ATT.COM (Robert C. Pilz) writes: [...] >What he meant by that is that the big 3 (McDonnell Douglas Corp., >General Dynamics Corp., and (Orlando's) Martin Marietta have increased ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ >the number of commercial payload contracts from 2 in 1987 to the Actually, Martin-Marietta Orlando is involved with electronics/control systems (I think). The (Titan) launchers are made in Denver. (Martin also makes the Shuttle ETs, at Michoud). -- "The problem is not that spaceflight is expensive, | Alastair J.W. Mayer therefore only the government can do it, but that | alastair@geovision.UUCP only the government is doing spaceflight, therefore | al@BIX it is expensive." |
henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) (02/09/89)
In article <672@ablnc.ATT.COM> rcpilz@ablnc.ATT.COM (Robert C. Pilz) writes: >Why is there all this jabber about NASA this and NASA that? Blaming >and expecting everything from NASA? >... the big 3 (McDonnell Douglas Corp., >General Dynamics Corp., and (Orlando's) Martin Marietta have increased >the number of commercial payload contracts from 2 in 1987 to the >current number of 26. (11 of these are for foreign companies). "Companies"? Try "countries". Last I heard, the US "commercial" launch industry had NOT ONE firm commitment from any purely commercial customer. US or foreign. The honestly commercial customers are all on Ariane. If there's been any change to that, it's recent. >The commercial space industry is alive and well... Ha ha. Ho ho. The commercial-launches-as-a-sideline-on-government- launches industry, you mean. Look at how many pseudo-commercial launches McD-D, GD, and MM have signed up to do, and then compare it to the volume of government business. None of the "big three" is part of the "commercial space industry" in any accurate sense; they all get their bread and butter from sole-source US government contracts, with vaguely-competitive "commercial" business supplying a bit of jam now and then. The real commercial space industry is still struggling for existence; if it makes it, it may wipe the Bloated Three off the map. >... What the 1988 >act did is set up guidelines for prices at Cape Canaveral launch pads, >make the government a co-insurer of the flights, and protect the >companies from arbitrary changes in launch dates. All of which is precisely as reliable as all those shuttle launch contracts that NASA signed and then repudiated without compensation. >Let's let free enterprise bring space into the next century and >stop knocking/depending on NASA! Actually, I agree, but let us not confuse government contracts with free enterprise. -- Allegedly heard aboard Mir: "A | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology toast to comrade Van Allen!!" | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu