I hadn’t realized that after fifteen years, NASA has spent almost seventeen billion on Orion. Lockmart has been making out like a bandit.
[Update a few minutes later]
Bob Zimmerman is appropriately outraged.
Both of these programs are nothing but corrupt corporate welfare for Boeing and Lockmart, with kickbacks to congressional campaigns.
I used to work on the floor where Lockheed Martin’s proposal for Orion was put together. I haven’t worked at Lockheed Martin in 13 years. To be fair to LM; what won is not what LM wanted to propose. But just prior to submission; Mike Griffin came out about how the next vehicle would be a capsule (which Boeing was planning, but LM was planning a lifting body). LM came up with a new design and won. Then for the next 6 months, LM managers and NASA managers met at nearby (to JSC) University of Houston Clear Lake to redesign LM’s proposal to what NASA really wanted. It was my own first hand look at the piss poor government acquisition program we have.
LM is making out like a bandit, but they are just getaway driver. The guys holding the gun are the NASA bureaucrats that have cashing their paychecks for decades without consequential oversight. And its not just NASA, just look at how many made money in the DOJ while investigating the Russian Hoax.
” look at how many made money in the DOJ while investigating the Russian Hoax”
Admiral Rodgers stopped contractors from having access to certain national security databases. Would it be surprising that politically connected contractors were acting as a shadow intelligence agency for the DNC under the cover of being CIA affiliated spies? Steele wasn’t the only one.
Thanks for that invaluable peek behind the scenes.
Can you share any insights about the NASA change from wanting a 5.5 meter diameter capsule to a 5 meter diameter?
And why did NASA stick with a gigantic 5 meter capsule, after the cancellation of Project Constellation? Why and when was Orion abandoned for use as an ISS lifeboat? (policy during the Obama years seems particularly opaque)
The preferred option during the Lori Garver/Obama years was to execute the COTS D option to human rate Commercial Cargo. Congress and Shelby said no way.
Yes, but they did finally relent and allow Commercial Crew. Fortunately.
One thing I would like to see is that for years Mike Griffin has said that Ares I with Orion would be much safer than Atlas V(which Starliner uses) for crew. This was back before SpaceX was seen as a possible crew launch system(although many SpaceX-ers would say even back then they should have been seen as one). Notwithstanding the recent issues with Starliner I have been searching all around but can’t seem to find anything in writing justifying Griffin’s view than Ares I plus Orion was/is much “safer” than the Atlas V.
Oh, that’s an easy one. The reason you can’t find anything is because there is nothing to justify “safe, simple, soon.” It was utter BS. And Mike knew it. He had testified earlier that there was nothing he would do to make EELVs “safer” for flying astronauts, because they were already approved for billion-dollar national-security satellites.
That one’s easy. So it could only be launched on SLS.
“Since NASA awarded its first contract on Orion in August 2006, the report says NASA has spent $16.7 billion for development of Orion, or about $1.1 billion annually.”
A billion isn’t even a drop in the bucket of federal spending. It is more like a grain of sand in the Sahara. No one would care if they actually produced a usable product. How bad is it in sectors the government actually spends money on?
“We calculate that, at a minimum, NASA paid at least $27.8 million in excess award fees to Lockheed”
That doesn’t show a problem with cost plus contracts, the plus part anyway.
That a few billion isn’t much in the grand scheme of federal spending isn’t the point, at least for me. What is the point is twofold: 1 – we still don’t have a working vehicle after spending all that money (and time) 2 – SpaceX Crew Dragon proves that the amount spent on Orion is at least an order of magnitude too much
I’ll bet Ted Cruz still loves Orion.
I am sure he does. I got beat up on Zimmerman’s blog for blaming Cruz for Orion by what I think was a strong Cruz supporter.