Jeff Foust Profile picture
Mar 23 10 tweets 1 min read
NASA Administrator Bill Nelson: I promised competition for lunar landers to Congress, and here it is.
Nelson: express support from Congress and Biden administration on this effort, will get it into FY23 budget (due out next week.)
Both Nelson and HLS manager Lisa Watson-Morgan say SpaceX’s work on HLS is going well. New strategy “bolsters industry readiness” for future services contracts.
Watson-Morgan: draft RFP later this month and industry day in first week of April. Final RFP will be out later in the spring.
Nelson declines to give budget details about the new program, noting the budget proposal’s release early next week.
Watson-Morgan: HLS will be the overarching program with multiple “swim lanes”: ongoing SpaceX Option A work, new Option B work for SpaceX for sustaining lander capabilities, and the Sustaining Lunar Development award to a second company.
Switching gears, Nelson says professional relationship between NASA and Roscosmos on ISS continues “unaltered” including Mark Vande Hei’s return on a Soyuz late this month.
Watson-Morgan: if everything goes as planned, make Sustaining Lunar Development award as soon as possible after the beginning of the new year.
Nelson doesn’t answer a question about whether he was concerned about potential delays in the Artemis 3 schedule raised by the NASA OIG and GAO; reiterates a 2025 date for Artemis 3.
End of the press conference. After some confusion about contract details (SpaceX’s new Option B includes only a crewed demo mission, not uncrewed and crewed as stated earlier) everything is as clear as regolith.

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More from @jeff_foust

Mar 22
Time for the annual Satellite launch panel, with ULA, Rocket Lab, Arianespace, Blue Origin, and SpaceX. #SATShow
Stéphane Israël, Arianespace: 2022 will be very different from what it was supposed to be for us with Soyuz launches on hold. Working closely with our customers. #SATShow
Jarrett Jones, Blue Origin: we’ve grown by more than 1,000 people in the last year, opening new offices.

On New Glenn: “well into qualification” of the vehicle with ongoing tests. (No mention of a 1st launch date.) #SATShow
Read 12 tweets
Mar 22
Former NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine, giving the opening keynote this morning at Satellite 2022, says the issue he always hears about in meetings is space debris. The regulatory environment, he says, is lacking; not singling out any one company. #SATShow
Bridenstine recalls the long path to transfer civil space traffic management authority to Commerce. Now, he says, Congress needs to step up and fund that STM activity at Commerce. #SATShow
Bridenstine: we have made a huge investment in the ISS, and it is important for us as a nation to continue ISS operations to 2030. #SATShow
Read 4 tweets
Mar 21
Arabsat VP Hadi Alhassani: LEO operators are selling the sun, moon and stars, and label GEO operators as dinosaurs. We are not. Our best way to compete is through GEO satellites with flexible payloads. #SATShow
Astranis CFO Mike Mancini: with small GEOs we can innovate at a faster pace. Doesn’t make sense to have 15-yr assets anymore. #SATShow
Intelsat’s Bruno Fromont: no debate from a cost-per-bit perspective: no better economics than GEO, period. But LEO systems could be a nice complement to GEO. #SATShow
Read 7 tweets
Mar 21
In a smallsat constellation panel, SpaceX’s Jonathan Hofeller says the company is building “close to 8” Starlink satellites a day at its Redmond, Wash., facility. Vertical integration has cut the cost of its user terminal by 2/3rds from the original version. #SATShow
He reiterates past comments that SpaceX has talked with GEO operators about offering Starlink satellites for a hybrid network but haven’t found an approach that works.
Telecast’s Erwin Hudson: been hit by the same supply chain issues others have felt. Now expect first launch of LEO sats in 2025 and beginning service in 2026. #SATShow
Read 10 tweets
Mar 1
Everything go for the Atlas 5 launch of GOES-T at 4:38 pm EST. NASA TV coverage:
Go to proceed into the terminal count for launch.
Liftoff of the Atlas 5 carrying GOES-T.
Read 7 tweets
Mar 1
NASA Admin. Bill Nelson at start of the NAC meeting: despite the challenges here on Earth, committed to the 7 astronauts and cosmonauts on ISS. Continuing working relationship with international partners.
Nelson is giving us the highlights of the last year for the committee: Perseverance/Ingenuity, DART, Lucy and JWST.
Nelson promises three NAC meetings this year. The last NAC meeting before this was in late 2019, when Nelson himself was one of the council’s newest members.
Read 7 tweets

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