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NASA Postpones Next Phase of Space Launch Initiative
By Brian Berger
Space News Staff Writer
posted: 10:40 am ET
22 October 2002
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It's official It's official. NASA announced Tuesday that it is postponing its next major Space Launch Initiative milestone -- a long scheduled review of the capabilities the U.S. space agency desires for a so-called second-generation reusable launch vehicle. The so-called Systems Requirement Review (SRR), lead by NASA officials at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., had been scheduled to get underway in November. The point of the SRR, as NASA officials have put it, was to begin nailing down the requirements for a next generation reusable launcher. However, SLI contractors have known for months that the SRR would be postponed. NASA is rethinking whether it wants to continue with the $4.8 billion SLI program as currently planned. A comprehensive review of NASA's space transportation needs is underway. At the same time, the space agency is still pursuing close cooperation with the U.S. Defense Department on reusable launcher technologies. How that relationship unfolds -- assuming that it does -- could have a further impact on NASA's plans to develop a new launcher. NASA's press release announcing the SRR's postponement says "NASA will reschedule the review when the agency completes its assessment of its Integrated Space Transportation Plan, ascertains the role of the Department of Defense in the SLI, determines the future requirements of the International Space Station and firms up the agency's future space transportation needs." NASA spokesman Michael Braukus said the space agency does not have a timetable for completing the Integrated Space Transportation Plan review, which got underway in April. Nor does the agency have a date in mind for ascertaining the role of the Defense Department in SLI or firming up the agency's future transportation needs. "The answer is the same for all those issues," Braukus said. "We don't know."
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