2014 - 02/2014 Meeting

Page Created: 07/27/13. Last Updated: 03/26/14.

DALE SKRAN

Dale Skran “Space” Resume

· As of June 2013, appointed Chair of the NSS Advisory Committee on Space Infrastructure

· As of June 2013, appointed to be the Deputy Chair of the NSS Policy Committee

· As of May 2013, appointed to be a member of the NSS Policy Committee

· Co-sponsored Nov 14, 2011 NSS press conference on Space Solar Power

· Sponsored and presented the Gerard K. O’Neill Memorial Award (Freeman Dyson, 2010 ISDC)

· Sponsored and presented the Gerard K. O’Neill Memorial Award (Peter Kokh, 2009 ISDC)

· Spacecause Outstanding Service Award (1996)

· Editor, Space Activist’s Handbook (1993, 1994, and 1995)

· NSS Regional Board of Directors Representative (Region 7: elected 1993)

· Associate Editor, SpaceCause News (1993)

· SpacePac Local Chapters Coordinator (1988- 1990)

· NSS New Jersey Phone tree coordinator (1986 - 1993)

· Founder, Central Jersey SpacePac; raised $500 for 1986 elections

· Organized NJL5 lobby trips to Washington in 1985 and 1986; participated in 1987 trip

· North Jersey L5 President (1984-1986)

· NJL5 (North Jersey L5) received the Frederick H. Osborn Award in 1985 and 1986 for the largest chapter membership growth

· North Jersey L5 Secretary (1983-1984)

Space Articles by Dale Skran Jr Reprinted with Permission (Also on the S F A B C Science & Science Fiction Google Group

How STAR TREK Hurt the Space Program

International Space Development Conference 2012, May 25-28, 2012, by Dale L. Skran, Jr.

International Space Development Conference 2011 (report by Dale L. Skran, Jr.

Keeping Up With Space (comments by Dale L. Skran, Jr.)

COMING CLIMATE CRISIS? CONSIDER THE PAST, BEWARE THE BIG FIX by Claire L. Parkinson (book review by Dale L. Skran, Jr.)

https://groups.google.com/forum/?hl=en#!topic/sfabc-nj-science-science-fiction-group/B7Ftz6wqjE0

Links to Additional Articles, Commentary & Reviews by Dale Skran, Jr.

..........Book Reviews

..........Movie Reviews

..........Space / Science

..........Television

Links to Sites Mentioned in Talk & Handout:

Companies Mentioned in Talk:

..........Bigelow Aerospace: http://www.bigelowaerospace.com/

..........Blue Origin: http://www.blueorigin.com/

..........Lockheed Martin: http://www.lockheedmartin.com/

..........Made in Space: http://www.madeinspace.us/

..........NanoRacks: http://nanoracks.com/

..........NanoSatisfi: http://www.nanosatisfi.com/

..........Orbital Sciences: http://www.orbital.com/

..........Sierra Nevada: http://www.sncorp.com/

..........Space X: http://www.spacex.com/

..........Virgin Galactic: http://www.virgingalactic.com/

..........XCOR Aerospace: http://www.xcor.com/

Books, Conferences, Magazines & Organizations Mentioned in Talk:

..........Ad Astra Magazine: http://www.nss.org/adastra/

..........International Space Development Conference: http://isdc.nss.org/

..........L-5 Society (Wikipedia): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L5_Society

..........National Space Society: http://www.nss.org/

..........Parabolic Arc: http://www.parabolicarc.com/

..........Starship Century by Gregory & James Benford: http://www.gregorybenford.com/starship-century/

Commercial / Public-Private / Foreign Launches Mentioned in Hand-Out:

..........Antares Launch, 04/21/13: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjhWI8Owf-E

..........Grasshopper Launch, 04/19/13: http://www.gizmag.com/spacex-grashopper-test/27219/

..........Grasshopper Launch, 06/14/13: http://www.space.com/21881-spacex-grasshopper-rocket-highest-test-flight.html

..........Grasshopper Launch, Lateral Flight 08/13/13: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2t15vP1PyoA

..........Misubishi H-llB F4 Launch, 08/03/13: http://www.spaceflight101live.com/live-h-iib-launch-with-htv-4.html

..........Pegasus Launch, 06/13/13: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7_yyvGxwrE

..........Shenzhu 10 Launch, 06/11/13: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LndYEpfr1UA

..........SS2 Launch, 04/29/13: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=my-vo3jCN20

..........X-51A Launch, 05/01/13: http://www.airspacemag.com/videos/x-51a-flight-may-1-2013/

..........Xombie Launch, 04/01/13: http://www.parabolicarc.com/tag/xombie/

MEETING SUMMARY:

Meeting Date: February 8, 2104.

Meeting Site: Saddle River Valley Cultural Center, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey.

Official Attendance: 13.

Meeting Program: Talk / Slide Show on Commercial Space Program.

Notes:

Additional notes can be found after the Newsletter Account.

Newsletter Account

The February 8, 2014 General Meeting of the Science Fiction Association of Bergen County was held at the Saddle River Valley Cultural Center in Upper Saddle River, New Jersey. We got lucky and managed to land a day that was free of snowfall, although I suspect snow shoveling exhaustion played a role in keeping attendance down.

The Animation Associates showed episodes of an old anime series, PRINCESS KNIGHT, and some classic BETTY BOOP cartoons. The Ice Nine discussion was all over the place, with comic books, (Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Smallville Season 11), online comics (Calvin and Mu-Dib), television (THE BIG BANG THEORY), movies (HER) and more.

Our speaker was Dale Skaran, Jr who spoke on the Commercial Space Program, i.e., smaller private companies whose business is space-related but who are not dependent upon government contracts for their existence. This differentiates them from companies like Lockheed which are more closely tied to the government. Mr Skran has been involved with pro-space groups like the National Space Society for many years.

These are exciting times for the commercial space program. Key players include Bigelow Aerospace, Blue Origin, Orbital Sciences, Sierra Nevada, SpaceX, Virgin Galactic and XCOR Aerospace. These are not mom-and-pop operations. They are operated by people involved with Amazon, E-Bay, Google and the like. (Continued on website).

Notes:

Most of these firms are concentrating on two areas. The first is Space Tourism. Many people wish to experience traveling into space and being weightlessness, even if it's only for a short time. Virgin Galactic is working on a vehicle which will transport a group of people on a trip while XCOR's design is for one pilot and one passenger. However, XCOR is adapting many automotive technologies and intends to develop vehicles which can be used several times per day. The ticket for XCOR is 95K, and new technologies are continuing to bring prices down.

The second business focus is on launching payloads. This includes purely commercial ventures such as launching weather, GPS and television satellites and public / private partnerships to transport equipment for the government. A key factor in the public / private business has been the SAA (Space Act Agreement) which pretty much says, "This is what we want done. How you do it is your business." This is very different from the traditional FAR (Federal Acquisition Requirements) in which the government draws up a detailed, comprehensive design and then asks for bids on the design.

SpaceX is the poster child for private success, and their Falcon 9R Grasshopper may completely revolutionize the field by employing reusable craft with many times the lifespan of vehicles currently in use. This would result in dramatically lower costs.

Additional notes to follow.

Much of the debate about the future of the space program is driven by political factors. The government space program mushroomed when JFK was President. He made then-Democratic states like Texas the beneficiaries of space expenditures. These states are now largely Republican. This has often led to economics trumping politics with Republican politicians backing the traditional Big Space government paradigm while Democrats champion small, private industry solutions. This has transformed the old dynamic of debating IF we should be in space into HOW we should be in space.

Mr Skran argues the future of space exploration and development belongs to private industry. The traditional inefficiency of resetting the space program's mission and priorities every time a new President is elected has been compounded by the political dysfunction of the nation wherein political disagreements routinely shut down research and operations for non-essential programs like NASA. Even under the best of circumstances, the government is incredibly wasteful, and budget realities will demand a smaller, more streamlined government role.

The nation's enthusiasm for space exploration and the allocation of resources that made the moon landing and similar endeavors possible was the result of combination of political, economic and military drives which will not again happen. Trying to do so is as futile as searching the North Pole to discover Santa's workshop. Our speaker feels that the key to settling in space is sustainability, which is defined as being economically viable outside the governmental economic ecosystem.

Mr Skran argues that much current thinking about space is just plain wrong. Robots and Artificial Intelligences which can probe through a far greater range of the electro-magnetic spectrum should handle space exploration. Talk about sending men to Mars lies quite some distance in the future. There are just too many technological problems in the way for the near term.

He closed with the observation that science fiction has consistently been wrong about the exploration and development of space. Stories written in the first half of the 20th Century were overly pessimistic. They thought it would take a lot longer to get to the moon than it, for example. Stories written in the second half of the century overly optimistic, taking it for granted that we would have moon bases by now.