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\u201cI was not the first person to recognize this vehicle configuration\u2019s benefits. Thiokol had proposed such a vehicle as early as 1978 \u2013 three years before the first Shuttle flew. So when I came up with this and mentioned it on the forum here on NASASpaceFlight, I was suddenly inundated with private messages and e-mails telling me that I was on to the right thing,\u201d noted Tierney.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was simply stunned. All these bona fide rocket scientists were contacting me \u2013 a rank amateur, at that time. I was amazed at how many professionals wrote to say such things as (and I quote): \u2018you are on the right path\u2019 and \u2018this is the direction NASA should be going in\u2019, not to mention that almost every one of them also said that \u2018ESAS is going to cost too much and will be cancelled\u2019 \u2013 prophetic words indeed.\u201d<\/p>\n
However, most of those engineers and space professionals \u2013 especially ones working for NASA \u2013 would never be able to reveal themselves, given the risk involved with either appearing to be working on a non-official project, or seeming to disagree with the then-current architecture they were tasked \u2013 and paid \u2013 to work on (Ares).<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was really the desperation I heard from all these folk \u2013 that NASA had been given a golden opportunity to go back to exploring strange new worlds, yet ESAS was clearly heading for financial disaster,\u201d added Tierney. \u201cThey couldn\u2019t speak up, because their careers and families depended on the Administrator\u2019s good graces.<\/p>\n
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\u201cBut I didn\u2019t suffer from that problem, my paycheck didn\u2019t come from NASA, so I asked if I could be used as a conduit to say the things they couldn\u2019t risk saying themselves. And that was where the snow-ball began to roll!\u201d<\/p>\n
**CLICK HERE to view the majority of DIRECT threads (several million views) on the NSF Forum**<\/p>\n
Tierney began to build a team, which included his right hand man, Chuck Longton, a Senior Structural Design Specialist at General Dynamics Electric Boat Corp in Groton, Connecticut where he manages a design group responsible for creating the tools required to build the nation\u2019s nuclear submarine fleet. He brought with him a total of 40 years in structural design, including Pratt & Whitney and the Saturn-V F-1 engine.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy recollection was that after Ross posted those questions, he started getting a lot of reaction from posters on NSF, myself included,\u201d noted Longton. \u201cIn private conversations with Ross I also became aware that he was being contacted offline by a large number of design engineers from MSFC who wanted to know more about his thoughts, and if he had any plans to pursue his ideas further and if so could they help.<\/p>\n
\u201cRoss decided to write a short paper, just a few pages long, to flesh out his thoughts and asked me if I would consider working with him on it.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/10\/D7.jpg\" "\\"D7\\"")
\u201cLikewise, Matt Hays was asked if he would like to edit as well and of course Antonio Maia provided his excellent graphics and video. Ross took advantage of the expertize offered to him from MSFC personnel, who insisted that they remain anonymous to protect their jobs and the work began to come together nicely.<\/p>\n\u201cIt was like watching a plant grow; it just never stopped, getting bigger and bigger until DIRECT v1.0 was launched with the \u201cDIRECT Goes Live\u201d thread on NSF. By that time we had gotten some unwelcome notice inside NASA HQ.\u201d<\/p>\n
That \u201cunwelcome\u201d attention became public when ESAS Lead Dr. Doug Stanley offered to look through the DIRECT v1.0 paper in his own time, allowing for the opportunity to bring his knowledge and experience to the initial findings. However, Dr Stanley\u2019s results noted numerous flaws, which had such a massive impact, it threatened to deliver a fatal blow for the DIRECT movement.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were some pretty dark days along this path, I recall the first Christmas after we went live, Dr. Doug Stanley (Exploration Systems Architecture Study (ESAS) Lead) tore DIRECT v1.0 up one side and down the other,\u201d Tierney recalled. \u201cI didn\u2019t have a happy Christmas that year.<\/p>\n
\u201c(However, Longton) put a smile back on my face and helped me get back on my feet, dust myself off again and we set to work to tackle each and every point of criticism Dr. Stanley had brought up.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/10\/D2.jpg\" "\\"D2\\"")
\u201cThe result was DIRECT v2.0, which was far, far superior to our first version. While it sure stung at the time, looking back on it, I actually believe that Dr. Stanley helped us get really serious about this project.<\/p>\n\u201cFrom everything I have learned, Dr. Stanley has said, publicly, that until two weeks before release, ESAS was actually planning to use an SSME (Space Shuttle Main Engine) powered, in-line 8.4m 4-segment SRB (Solid Rocket Booster) configuration system, with and without an upper stage \u2013 a vehicle ESAS calls LV-24 and LV-25, but which fans of our approach would recognize as Jupiter-130!\u201d<\/p>\n
As DIRECT v2.0 took shape, the movement claims they began to attract \u2018big name\u2019 attention within NASA. However, this time the interest appeared to be more positive than before \u2013 especially after the departure of NASA administrator Mike Griffin.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom within the first few months we had some fairly high-level interest, not Project Manager level, but close! I met (Space Shuttle Program manager) John Shannon at the first Augustine Committee hearing, where he was presenting Sidemount. He had not actually been aware of DIRECT prior to that, but he liked what he saw,\u201d added Tierney.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt wasn\u2019t until after Dr. Griffin was removed that things really started to pick up, when at the start of this year Longton, Steve Metschan and I were invited to meet with Bill Gerstenmaier (Associate Administrator for Space Operations for NASA), Doug Cooke (Constellation), Phil Sumrall and Geoff Yoder at NASA Headquarters.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe made our pitch and told them we never wanted to be the thorn in their sides that we had become over the years. We offered to consult if they wanted to proceed, but we made it very clear that this was their program and that we have no intention of stealing their thunder \u2013 in short, since 1978, through the almost identical National Launch System period of 1991-1993, this project is, and always was, NASA\u2019s.<\/p>\n
\u201cOwnership has never been of any importance to DIRECT. While we could certainly be accused of taking a \u201ctough love\u201d approach, everything we have done in this project has always been to try to help NASA.\u201d<\/p>\n
Becoming one of the options presented at the Augustine Committee\u2019s review into Human Space Flight, DIRECT was allowed its first real public platform for the architecture \u2013 although the need to keep most of the names behind it secret was met by a jibe from astronaut Leroy Chiao, who was serving on the panel.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat support ultimately came in the person of Buzz Aldrin through his relationship with Steve Metschan. While I do not know the details, because they were handled by Buzz, this ultimately resulted in DIRECT being asked to present at the Commission hearing in Washington DC,\u201d noted Longton, with Tierney adding the event had proved they had been noticed \u2013 despite the dismissals that the concept had been hit by over the previous years.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Augustine Committee was a very big event for us. No other non-profit group presented to that Presidential panel. To be invited to present, very simply meant that we had been noticed and that our concept had been deemed worthy of further examination. Not bad for a project that had mistakenly been classified as breaking the laws of physics, just the year before!<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/10\/D5.jpg\" "\\"D5\\"")
\u201cI know others in the DIRECT Team were a little miffed at that comment by Leroy Chiao (\u201cWho are you guys?\u201d), but I never took it badly myself. I always knew that would be a major concern the panel would have \u2013 they had to question our experience and our credibility, because we have always protected the identities of the members of the team.<\/p>\n\u201cIf it could have been me up there, I would have liked to have said: \u2018We are you: By that I mean we are a widespread group of highly experienced NASA engineers trying to help the program to succeed\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Commission hearing in Washington was a definite milestone in the DIRECT story,\u201d added Longton. \u201cIt seemed to me at first that the Commission was prepared to listen to us more as a courtesy to Buzz Aldrin than anything else, but once they began having discussions with some of our anonymous sources that had decided to cooperate, it was evident to me that we had stepped up a notch in their eyes.<\/p>\n
\u201cWithout that we would never have been asked to go to the Aerospace Corp in Los Angles, who in spite of the enormous margins that they added to the Jupiter, had essentially validated what we had proposed. By the time the hearings were over everyone knew we were a serious contender and not just a bunch of hobbyists with an idea.<\/p>\n
\u201cWithin a couple of months of the hearing we started hearing from our contacts of certain steps being initiated by upper level executives at KSC, MSFC and at HQ that were unlike the things we had seen before. These were positive steps, like gathering data for a new HLV study aimed at a post-CxP in-line launch system.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor example we learned that DIRECT\u2019s Jupiter LV was being specifically incorporated into the new as yet unofficial study at MSFC. Mind you it was not an acceptance of DIRECT by any means. Rather it was more like an acceptance of the validity of the design approach we had taken.<\/p>\n
\u201cEven though Aerospace Corps final cost and performance estimates had been hugely inflated by enormous margins that they had added on top of our own huge margins, it was clear to anyone who looked at the underlying data that we did indeed have a viable and serious proposal.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/10\/A210.jpg\" "\\"A210\\"")
With the Jupiter-like vehicles making favourable appearances on several studies, though never named as a \u201cJupiter\u201d but instead as an inline SD HLV, the appearance of inline SD HLVs in the studies which followed the Augustine review \u2013 mirroring configurations proposed for some time via the DIRECT movement \u2013 felt like a vindication to the teammembers.<\/p>\n\u201cTotal delight! To see NASA confirming our own findings in documentation was validation that everything we had said was true,\u201d noted Tierney. \u201cAfter the long fight we had, this was an absolute breath of fresh air and the whole team was over the moon.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat can we say?\u201d Longton added. \u201cWe were excited to the max! We had been bursting at the seams to let people know what was going on \u201cbehind the curtain\u201d but had been prevented from doing that by loyalty to our inside sources.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen those things began appearing in public with official blessing it was like a prisoner being unshackled and told he was free. It was exhilarating!\u201d<\/p>\n
However, despite the studies pointing favorably towards the inline SD HLV \u2013 allowing for a level of optimism the findings would translate into NASA\u2019s forward path \u2013 the FY2011 budget proposal would prove to be a hammer blow, effectively ending any and all hope for a SD HLV of any configuration.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/10\/D8.jpg\" "\\"D8\\"")
\u201cWe met with Bill Gerstenmaier a matter of days before the President rolled-out his FY2011 plans in February and de-railed everything,\u201d Tierney recalled. \u201cWe\u2019re very strongly in favour of the new commercial space industry being given powerful support, and a budget does need to be allocated to new R&D work within the agency \u2013 both of those are highly supportable objectives.<\/p>\n\u201cHowever, to do so at the cost of pulling all your resources out of the programs that make the foundation of the political support for NASA as a whole was not a smart plan.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf FY2011 had gone forward unchanged it would have been devastating, because Congress would have had no reason to keep NASA\u2019s budget in place any longer \u2013 and without political backing, there would be no money for any programs at all, commercial and R&D inclusive. That plan was, to me, nothing short of a recipe for political suicide for the agency.\u201d<\/p>\n
Longton was equally shocked upon reviewing the information in the FY2011 rollout, showing that all the meetings and positive direction the studies were portraying had not been adopted by the creators of the budget proposal.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were dumbfounded! Especially because we had been told from the highest inside sources that NASA was going our way. While the DIRECT-O-Meter was hovering around a 9.5 in the public arena, internally we had it pegged at the 10.0 level, waiting only for the President\u2019s budget proposal to bless it.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen that didn\u2019t happen, and given that ALL our sources, some of whom are at the very highest levels at HQ, Marshall, Johnson and KSC, had been completely fooled by the Administration, it was like Doug Stanley (his negative findings for Direct v1.0) all over again. Only this time it didn\u2019t have the same effect. We immediately began to retool to fight this wrong-headed direction.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/10\/D4.jpg\" "\\"D4\\"")
However, holding out hope for an inline SD HLV proved to be a correct decision, as the FY2011 budget proposal was itself retooled to provide NASA direction to build such a vehicle.<\/p>\nAnd once again, continuing studies \u2013 such as the HEFT (Human Exploration Framework Team) assessments \u2013 show a favorable attitude to the inline SD HLV, one which mirrors the configuration of a Jupiter 246.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo be specific, the Senate has voted unanimously in both Authorizations and Appropriations,\u201d Tierney outlined, supporting the passed Senate Bill forward path for NASA. \u201cThe House just voted to support this new approach in Authorizations, but we\u2019re still waiting for House Appropriations to follow-suit later in the year \u2013 three down, one to go!<\/p>\n
\u201cThe President has also indicated approval for this compromise, because it buys everyone a very healthy portion of what they wanted. Commercial and R&D both get healthy funding. Congress gets to save jobs in a bad economy and produce a new capability to help NASA reach beyond Low Earth Orbit for the first time in nearly 40 years. This is a win-win situation.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is definitely a \u2018win\u2019, but not just for us: NASA wins by keeping it\u2019s strong political support and sustaining its budgets while all other agencies are suffering cuts. The contractors win by keeping many of the existing contracts. The workforce wins by saving more than 60 percent of the jobs that were otherwise to be lost. Commercial New. Space wins by getting more than $3 billion allocated over the next 6 years. R&D wins by getting its larger budgets.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn short; everyone wins with this compromise \u2013 especially the United States as a nation, who get new industry, save jobs and create a new, affordable, exploration program.\u201d<\/p>\n
The result of the Bill\u2019s passing left the DIRECT movement with a decision to make; whether to continue pushing forward their own architecture and proposals, or to claim NASA is now on the correct trajectory, and to leave them to their own devices \u2013 without what could be deemed as outside interference.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/10\/D6.jpg\" "\\"D6\\"")
\u201cOnce DIRECT actually reached it\u2019s pinnacle of acceptance and became self-perpetuating as you say, there is little more for us to do except to occasionally offer encouragement, advice and assistance, in the same way parents of a college student or young adult would,\u201d noted Longton.<\/p>\n\u201cOver the last 4 years we had always said that once NASA picked up the ball and began to run with it that we intended to let them have it. That has always been our desire. We want NASA to take ownership of this and make it their own, not ours.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll now they have it and we are on the sidelines, cheering them on like a favorite football team. There is little else we can contribute. NASA will make of it whatever they will. While their current proposals look just like the Jupiter, we don\u2019t expect it to end up like that. It will be something else, something that resembles the Jupiter, but with their own stamp on it.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe hope they don\u2019t stray too far, because we occupied the sweet spot for a SDHLV, but they will stray, and make SLS their very own. We wish them the most sincere best wishes as they carry this over the goal line.\u201d<\/p>\n
(Images: Artistic Impressions by Philip Metschan)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Direct movement \u2013 a group of professionals and non-professional engineers that created an architecture alternative to Constellation\u2019s Ares vehicles \u2013 are ready to transition their movement, following the redirection of NASA\u2019s future by lawmakers, which calls for a Space Launch System (SLS) based around a Shuttle Derived (SD) Heavy Lift Launch Vehicle (HLV), which […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29703,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[9034],"class_list":["post-40632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-hlv"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40632"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40632"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40632\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}