posted 04-07-2006 10:06 PM
He’s the Generalissimo and President for Life of all space geeks. Normally his Encyclopedia Astronautica is rich source of space obscuranta, especially about Soviet programs. But he recently took hyperbolic aim at NASA's CEV design with the question, "Will this misbegotten decision mean the end of American human spaceflight?"
He's convinced of the superiority of the Russians' Soyuz design concept of a small crew reentry vehicle attached to a disposable equipment-and-living module for in-space use. He suggests the Soviets lifted the idea from an early GE design for Apollo, and is seriously taken with this arrangement's volumetric efficiency (maxmized internal space relative to the exterior surface area). He also touts the slightly greater manueverability a Soyuz-esque acorn-shaped crew module provides during reentry.He thinks NASA blew it -- then and now. He says: "The selection of an Apollo-type configuration for the re-entry vehicle represented a step back 60 years. The original Apollo design, a NASA in-house concept, was inferior to contractor alternatives. The Soviets selected the Soyuz configuration (identical to the losing General Electric Apollo design) and had a configuration still in production 50 years later … In 2005, Northrop-Grumman again proposed a Soyuz-type design ... Incredibly, NASA made the same mistake again, 50 years later." (Yeah, but 50 years later no Soyuz spacecraft has yet been to the moon. And oh for the joys of three people crammed into a technically limited Soyuz really suitable for just two.)
But Mike Griffin insists that the realities of physics drove the CEV design. He says the NASA guys a half century ago did their homework -- and were right. In the absence of indisputably better alternatives, is deviation from their validated, hard-earned discoveries really a better approach? NASA wants a reusable CEV crew module good for up to 10 flights. (We’ll see about that.) So what if the crew occupies a single module … a bigger habitat afforded by a Soyuz-type design would be nice, but what's the utility of an expensive, throwaway mission module that'd only provide some unessential extra room to and from the moon? A smaller reentry module would also mean less surface area to be heat-shielded, but this, too, is a marginal improvement; it's not like the risks of protecting a behemoth the size of the shuttle orbiter would be incurred.
He also knocks NASA for both failing to adopt a winged configuration for horizontal landings AND for not selecting a direct, single-craft lunar landing approach -- contradictory if not mutually exclusive criticisms. (Landing a winged craft directly on the lunar surface? No weight/fuel/design inefficiency issues there. A mission module sitting atop a reentry module? Now there's an optimum configuration for a lunar lander.) Still, he wants it both ways. It seemed like once he got going with scattershot criticisms, he couldn't contain himself.
Normally I’m a great admirer. But not this time. So, have I alienated any Mark Wade fans? Or does anyone even know who he is. Or care.
posted 04-07-2006 10:06 PM
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