International Space Development Conference 2009: Standing on the Brink: Commercial Spaceflight Provides Hope for Future of Space Exploration

The following article is published in Ad Astra Volume 21 Number 3 in the summer of 2009.

International Space Development Conference 2009: Standing on the Brink: Hope Springs Eternal for Future of the Space Industry

By Ian Murphy

The National Space Society’s 2009 International Space Development Conferencetook place at the beautiful Omni Resort at ChampionsGate in sunny Orlando, Florida from Thursday May 27^th to Sunday May 31^st.From the long list of famed and honored guests and speakers to the Friday night fireworks, the resort setting, and the open access to thought leaders and industry heads, the conference was an immense success.

The 2009 ISDC kicked off with an exclusive pre-event, the 6th Space Investment Summit (SIS), which brought together the emerging privately funded space industry with the established world of finance in order to exchange goals, ideas and advice. Investors and established aerospace firms were presented with business plans from some of the most exciting new companies in space-related business, while expert panels discussed important issues like exit strategies for aerospace startups, as well as early and mid-stage financing.

On Thursday, entrepreneurial and commercial space enterprises and enthusiasts met to discuss the current privately funded efforts to decrease the cost of access to space.  The underlying spirit of freedom of thought, innovation, and human creativity at ISDC has always been reflected in the conference’s attention to commercial space entrepreneurs.  In the end, getting to space as cheaply as possibly through NASA, personal and commercial space, and entrepreneurial space programs and establishing a permanent human presence is inextricably linked to keeping the space industry going as a whole. Years ago, ISDC discussions were centered on what the future may hold. Now, the presentations are filled with video and images of working and completed hardware, engine firings, and test flights.  The future we have looked forward to has finally arrived.

George Nield, Associate Administrator for the FAA office of Commercial Space Transportation (AST) was the first speaker of the event.  His speech was laden with big picture positively and philosophical outlook on the state of the industry in light of all the recent controversy and absence of a clear direction.  Confident in the industry’s progression to date, Nield started off saying that with respect to the achievements of NASA “commercial space achievements will the way and wave of the future.”

His entire speech seemed to be aimed at combating the “sullen weight that has settled on the American Space Program.” He reference the “unusually pessimistic tone” symbolic of conversations centered around the retirement of the Shuttle, the supposed plateau of progress in the commercial space arena, the frustration over ITAR and the relative success of international aerospace ventures.  He wondered aloud “Have we lost our edge?”

He encouraged the audience to point out to the unconvinced to “not confuse the occasional bad day for the end of days,” for these people suffer from what he referenced as the Eeyor Effect. We must maintain, “Humans are possessed with an infinite plasticity” to accomplish the difficult and “private spaceflight is a humanitarian imperative.”

He joked that the arbitrary deadlines placed upon the industry by the general public and media must have been created on “National Wishful Thinking Day” pointing out that Sir Richard Branson, when asked about how many tests it will take to get to his first passenger flight, responded, “We will do more tests that NASA has flown missions.”

The moral of the FAA AST leader’s speech “The pace is being set by safety.”

At the forefront of this emerging commercial space sector are several organizations using distinct and unique approaches. These entrepreneurial efforts provided a glimpse of their vision of the space industry, why they chose to build their respective vehicles, and why humanity should strive to travel to space.

President and Founder of XCOR Aerospace Jeff Greason began the first of these presentations by taking a step back and looking at the big picture.  He asked his audience rhetorically: “Why do we have NASA?”  His response pointed to the NASA Space Act of 1958, which essentially noted the expansion of human knowledge, the improvement of technology associated with aeronautics, the development of space vehicles, the scientific benefits gained from space travel, and the preservation of the United States as a leader in aeronautics, space science, and technology.

Historically, the expansion of human knowledge has always been accompanied by the productive utilization by the populace of this newly discovered knowledge.  The example used is that Lewis and Clark did not just bring back regional maps and pictures of plants in the same way Apollo astronauts did not simply return with Moon rocks.  Instead, they brought back a pathway that other people can use to capitalize what they found.

Greason mentioned that NASA and the private sector are “two halves of a common goal.”  If NASA doesn’t allow the private sector to follow behind it than what’s the point?  Conversely, if the private sector can’t keep up behind NASA than what’s the point?

Greason has now focused his effort on his LINX suborbital spacecraft.  The LINX has a staggered side-by-side cockpit seating and room for a pilot and passenger similar to an F-111 aircraft. Greason explains that the market is far larger than expected so he wanted to build a vehicle that could fly many times per day or as he puts it, “Gas & Go,” likening his business model to Southwest Airlines so he can “keep the wheels in the wheel well.”

After Greason wowed attendees with the technical aspects of designing a spaceship, Virgin Galactic President Will Whitehorn took the ISDC stage to walk the audience through Virgin’s business-like approach towards suborbital flight, focusing on the marketing, branding, and an unparalleled in-flight consumer experience.

Whitehorn prefaced his speech on the future of spaceflight systems by saying that it is Virgin’s belief that over the next ten years, the commercial spaceflight systems industry could mirror the growth of the satellite communications industry or even the internet and mobile phone industries; a possible $10 trillion investment.

Whitehorn began with a stunning opening film that featured SpaceShipOne’s (SS1) previous flights to suborbital space, hanger shots of the massive carrier ship Eve, top level CG graphics of the proposed interior of SpaceShipTwo (SS2), interviews with Brian Binnie, two time pilot of SS1, talking about the “instant karma of weightlessness,” and conceptual drawings of New Mexico’s Spaceport America.

Virgin Galactic has clear and sizable advantages over any other program in existence today.  They have already demonstrated proof of concept with SS1, built real flight hardware currently undergoing flight and engine tests, received deposits from a significant number of potential customers, are very well funded, and posses an international renowned brand.

Virgin Galactic plans to use Eve to fulfill many industrial purposes in addition to space tourism.  Eve can be used as a ferry aircraft or a high altitude launcher for military or civilian manned flight.  Eve is even capable of parabolic zero gravity or high gravity centrifugal flight used in training and science missions.  Virgin has dubbed Eve “the LINUX software of space for its open architecture.”  In early June of this year, Eve successfully completed its seventh test, successfully flying at 45,000 feet for more than 6.1 hours.  Before the end of 2009, Virgin Galactic plans to conduct a glide test of SpaceShipTwo for the first time.

Whitehorn concluded his performance at ISDC with a bang by giving attendees an exclusive look at the newest footage from the SS2/Eve development program.  The footage of Rocket Motor Two completing its first round of hot fires is now available on YouTube.

Elon Musk, Founder of Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) was the featured luncheon keynote speaker and in addition to receiving the prestigious Werner Von Braun Award, discussed, in detail, the upcoming launch.  At the time this went to print, the SpaceX Falcon 1 had already carried the RazakSAT satellite to orbit in mid July.  SpaceX has an aggressive schedule of launches planned for their customers over the next 12 months and also plans to have the Falcon 9 ready for testing soon at it’s launch site in Florida.

Friday was devoted to NASA programs and outreach and was kicked off by a special welcome message from the Lt. Governor of Florida Jeff Kottkamp, who reminded attendees that the State of Florida is and will always be a strong supporter and proud home to the space industry.  They have backed this up with a considerable investment in a vast space based infrastructure and significant support of human capital.  Kottkamp urged both the public and private sectors to continue to look to Florida for their launch and operations headquarters and reminded them that it should also be a featured location for their research and development of new technologies.

Former NSS Executive Director George Whitesides, who was recently named Chief of Staff at NASA, was the first keynote speaker of the day and focused his talk on how NASA will take on a more progressive approach to outreach by engaging the general public and implementing ‘new media’ and social networking.  He explained that NASA must rapidly adjust to new environments becoming more in touch with the American public and becoming a more efficient organization.

At the core of NASA’s future space exploration is a return to the Moon, where we will build a sustainable long-term human presence. As the space shuttle approaches retirement and the International Space Station nears completion, NASA is building the next fleet of vehicles to bring astronauts back to the moon, and possibly to Mars and beyond. This new generation of space vehicles under Project Constellation includes the Ares launch vehicle family, the Orion crew exploration vehicle, and the Altair Lunar Lander.  The Ares and Constellation panels followed and were well attended, as the audience was eager to receive an in-depth look at the status of Orion and Ares I by senior managers from Lockheed, Boeing ATK, and Aerojet.

Janet Petro’s lunch keynote for Friday focused primarily on the transition Kennedy Space Center (KSC) will make during the anticipated operations gap created by the retirement of the Space Shuttle occurring as early as September of 2010.  With more than 7,000 jobs expected to be lost after the Space Shuttle retires, KSC must rebuild itself to support the new agenda for American space exploration and research.

The featured event of the day was the annual NSS awards Gala!  Former astronaut Rusty Schweickart and Buzz Aldrin spoke to attendees about the future of our space program as guests enjoyed drinks and dinner followed by an incredible fireworks display over the resort’s 18 hole golf course.

Saturday’s schedule featured numerous speakers, panels, and discussions on aerospace sciences and education. The United States currently ranks 17th in science amongst the world’s 30 richest countries.  U.S. students are even further behind in math, ranking 24th.  If the United States does not act quickly to close this gap, the nation runs a serious risk of depriving the next generation of the skills necessary to maintain the United States as a space-faring nation.

As a charitable non-profit organization, the National Space Society has initiated several student education and awards programs to inspire youth around the world to look to the stars and beyond.  Space is widely considered an exciting activity to share with students to inspire them to pursue an education in math and science.

At the Saturday Luncheon featuring moonwalker Buzz Aldrin, the National Space Society and partners presented a number of student winners with their awards.  The student projects were also on display throughout the conference in the Exhibit Hall for attendees to peruse at their leisure.

Saturday’s schedule also featured a panel on the solutions that future space initiatives could provide for modern-day problems here on Earth.  Addressing many of these issues was Orion Propulsion Founder and President Tim Pickens in his presentation on the Greening of Space.  The United States also faces the critical problem of dwindling supplies of energy and resources. Some answers await us just beyond the atmosphere of our planet. Harnessing the virtually unlimited power of the Sun’s solar energy, Space-based Solar Power (SSP) could create energy independence for our country.  The National Space Society has given a voice to many dreamers and engineers who have worked on bringing the concept of Space-based Solar Power to reality, and the 2009 ISDC was no different.  After a panel spoke on the future of SSP, John Mankins, President of the Space Power Association and a great advocate for SSP spoke to the Saturday Dinner crowd about the benefits that we could reap from SSP in the future by supporting it today.

On the final day of the conference visionaries, scientists, and entrepreneurs looked to the future of space settlements, ways to use and inhabit Mars, and the methods to protect our planet from near Earth objects such as asteroids. NSS also hosted sessions and meetings focused on space advocacy and space outreach to further our Mission of a space-faring civilization.

The magic of ISDC will always be the amazing access and insight it gives all individuals — regardless of rank, title, or net worth — into the cutting edge world of space exploration and research.  The opportunities at this year’s event in Orlando, Florida certainly did not disappoint.  If you were thrilled with your experience at ISDC 2009 or if you’d like to join in next year, you can sign up now at early bird rates for the National Space Society’s 2010 ISDC in Chicago, Illinois at isdc2010.org.

The Precipice of a Private Space Revolution

An Excerpt of the following article was published in Ad Astra Volume 20 Number 2 in the summer of 2008.

The Precipice of a Private Space Revolution

By Ian Murphy

It’s fitting that the National Space Society will hold its annual International Space Development Conference, a space conference best known for the access it grants the general public to space industry leaders, in the city of Washington DC during such a pivotal time in American political history.

The 2008 election will soon pit a smart, fresh, up and comer with a pulse on the here and now against a Senator and POW with 40 years of hands-on experience working within the civil and military complex.  Fair or not, the previous represents the future – and the latter the establishment.

It seems the passing of the torch between the past and future is now palpable and imminent.  The days of the greatest generation and their baby boomer children is ending. For first time in a long time the present ruling class won’t get to choose it’s successor; their mark, good or bad, has been left.

The theme of the ISDC 2008 is “The New Pace of Space.”

Before the conference I think it’s appropriate to take a look back at what the pace has been like since aerospace began.  We do this to make sure we 1) don’t go any slower than the fastest pace we’ve previously achieved – if we do we are most certainly moving backward and 2) to learn from the successes, as well as the mistakes, that have been made along the way – not the engineering failures but instead the human and societal flaws that accompany innovation cycles.

Five years after the Wright Brother’s first flight, very few people in the world still believed that flight was even possible. The reason many people were still doubtful was that the Wright Brothers actually refused to demonstrate their newly invented technology until they had a firm long-term production deal in place for fear that their innovative concepts would be stolen, reproduced and sold for a lesser price. In the end it was the U.S. Army who bought their concept and made plans to put the flying vehicles into service.

As part of the deal, the US Army sent the Wright Flyer on a European tour.  Paris, in 1908, was the modern day New York City.  The cultural, economic and political epicenter of the world and when the first airplane flew over those famous shops and cathedrals, it was the spark that launched the aviation industry.  What was also happening during that remarkable period of industrial growth was that young children, in the prime of impressionability, were seeing this flying machine and beginning to dream of where to go next.

Some of the most influential people in the history of early aerospace were all children during this five-year period.  William Allen, John Atwood, Karel Jan Bossart, Hugh L. Dryden, George Goddard, Robert H. Goddard, Theodore von Karman, James H. Kindelberger and Sergei Pavlovich Korolev.  These men were the forefathers of the rocket and space industry that would begin to take shape forty years in the future.

In 1927, just twenty years after the famous Parisian flight of fancy, it was Charles Lindbergh’s transatlantic solo flight that inspiring the first generation of test pilots and astronauts that would operate the technology and rocket powered vehicles the names mentioned above would soon create.  Within just one year of this famous flight, the number of pilots tripled, the number of airplanes quadrupled and the number of tickets sold increased by a factor of 30!  Some of the young children listening to the accounts of Lindbergh’s voyage on the radio included future pioneers like Buzz Aldrin, William Anders, Neil Armstrong, Frank Borman, Werner Von Braun, Konrad Dannenberg, Michael Collins, Kerim Aliyevich Kerimov, Scott Crossfield, Krafft A. Ehricke, Vasily Pavlovich Mishin, Dr. Robert R. Gilruth, Yuri Gagarin, Bill Pickering, Wally Schirra, Alan Shepard and Jim Lovell.

In less than thirty years the pace of space would become frenetic.  Before the wake of the industrial revolution and the technological boom that accompanied two World Wars had subsided, the Soviet Union would launch Sputnik and a great race to space between the world’s two largest superpowers had begun.

Over the next twenty years, each individual mentioned above would play a vital role in the success of the first manned mission to space.  The pinnacle achievement being the Apollo 11 mission landed Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstong on the moon.  More than 500 million people watched this live on television with millions more tuning in worldwide on their radios for what is commonly referred to as the greatest technological achievement in human history.

The pioneers of space industry found a way to win when the odds were stacked against them – they were willing to literally risk their lives and their careers to advance the human species towards the stars.  In the two largest sectors of the space industry, this environment no longer exists.

Remarkably, the average age of the people that worked on the Apollo program was 26.   In 1993 the average age of the crew that flies on the space shuttle was 36.  Today it is 47 and the technicians and engineers on the shuttle program average 54 years of age.

The same people who brought us to the moon are still the primary decision makers and operators of the civil space program   The fact is there are sparsely any 26 year-olds in the space business anymore – there are very few 36 year-olds.  Where is the next generation of motivated intelligent young mavericks whose ambition to succeed drowns out the 535 member Board of directors for the civil space program, each of whom have their own separate agendas? Why has the pace slowed to such a halt that in 2010 there will be no manned space vehicle operating in the United States for the first time since 1961?

However, there is hope.  It has been existing on the fringes of the space industry for decades and finally given consideration and credibility in 2004 when the first privately funded and privately built vehicle flew to the edge of space and back twice in two weeks winning the $10 million Ansari X PRIZE and effectively silencing the giggle factor in the debate of space tourism forever.  Already there is 1.7 Billion in investment committed in private spaceflight that is not government at all.  And it certainly is profitable, when you fly people at 200K per passenger on something that you can actually operate for 1/10 or less of that cost.

There are three pace setters that will be part of the speaking lineup for ISDC 2008 that represent vital and unique pillars of a new commercial space industry and its worth taking a closer look at their lives, philosophies and accomplishments.

The Innovator

Born in Estacada, Oregon, thirty miles southeast of Portland, and raised in Dinuba, California, Burt Rutan displayed an early interest in aircraft design.

By the time he was eight, Rutan was designing and building model aircraft and by sixteen he was flying solo.  In 1965 he graduated third in his class from California Polytechnic University with an aeronautical engineering degree.

From 1965 to 1972, Rutan worked for the U.S. Air Force as a flight test project engineer.   For the next two years he became the director of the Bede Test Center for Bede Aircraft, in Newton, Kansas.

Rutan struck out on his own in June of 1974 with the creation of the Rutan Aircraft Factory in the Mojave, California where he designed and developed prototypes for a number of aircraft, mostly homebuilt. It was here that Rutan would create his first masterpiece.

The Voyager aircraft was designed and fabricated Rutan Aircraft Factory for a single mission: Fly around the world non-stop and without refueling.  The result was an airplane with a structural weight/gross weight fraction significantly lower than any existing man-rated airplane and a cabin large enough to accommodate only the crew of two plus provisions.  In December 1986, Rutan’s brother Dick and Jeana Yeager took off from Edwards Air Force Base in California and flew around the world in nine days. The Voyager was retired and now has the honor of hanging in the Milestones of Flight exhibit in the National Air and Space Museum main exhibit hall with the Wright Flyer, Spirit of St. Louis, Bell X-1 and a future Rutan craft – SpaceShipOne.

In April 1982, Burt Rutan founded Scaled Composites, LLC.  Here he would focus on creating aircraft and eventually spacecraft that could push boundaries of what is possible for flight.  His most famous aircraft would fly higher for longer than ever before.

Proteus is a twin turbofan high altitude multi mission aircraft designed to carry payloads in the 2000-pound class to altitudes above 60,000 feet and remain on station up to 14 hours.  Missions for Proteus include telecommunications, reconnaissance, atmospheric research, commercial imaging, and space launch.  Proteus would eventually be the prototype for the first stage airplane that would carry SpaceShipOne a few years later.

Rutan made headlines again in June of 2004 with White Knight and SpaceShipOne.  Rutan would launch SpaceShipOne twice in a two-week period to win the $10 million Ansari X PRIZE – an eight-year space tourism competition for the first private spaceship capable of carrying the weight equivalent of three people to the edge of space and back within two weeks without replacing more that 10% of the vehicles hardware.   The craft embodies Rutan’s unique style and now also hangs in the National Air and Space Museum.

This achievement was quickly commercialized — Virgin Galactic, an offshoot of Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Group, announced that it will begin space tourism flights in 2008 using craft based on the designs of SpaceShipOne. Dubbed SpaceShipTwo, these new craft will carry six passengers to more than 70 miles above the earth to experience sub-orbital space. The first test flights are currently scheduled for 2009 and passengers are expected to be carried starting in 2010.  The price of the ticket: $208,000

On March 3, 2005, the Virgin Atlantic GlobalFlyer, an aircraft similar to the Voyager design, but with stiffer materials and a single jet engine, completed the first solo non-stop, non-refueled flight around the world with billionaire adventurer Steve Fossett as pilot. Reducing weight was critical to the design, and Rutan is quoted as facetiously telling his staff that when they finish building a part, they must throw it up in the air for a weight test, and “If it comes down, it’s too heavy.”

Between February 7, 2006 – February 11, 2006, Fossett and the GlobalFlyer set a record for the longest flight in history: 41,467.53 km (26,389 miles), the third absolute world record set with this aircraft before being flown to the NASM Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center. Global Flyer is the sixth vehicle designed by Burt Rutan in the NASM collection.

Rutan’s vehicles, while famous are not what make him an icon.  He is engaging, controversial, inspiring, sharply intelligent and wickedly funny.  The following is an excerpt from a speech Rutan gave at a TED conference in 2006:

“Houston we have a problem.  We’re entering a second generation of no progress in terms of human flight in space; in fact we’ve regressed.  We stand a very big chance of losing our ability to inspire our youth to go out and continue this very important thing that we, as a species, have always done, and that is instinctively we’ve gone out and climbed over difficult places went to more hostile places and found out later, maybe to our surprise, that that’s the reason we’ve survived.

I feel very strongly that it’s not good enough for us to have generations of kids that think that it’s ok to look forward to a better version of a cell phone with a video in it.  They need to look forward to exploration, they need to look forward to colonization and they need to look forward to breakthroughs.

We need to inspire them because they need to lead us and help us survive in the future.

My critics say

“Hey Rutan is just is just spending all these billionaires money on joyrides, this isn’t a transportation system, it’s just for fun.”

I used to be bothered by that but I got to thinking, I bought my first apple computer in 1978 and I bought it because then I could say…

“I got a computer at my house and you don’t.”

“Well what do you use it for?”

“Come over it does Frogger!”

Not the banks computer or Lockheed’s computer but the home computer was for games, for a whole decade we didn’t know what it was for but the fact that we had this big improvement in capability, we were ripe for a new invention and then Al Gore came along and invented the internet an because of that something that we used for a whole decade for fun became everything – our commerce our research our communication and if we let the Google guys think for another couple of weekends we can add a dozen more things to the list. It won’t be very long before you won’t be able to convince kids that didn’t always have computers in our homes. So fun is defendable.

The Entrepreneur

Elon Musk is a co-founder of PayPal and founder of Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX). He is also chairman of Tesla Motors and SolarCity.

Born June 28, 1971 in South Africa, Musk is the son of a South African engineer and a Canadian-born mother who has worked as a New York City dietitian and modeled for fun. His father inspired his love of technology enough so that Musk bought his first computer at age 10 and taught himself how to program code.  By the age of 12 he sold his first commercial software, a space game called Blaster.

He left home in 1988 at the age of 17, without his parents’ support, and in part because of the prospect of compulsory service in the South African military: “I don’t have an issue with serving in the military per se, but serving in the South African army suppressing black people just didn’t seem like a really good way to spend time,”

He headed toward the US, saying: “It is where great things are possible. I am nauseatingly pro-American.” Leaving South Africa he first went to Kingston, Ontario where he enrolled at Queen’s University, barely scraping by on as little as $1 a day with part-time and summer jobs. He then landed a prestigious scholarship to the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. “Tuition costs are outrageous . . . Fortunately, they gave me a scholarship . . . so I only had to cover living expenses, books, etc., by working.” From Wharton he received an undergraduate degree in economics and stayed on another year to finish a second bachelor’s degree in physics.

His undergraduate degrees behind him, Musk then considered three areas he wanted to get into that were “important problems”, as he said later, “One was the Internet. One was clean energy and one was space.”

In 1995, Musk went on to a graduate program in high-energy physics at Stanford, in which he stayed exactly two days before dropping out to start Zip2, which provided online content publishing software for news organizations. In 1999, Compaq’s AltaVista division acquired Zip2 for US$307 million in cash and US$34 million in stock options. Elon and his brother Kimbal held about 12 percent of Zip2 at the time.  In March 1999, Musk co-founded X.com, an online financial services and email payments company. One year later, X.com merged with Confinity, originally a company formed to beam money between Palm Pilots and the combined entity focused on email payments through the PayPal domain. In February 2001, X.com changed its legal name to PayPal. In October 2002, PayPal was acquired by eBay for US$1.5 billion in stock. Before its sale, Musk, the company’s largest shareholder, owned 11.7% of PayPal’s shares.

In June 2002, Musk founded his third company, Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX), of which he is currently the CEO and CTO. SpaceX develops and manufactures space launch vehicles, with an emphasis on low cost and high reliability.  The company’s first two launch vehicles are the Falcon 1 and Falcon 9 rockets.

In addition to his business activities in entrepreneurial space, Musk is the principal owner and Chairman of the Board of Tesla Motors, which aspires to build cost-effective electric automobiles for the mass market. He is also the primary investor and Chairman of the Board of SolarCity, a photovoltaic products and services startup company. The underlying motivation for funding both companies is to help combat global warming.

His long-term goal is that SpaceX helps humanity become a true spacefaring civilization.

Musk is a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences Aeronautics and Space Engineering Board, a Director of the Planetary Society and a Trustee of The X-Prize Foundation.  In 2005, Musk acquired a 10% share of Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL), a world leader in the design, manufacture and operation of high performance small satellites, majority owned by the University of Surrey, UK. Musk is Chairman of the Musk Foundation, which focuses its philanthropic efforts on science education, pediatric health, and clean energy.

The Explorer

Anousheh Ansari was born in Iran and lived there until she was 16.  She spent her childhood staring at the sky and dreaming of space.  She came over the states after the overthrowing of the Shah did not allow her to attend school anymore.  She didn’t speak a word of English.

She earned a bachelor’s degree in electronics and computer engineering from George Mason University, followed by a master’s degree in electrical engineering from George Washington University. She has an honorary doctorate from the International Space University. She is currently working toward a master’s degree in astronomy from Swinburne University.

Anousheh Ansari is co-founder and chairman of Prodea Systems, a company that will unleash the power of the Internet to all consumers and dramatically alter and simplify consumer’s digital living experience. Prior to founding Prodea Systems, Anousheh served as co-founder, CEO and chairman of Telecom Technologies, Inc.  The company successfully merged with Sonus Networks, Inc., in 2000.

To help drive commercialization of the space industry, Anousheh and her family provided title sponsorship for the previously discussed $10 million Ansari X PRIZE.

On September 18, 2006, Anousheh Ansari captured headlines around the world as the first female private space explorer. Anousheh earned a place in history as the fourth private explorer to visit space and the first astronaut of Iranian descent.

Anousheh is a member of the X PRIZE Foundation’s Vision Circle, as well as its Board of Trustees. She is a life member in the Association of Space Explorers and on the advisory board of the Teacher’s in Space project. She has received multiple honors, including the World Economic Forum Young Global Leader, the Working Woman’s National Entrepreneurial Excellence Award, George Mason University’s Entrepreneurial Excellence Award, George Washington University’s Distinguished Alumni Achievement Award, and the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Southwest Region. While under her leadership, Telecom Technologies earned recognition as one of Inc. magazine’s 500 fastest-growing companies and Deloitte & Touche’s Fast 500 technology companies.

She currently works to enable social entrepreneurs to bring about radical change globally, with organizations such as X Prize, ASHOKA and the PARSA Community Foundation.

On August 1-2, 2007, Anousheh hosted a unique and innovative team of individuals and organizations to collaborate on enhancing the state of global education. This team’s mission is to effectively bring about positive change in the way our youth are educated, encourage imagination and increase their interest in science and a variety of technical topics. We have created this community to develop collaborative projects which bring the best that each of us have to offer, in order to develop an inter-sectoral program of actions to overcome the challenges in education that we are facing today. We hope to share valuable ideas and projects with a global community that brings in a variety of perspective to this common problem and helps lead us to new, revolutionary ideas.

She believes the key to a better future for humankind is in the hands of our young generation, and it is up to us to provide them with the right tools through education and as good role models. Through it all, Anousheh continues to quote Gandhi, one of her personal heroes, who said, “Be the change you want to see in the world.”

The three visionaries mentioned above are paving the way for future innovators, entrepreneurs and explorers.  Their actions are driving the industry and therefore the human species to a bright future full of discovery, challenge and adventure.  Their common hope is that young children, in the prime of impressionability, will see what they’ve done and begin to dream of where to go next.

A Commentary on the Future of the American Space Program: I Get Who, What, Where & When but Why?

Bang, zoom, straight to the moon!

I wasn’t around for Mercury or Gemini. I wasn’t around to see the end of the Apollo. I wasn’t around to see the first Shuttle flight. I’ve never witnessed the “profound” emotional effect the American space program had on the people of this country.

I was born in 1978 and that makes me Generations X or Y, I’m not sure. I’m still waiting for some egghead sociologist/ intellectual to definitively pigeon hole me so a marketing company can properly apply me to a demographic group. Like so many born in the 70’s or early 80’s, my first recollection space travel was when I was 7 years old and my 2nd grade class was ushered into a crowded elementary school gymnasium and placed in front of the school’s only television (remember? It lived a top one of those tall A/V carts so classes could share) to watch the first teacher launch towards space. We all know what happened.  She never got there and space travel became an unnerving childhood memory for what is now the most prolific generation to ever to walk the earth.

It’s been 40 years since the end of the Apollo and 23 years since that tragic event and once again we are all wondering where do we go from here. The Bush administration mandated the Vision for Space Exploration in 2005, which stated that by 2020 we would go back to the Moon, then on to Mars and beyond.

Imagine you need to describe our progression in human spaceflight to a 2nd grader today (and please bear with me on this one, I promise there is a point):

“Well Junior, first we built a rocket and launched it into space….Next we put an animal in the rocket and launched it into space… Then we put a person in the rocket and launched it into space, once there he flew around the Earth and then came home… Next we put two people in the rocket and launched them into space so they could fly around the world several times before coming home…Then we launched three people into space, they flew to the Moon, went around it a few times and then came home… After that we launched three people into space, they flew to the Moon and landed on the moon and then came home.  We sent several more people to land on the moon after than and they played golf, drove a car and collected rocks.  A few years later, we built a new spaceship called a Space Shuttle.  It could carry even more people and do more things. We used this new spaceship to build a house in space. Then we made the house bigger and bigger until more people could live in it.  Now that the house is built, we are going to build a new rocket, like the one in the beginning of the story, that will launch people into space so they can fly to the Moon, land on the Moon, collect some rocks, play some golf and build a house.”

Notice the confused look on the face of the child when they say, “Wait a second! You already said that last part!”

I’m not a child but I get just as confused when I hear this same story told to me using bigger words and then justified with convoluted reasoning.

Maybe it’s because I believe in the adage that it is the purpose of NASA to push the limits of what humans can do in space and it is the duty of the private sector to industrialize in their wake.

Is the current strategy pushing any limits?

I’m not a rocket scientist, NASA program manager or ‘big 3′ corporate executive. I am not an accomplished professor of aerospace studies nor did I receive a degree in the field. But I’m also no dummy and when I speak to Apollo astronauts I wonder why none of them has told me that going back to Earth’s Moon makes sense. In the words of an Apollo astronaut I spoke to last week, “why are we bankrupting ourselves by building an extraneous lunar colony on the Moon for indulgent astronauts when we can instead go to Mars’ Moon, Phobos, with similar technology?”

I have high hopes for the Augustine Commission. The Book of Laws is an amazing read and it would be difficult to find a more qualified person to head such a panel than Norm Augustine but after the members of the commission were announced, I have to wonder out loud why a “blue ribbon” panel put together to decide whether going back to the Moon is a good idea does not include one person that has either been to the Moon or worked on any previous lunar mission.

There is nothing wrong with changing our collective national mission in space. The American people will not give up and neither Lockheed, Boeing, Aerojet nor ATK will go the way of GM. I sincerely hope the members of the Augustine Commission put aside preconceived notions and business relationships and try and think less like a know-it-all rocket scientist or politician and more like an insightful 2nd grader.

Horton Needs To Hear from Who Matters

Horton is vital in defending the short passing game

Can a seventh round pick really get a fair shake when it comes to voting on Defensive Rookie of the Year?

GMs from across the NFL, Mel Kiper, and the boys from Scouts Inc. (I am pretty sure they don’t let women work there because they are most likely incapable of verbal discourse with the opposite sex) think they have a really good bead on things.

Each year, they get up and unequivocally tell us plebeians who is NFL worthy and who is not. The only thing threatening their treasured dictatorship of received draft talent wisdom is the fact that, for the most part, they are just guessing.

Here’s what they don’t want you to know: In order to keep their silly-looking mugs on TV a few times a year and for 12 hours a day during the draft, they have to make you believe that their guess is a good one.

This leads me to my beef of the week. At 12:54 PM on Wednesday Nov. 5, ESPN came out with a poll for NFL midseason awards. They are trying to project who the winners are going to be for the major NFL awards.

One of these polls asks “Who is Rookie of the Year” and the choices visitors to the Web site and viewers of SportsCenter can choose from are the following: Chris Long, Jerod Mayo, Matt Ryan, Chris Johnson, and Matt Forte.

Let’s not worry about that there is no award for Rookie of the Year for a second (There is Defensive Rookie of the Year and Offensive Rookie of the Year—you would think the crack team of hundreds of paid writers, analysts, and researchers at ESPN would be aware of this) and look at the fact that only two defensive players are listed: Jerod Mayo and Chris Long.

At 5:21 PM that very same day, ESPN.com published a Scouts Inc. article, listing their choices for the midseason awards. This article included Defensive Rookie of the Year and their winner was (Surprise!) Chris Long and their runner up was (Surprise again!) Jerod Mayo. Their justification:

Unlike past seasons, no rookie defender has stood out as a dominant performer so far in 2008. Patriots LB Jerod Mayo leads all rookies in tackles (59), but he hasn’t provided any big plays (zero sacks, interceptions and forced fumbles) to go with those stops. Long’s 28 tackles are a respectable total for a defensive lineman, and he also has four sacks through eight games…(Source: ESPN.com and Scouts Inc.)

Let’s look at these stats more closely. If you were to project Long’s stats out for a full year, assuming he doesn’t get hurt and starts every game, he would end up with 56 tackles and eight sacks ranking him (using 2007 Stats) 26th in tackles and 21st in sacks among defensive lineman.

Jerod Mayo would end up with a slightly more respectable rank of 15th in tackles; however, he has zero sacks, zero interceptions, and zero forced fumbles. If you apply a fantasy value based on the Yahoo IDP scoring system, and Long would have 87 points and Mayo would have 111 pts.

You know who isn’t even mentioned? Strong safety for the Washington Redskins, Chris Horton.

Horton came into the NFL under relative obscurity. A seventh-round draft pick out of UCLA, Horton was the 249th player taken overall, and the last safety chosen in the draft. Horton wasn’t even the first safety drafted by the Redskins (Kareem Moore in the sixth). Even though Horton had 90 tackles in senior year and was first team all Pac-10, Scouts Inc. gave him a grade of 31 in the draft, which is described as:

“…players that teams like something about, but certainly do not have the full package in terms of NFL talent. A lot of times, teams will take chances on character players or developmental type athletes with this grade. And often, these are players that come from smaller schools or did not standout at the college level. NFL teams are looking for ‘diamonds in the rough’ with this type of prospect. He will usually rate in the bottom third of players at his position and will be considered a late round draft choice or un-drafted free agent.” (Source: ESPN.com)

The individual scouting report on Horton reads:

Doesn’t show great burst coming out of cuts and is going to have problems matching up with explosive slot receivers. Lacks ideal ball skills and drops some passes that should catch. Lacks ideal upper body strength, doesn’t show a violent punch and takes too long to shed blocks when lined up in the box.” And “…isn’t much of a playmaker.” (Source: ESPN.com)

Since being drafted, Horton has not only contributed but won the starting SS position by Week Four. His projected stats for the year are 84 tackles, two fumble recoveries and sacks, six interceptions, and 10 pass deflections.

This would rank him (using 2007 stats again) 26th in tackles and fifth in interceptions among all defensive backs. Using Yahoo’s IDP scoring, he would end with 122 points—35 more than Long and 11 more than Mayo.

If you still needed more evidence, among all rookies, Horton currently ranks fourth in total tackles (fifth in solo tackles and fourth in assists), third in pass breakups, and first in interceptions (tie).

No other rookie ranks even in the top 20 in all those categories. Horton has been a key cog in a Redskins defense that ranks fourth in total defense (fifth against the run and seventh against the pass).

So why isn’t Horton even included in these types of polls or mentioned on major websites like ESPN? Because Chris Long was taken second overall and Mayo was taken 10th overall, and if Chris Horton, the 249th overall pick, wins Defensive Rookie of the Year, then NFL GM’s, Mel Kiper, and Scouts Inc. have to admit they were dead wrong, and if they do that too much, then eventually, they won’t be asked to contribute to ESPN, NFL.com, or CBSSportsline.com.

In fact, since the inception of the award in 1967, only two players  selected after the second round have ever been bestowed the honor (1988 – S Erik McMillan, third round and 1980 – LB Al Richardson, eighth round) and 85 percent have been first-round selections.

Rational self-interest exhibited by sports analysts and NFL GM’s is the major inhibitor to players like Horton getting their due credit. Don’t get me wrong, Chris Long and Jerod Mayo are great rookies, but the bottom line is that they clearly aren’t better—or more valuable to their team—than Chris Horton.

Edited by “Chef” Ali Rahman(and several others)

Who Is Policing These So Called Football Experts

Hiiiigh Fiiiive

October 30, 2008

Don’t get me wrong, as a lifelong fan of the Washington Redskins it makes me happy to see the nation’s sports writers finally give the team some credit.

What bothers me is that none of these “experts” seem to actually watch the sport they write about.  This leads me to three questions that I have for all the DC area beat writers and national sports network analysts.

1) Why is anyone surprised that Washington is going to make the playoffs and contend for a Super Bowl title?

In the past three years only the New York Giants and Seattle have made the NFC playoffs more times than Washington.  Only Tampa Bay, Dallas and Chicago have made it an equal number of times and of that list, only Chicago and Washington have actually won at least one game.

Not the anointed darling of ESPN the Dallas Cowboys, not the power ranking starlet Carolina Panthers or New Orleans Saints.

Also take notice that if you factor in what is most likely to happen this year you would have to conclude that over the last 4 years the NFC the Rankings are clearly: 1) NY Giants 2) Chicago Bears 3) Seattle Seahawks 4) Washington Redskins.

So anyone who has any respect for the “how far you go is how good you are” concept could not be surprised.  The Redskins have a defense that lines you up and hits you squarely in the mouth and a run centric offense that is the epitome of calm, cool and collected.  It’s no surprise they will be in the playoffs three of the past four seasons.

2) Why is anyone surprised Jason Campbell is adjusting well to the West Coast offense?

Jason Campbell is a 6’ 5”, 233 lb. first round draft pick hand selected by Hall of Fame coach Joe Gibbs (who probably knows a little something about quarterbacks as he won three Super Bowls with three different ones).

He saw something in Campbell that caused him to trade three draft picks for him. I’m guessing that his senior year at Auburn, where he led his team to a 13-0 finish, might have has something to do with it.

Auburn’s offense outscored opponents 417-147 that year and as for Campbell, well he just completed 69.8 percent of his passes while throwing for 2700 yards, scoring 23 touchdowns and throwing only seven interceptions.

Oh yeah, he was also named SEC Player of the Year and MVP of the SEC Championship game that year and holds the Auburn record for career completion percentage with 64.6%

3) Why is anyone surprised that Clinton Portis is leading the league in rushing?

Clinton Portis was just the second true freshman since 1975 to start for the University of Miami.  That year he set a freshman record for five 100-yard rushing performances.

Two years later he would rush for 1,200 yards and 10 touchdowns.  He shares the record for 100-yard rushing games with Edgerrin James (14).

In the NFL, CP has never rushed for less than 1,250 yards in a season where he played more than eight games (His 2004 season was truncated by injury) and has rushed for more than 1,500 yards in three of his previous 6 seasons.

Barring injury he will break that barrier again.

So in only seven years, his team will have made the playoffs four times and he will have run for 1,500 yards in four of those seasons.  In fact, only Barry Sanders, LaDainian Tomlinson and Jim Brown have rushed for more yards per season in their career than Clinton Portis.

Only Eric Dickerson (4), Barry Sanders (5), Walter Payton (4) Edgerrin James (4) have more seasons over 1,500 yards than Portis and CP is 27 years old!

Clinton Portis is clearly the second best active running back in the NFL and an argument can be made that he has better upside than LT given he will have more seasons with more than 1,500 yards rushing after this year (LT has three but only 500 yards this year).

These “experts” (yes I plan to put it in quotes every time I refer to these knuckle-heads) bother me because they not only get paid for their analysis, but that some media outlet actually gives them space to publish their poorly thought out and under-researched drivel.

One last note: a perfect example is Chris Collinsworth, or Captain Bonehead as I like to call him.

He was on ESPN First Take this morning and said “The teams that we just knew were going to be there are just not there.”

Here’s why Chris: The NFL is designed for parity and it’s no longer 1980 so a team can totally rebuild itself into a playoffs staple in three years or less as long as they run the football, stop the run, maintain consistency in the locker room and coaching staff and don’t pick up “low character guys.”