Why Space Still Inspires

“We choose to go to the moon not because it is easy, but because it is hard” 

“By the end of this decade we will land Americans on the moon and return them safely”

– John F. Kennedy

Why does space still inspire Apollo 11 through Starship

December 19, 2023

Image Credit Viera.com

July 16, 1969: America is captivated by the Apollo 11 launch and people flock to what will become pad 39A on the space coast to watch the United States attempt a feat that had never before been accomplished. Every American either listened to the mission on the radio, watched on television, or even lay in their backyard looking up at the heavens knowing there were three humans somewhere up there and dreaming of what that might be like and what they were seeing. Then follow along with the mission from “one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” to splashdown in the Pacific. At the Apollo 11 Launch on a Saturn V 

Spaceflight since the dawn of the Apollo era has inspired not only Americans but humans from around the globe to believe that the impossible can be possible. Crowds streamed to Florida in the 1960s and still stream to Cape Canaveral, Kennedy Space Center, and the space coast to feel the rumble of rockets and believe that somehow things unimaginable are possible In the first year of operation in 1966 Kennedy Space Center had 475,000 visitors and in 2021 there were 966,000 visitors to Kennedy Space center creating a 5.22 B dollars in added economic output to Brevard County and the space coast. 

Photo Credit NASA 

The engineers in the Apollo program had children who would look up to their fathers, mothers, cousins, aunts, and uncles and dream about what the next phase of spaceflight could be. The children of these engineers in the 1960s and 70s became the students at Emory Riddle, Purdue, Florida Technical which became the University of Central Florida who are developing the systems that will power the next generation of spacecraft. 

As it became clear that the Apollo program was coming to an end in the mid-1970s the focus of NASA became what would be the focus of the next spacecraft that would make things that seemed to be impossible, possible. In 1973 a Saturn 1B Skylab was launched to start the low earth orbit focus, the technology developed during the Apollo moon focus had a legacy that led to skylab and through international partnerships with the Apollo-Soyuz Project is epitomized by Leonid Brezhnev’s letter of July 25, 1975, noted that “the flight of the Soyuz and Apollo Spaceships” was a “symbol of the current process of easing of international tension and improvement of Soviet-U. S. relations based on. . . . peaceful coexistence.” This inspired a world in which two superpowers could cooperate in space even though the geopolitical events on Earth might lead to tension between the two superpowers of the day. It is incredibly important and inspiring to people to see that no matter what was happening on that pale blue dot at home in space those disagreements are not going to affect how exploration must go on. Apollo 8 and the Earthrise photo showed the world the scale of space and how small we are in comparison to the rest of our solar system and celestial bodies. This not only inspires us to reach for the stars, but to understand the stars. 

Photo Credit NASA 

As the focus turns to LEO, NASA must find a rapidly reusable and able to carry large masses to orbit. What would become the space shuttle began to be developed in the late 1970s and in 1981 after much development the first test flight was scheduled, the uniqueness of STS 1 is that it is the first and only time an American space company has put humans on the first flight of any vehicle. The danger in this was great and the results of this flight were in doubt from time to time throughout the flight. With tiles coming off and a myriad of other potential flaws the outcome of this flight was never in doubt, but also space is hard and it is never risk-free. Every risk is calculated and given the inability of the shuttle to fly autonomously the choice of Commander John Young and Pilot Robert Crippen were both test pilots and were the correct choice to fly the first of this new and transformative space vehicle. The crowds gathered to watch a new heavy lift vehicle and be awed once again by the rumble from the space coast that had not been heard in years, once again inspiring generations of engineers. 

Photo Credit express.co.uk. 

While space travel has become quite routine, it is not without risk. Over the many missions of the space shuttle, Americans remember to this day where they were when two different disasters struck the American Space program. Challenger STS 51L and Columbia STS 107. The Challenger disaster was caused by a faulty O Ring in one of the solid rocket boosters and all were lost when the orbiter was destroyed. As President Ronald Reagan said “Nineteen years ago, almost to the day, we lost three astronauts in a terrible accident on the ground. But we’ve never lost an astronaut in flight; we’ve never had a tragedy like this. And perhaps we’ve forgotten the courage it took for the crew of the shuttle; but they, the Challenger Seven, were aware of the dangers, but overcame them and did their jobs brilliantly. We mourn seven heroes: Michael Smith, Dick Scobee, Judith Resnik, Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, Gregory Jarvis, and Christa McAuliffe. We mourn their loss as a nation together….. The crew of the space shuttle Challenger honored us by the manner in which they lived their lives. We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and “slipped the surly bonds of earth” to “touch the face of God.” Just like the Apollo 1 disaster, the nation mourns the crew of Challenger, and then the investigation begins and just like the Apollo 1 disaster there were mistakes made that could have been fixed. The push to have a launch cadence led to launching on one of the coldest launches from Kennedy Space Center with icicles hanging off the ground support equipment on the morning of the launch. When the return to flight eventually happens with Discovery crowds once again descend on Kennedy Space Center to see American space power rise once again. 

Image Credit NASA

Image Credit : AP File, David Weaver

On January 16, 2003, STS 107 with orbiter Columbia lifted off from famed pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center on a 16-day mission to conduct experiments in microgravity and would not dock with the ISS, which will come to be a possibly important detail as this flight comes to its conclusion. They conducted over 80 experiments over the length of their mission. As NASA looks at launch they notice a piece of foam falls off the external fuel tank and hits the leading edge of Columbia’s wing. Once the crew of Columbia had completed its mission they were on their way back to the Shuttle landing facility at Kennedy Space Center without knowing there was a massive hole in their wing that on reentry will cause a catastrophe over Texas during re-entry. As President George W. Bush said “My fellow Americans, this day has brought terrible news and great sadness to our country. At 9:00 a.m. this morning, Mission Control in Houston lost contact with our Space Shuttle Columbia. A short time later, debris was seen falling from the skies above Texas. The Columbia is lost; there are no survivors. On board was a crew of seven: Colonel Rick Husband; Lt. Colonel Michael Anderson; Commander Laurel Clark; Captain David Brown; Commander William McCool; Dr. Kalpana Chawla; and Ilan Ramon, a Colonel in the Israeli Air Force. These men and women assumed great risk in the service to all humanity.

In an age when space flight has come to seem almost routine, it is easy to overlook the dangers of travel by rocket, and the difficulties of navigating the fierce outer atmosphere of the Earth. These astronauts knew the dangers, and they faced them willingly, knowing they had a high and noble purpose in life. Because of their courage and daring and idealism, we will miss them all the more.” 

Photo Credit NASA

In the investigation that followed there was an audible gasp when they shot a piece of foam at the wing of an orbiter and showed the size of the hole that was in Columbia’s wing, as NASA began to think about the future of the Space Shuttle program and the three orbiters that remain, Atlantis, Discovery and Endeavor. One option is to build another shuttle and another option is to work towards a new and improved space travel system. One concern was that the only way to get to the ISS from American soil was the space shuttle and it was the only heavy lift vehicle that could finish building the International Space Station. President Barack Obama in 2010 stated the goals of the American Space program would phase out the Space Shuttle program and transition to private companies “This includes technologies like more efficient life support systems that will help reduce the cost of future missions. And in order to reach the space station, we will work with a growing array of private companies competing to make getting to space easier and more affordable” “In addition, as part of this effort, we will build on the good work already done on the Orion crew capsule. I’ve directed Charlie Bolden to immediately begin developing a rescue vehicle using this technology, so we are not forced to rely on foreign providers if it becomes necessary to quickly bring our people home from the International Space Station. This Orion effort will be part of the technological foundation for advanced spacecraft to be used in future deep space missions. In fact, Orion will be readied for flight right here in this room.” 

As the shuttle program came to an end those who had never seen a shuttle launch would make sure they made it to Titusville and the crowds were massive especially for STS 135 as the crew of Atlantis made its way to the pad on July 8, 2011, the crew of four will complete the final flight of Atlantis as mission control states on liftoff. “LIftoff, liftoff of Atlantis, on the shoulders of the space shuttle America will continue the dream… the space shuttle spreads its wings for one final time on its sentimental journey into history” The crew successfully docked with the ISS and conducted experiments and prepared the space station for the next stage of vehicles. One of the most interesting parts of STS 135 was an American flag the crew left as a capture the flag goal, first private American company to successfully launch a crew to the space station will claim the flag. As it lands on “having secured the imagination of a generation, a ship like no other its place in history secured, the space shuttle pulls into port one last time, its voyage at an end”. The space shuttle program inspired many people to want to be interested in space, including the author of this article. The engineers, astronauts, and members of the legacy and new media can point to a place in the shuttle program that furthered their interest in space exploration. 

The link between the commercial crew program and the shuttle program is the Pilot and Commander of STS 135, Doug Hurley and Chris Ferguson as these two were slated to be the first to fly on SpaceX and Boeing’s crew capsules. NASA and Congress allocated money for companies to develop first resupply missions and then to develop crew-capable missions. The first awards to companies such as SpaceX, United Launch Alliance, Sierra Space, and Boeing, Northrop Grumman amounted to nearly fifty million dollars, and through subsequent awards there have been primarily two cargo companies: SpaceX with their Cargo Dragon capsule and Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus that launches on either an Atlas V, Antares or Falcon 9 rocket. The development of these cargo crafts was instrumental in keeping the ISS supplied without relying on the Russian Soyuz cargo as the only option. The natural extension especially for SpaceX is to develop a crew capsule based on these cargo variants. The companies vying for the commercial Crew monies are SpaceX, Boeing, and Sierra Space. These companies were developing their crew crafts one company seemed to have the ability to move quicker than others and that would be SpaceX they were able to launch an uncrewed Dragon capsule in March of 2019 and in May 2020 a crewed test with Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken to the ISS for a mission to test all of the systems and safely return to earth under a parachute. As successful as SpaceX has been, it is incredibly important to have redundancy and not have to rely on Soyuz in case of an emergency or a failure of some kind with the Dragon capsule. Boeing has developed Starliner and has flown twice once in late 2019 when there was a software issue that made it enter the wrong orbit and therefore could not dock with the ISS, and again in 2022 and successfully docked with the ISS, but there were bugs throughout the flight that will delay the first crewed test of Starliner to second or third quarter of 2024. Sierra Space is also developing a space plane that will land at the Shuttle landing facility and they plan to launch sometime in 2024 with their uncrewed test flight. While SpaceX has flown nine missions demonstrating their crew capsule capabilities and two private crew missions with Axiom space, other companies need to have the capabilities for redundancy and to make sure NASA is not dependent on world geopolitical events for transportation to and from the ISS. 

Image Credit: Space.com, Boeing Illustration

Image Credit: Sierra Nevada Corporation

The goal of NASA is to go back to the moon and beyond, to do that there will be more than just the SLS rocket and Orion capsule, there must be private landers that are being developed and there entered a new company on the scene, Blue Origin, that is developing a heavy lift rocket, the New Glenn, and has won a contract along with SpaceX to develop lunar landers. While Blue Origin is going for more of an Apollo-style lander, SpaceX is using Starship as a lunar lander which is a colossal undertaking but will be necessary to achieve the goals of NASA to have a sustainable and permanent presence on the moon. So far these Human Landing Systems have been appropriated money, but only one of the two has flown on test flights. SpaceX has flown their Starship and Superheavy booster twice, learning valuable lessons on the first test flight on April 20, 2023, and a far more successful test flight on November 18, 2023. The challenging thing about Starship is that it will require on-orbit refueling to reach the moon, which they want to demonstrate on the next flight hopefully in early 2024. Blue Origin on the other hand has a tower built and we have seen portions of the rocket tank sections and a mock-up of the lander. Blue Origin is currently targeting August 2024 for the first launch of New Glenn. It will be amazing to see what these companies can do!

Image Credit SpaceX and Blue Origin

Inspiration can be described in more than one way, Webster defines it as the process of being mentally stimulated to do or feel something, especially to do something creative: People flock to the launch sites around the country and will quit their jobs and move without a plan for a job just to sit and look at rockets. They will fly from overseas to watch a launch to desire to see something bigger than themselves and to see explorers fly to other celestial bodies inspired in July of 1969 and will still inspire today. As we live in the second golden age of American Space exploration make sure to share this with the next generation as they will be the Mars generation and they will stand on the shoulders of the Mercury, Apollo, and Shuttle generations to achieve what many have thought to be impossible.

Photo Credit SpaceX