NASA’s path to the future is ‘clear,’ panel says

Posted: June 22nd, 2011 ˑ Filed under: Events

NASA has a “clear path” to the future and times will be good again one day at Kennedy Space Center — even though the 30-year space shuttle program ends in July and the agency has not yet revealed the next big thing in manned space flight.

That was the unanimous opinion of a panel that included U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Florida, KSC Director Robert Cabana and others who gathered this morning to discuss what lies “beyond the shuttle.” They spoke in the first of a series of public forums on Florida’s future sponsored by the Orlando Sentinel and the University of Central Florida.

“There is a perception that we do not have a clear path,” Nelson said. “The fact is… there is a clear path forward.”

The path he described, laid out in the NASA authorization bill he cosponsored last fall, involves:

•Expectations that the fledgling commercial space flight program will blossom, largely at KSC, leading to cargo hauls to the International Space Station as early as late this year, and privately-launched manned space flights as early as 2014;

•The evolution of KSC as more of a multi-use space port, supporting NASA and private launches of various kinds;

•The development of a still-unannounced, still-unfunded heavy-lift rocket program to take astronauts to still-undetermined places beyond Earth’s orbit. NASA is expected to announce a decision on a rocket design next week;

•And increasing space and aeronautics research and development activity and space vehicle construction at Cape Canaveral.