NASA imposes new rules for any private launches to ISS
NASA has added several new rules for any private launches to ISS, now requiring that each flight include at least one experienced former NASA astronaut.
From the actual procurement notice:
NASA is also in the process of finalizing details associated with a new requirement that upcoming private astronaut missions include a former flown NASA (U.S.) government astronaut as the mission commander. A former NASA astronaut provides experienced guidance for the private astronauts during pre-flight preparation through mission execution. Based on their past on-orbit and NASA experience, the PAM commander provides a link between the resident ISS expedition crew and the private astronauts and reduces risk to ISS operations and PAM/ISS safety. Specific details of the requirement will be documented in future solicitations, as well as in updated documentation and in the solicitation technical library.
The new rules also require the companies to submit their research plans twelve months before launch, as well as reserve a longer time for the private passengers to adapt to weightlessness on the station before initiating that work.
The changes appear to make sense, based on the experience of the first passenger flight of Axiom sent up to ISS earlier this year. However, their existence will likely encourage the arrival of the private space stations in order to break free from NASA’s rules.
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NASA has added several new rules for any private launches to ISS, now requiring that each flight include at least one experienced former NASA astronaut.
From the actual procurement notice:
NASA is also in the process of finalizing details associated with a new requirement that upcoming private astronaut missions include a former flown NASA (U.S.) government astronaut as the mission commander. A former NASA astronaut provides experienced guidance for the private astronauts during pre-flight preparation through mission execution. Based on their past on-orbit and NASA experience, the PAM commander provides a link between the resident ISS expedition crew and the private astronauts and reduces risk to ISS operations and PAM/ISS safety. Specific details of the requirement will be documented in future solicitations, as well as in updated documentation and in the solicitation technical library.
The new rules also require the companies to submit their research plans twelve months before launch, as well as reserve a longer time for the private passengers to adapt to weightlessness on the station before initiating that work.
The changes appear to make sense, based on the experience of the first passenger flight of Axiom sent up to ISS earlier this year. However, their existence will likely encourage the arrival of the private space stations in order to break free from NASA’s rules.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
So are the PAM comanders paid by the .gov or by the private company? They aren’t paying customers but are required personnel now and from what I understand active nasa astronauts. Does nasa pay for the seat?
Sounds like The NASA Astronaut Guaranteed Retirement Income Act.
They just remember the kids on Shatner’s flight showing out and think it wise to have an RA.
I’m beginning to trust NASA just as much as I trust the rest of the US federal government. Which is to say not at all.
“How to Usurp Control of Private Enterprises with a Camel Nose”
LTC Ted – I had thought the same thing – in Russia, he was known as the commissar or zampolit
When can we have a Shuttlecraft?
From the article:
Neither of these (non)experiences indicates to me that it need be a NASA astronaut rather than hire someone who had been there before (previous passenger, cosmonaut, astronaut from another county).
Thus, NASA remains a gatekeeper for what science and what manufacturing is done on ISS. We may have to wait a long time before We the People start directly benefiting from space manufacturing.
I had been unaware that Axiom’s NASA astronaut had other duties. I thought that the entire reason for the experienced NASA astronaut was to ensure that the private experimenters/tourists did not put a burden on the NASA and Russian crews. These reactions may merely be due to poor mission planning rather than actual problems, they may be able to be solved by other means. It looks to me like NASA is imposing controls where freedom and independence may be better.
I cannot wait for the independent commercial space stations.
From the Requirements Update notice:
What horrible thing did the Axiom crew do, that previous tourists didn’t do, that warrants this?
“What horrible thing did the Axiom crew do, that previous tourists didn’t do, that warrants this?”
They left the seat up on the space toilet!
Egads, the thoughtless monsters!
pawn answered: “They left the seat up on the space toilet!”
I hate when that happens.