by Tim Fernholz
“not a lot of money in the space arena”: Rebecca Wright, “Interview with Michael Griffin,” NASA Oral History Project, January 12, 2013.
just over $900,000: “Commercial Orbital Transportation Services: A New Era in Spaceflight,” NASA, SP-2014-617, June 2, 2014.
“‘forgotten something, use this’”: Hackler, “Interview with Michael C. Wholley.”
avoiding procurement regulations: Rebecca Hackler, “Sumara M. Thompson-King, Courtney B. Graham, and Karen M. Reilly,” NASA Oral History Project, March 19, 2013.
8. A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes
“commercialize my idea”: Alexander MacDonald, The Long Space Age: The Economic Origins of Space Exploration from Colonial America to the Cold War (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2017), 133.
“rocket development so tough”: Elon Musk, “October 2004–January 2005,” SpaceX blog, January 1, 2005, accessed September 10, 2017, http://www.spacex.com/news/2005/october-2004-january-2005.
SpaceX team’s Herculean efforts: Kimbal Musk, “Are We Crazy?” Kwajalein Atoll and Rockets blog, February 7, 2006, accessed September 9, 2017, https://kwajrockets.blogspot.co.uk/2006/02/are-we-crazy.html.
constructed on Omelek: Kimbal Musk, “Someone’s Looking Out for That Satellite . . .” Kwajalein Atoll and Rockets blog, March 25, 2006, accessed September 14, 2017, http://kwajrockets.blogspot.com/2006/03/someones-looking-out-for-that.html.
sixty people, maybe more: Rebecca Hackler, “Interview with Hans Koenigsmann,” NASA Oral History Project, January 15, 2003.
bought him a drink: Rebecca Hackler, “Interview with George D. French,” NASA Oral History Project, May 1, 2013.
“get our money back?”: Rebecca Hackler, “Interview with Randolph H. Brinkley,” NASA Oral History Project, May 1, 2013.
“nobody on Thursday”: Hackler, “Interview with George D. French.”
“sigh of relief”: Rebecca Hackler, “Interview with Antonio L. Elias,” NASA Oral History Project, June 3, 2013.
9. Test as We Fly
Bezos’s space collectibles: Brad Stone, The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon (New York: Little, Brown, 2014), 158.
analysis produced by SpaceX: “Demo Flight 2: Flight Review Update,” Space Explorations Technology Corp., June 15, 2007.
“as harsh as the first time”: Rebecca Hackler, “Interview with Hans Koenigsmann,” NASA Oral History Project, January 15, 2003.
“buying launches from us”: Rebecca Wright, “Interview with Gwynne Shotwell,” NASA Oral History Project, January 15, 2013.
almost all of it by 2006: Brian Berger, “Falcon 1 Failure Traced to a Busted Nut,” SpaceNews, July 19, 2006, accessed September 13, 2017, https://www.space.com/2643-falcon-1-failure-traced-busted-nut.html.
“to what they are today”: Rebecca Hackler, “Interview with Mike Horkachuck,” NASA Oral History Project, November 6, 2012.
“not reaching orbit”: Elon Musk, “Plan Going Forward,” SpaceX blog, August 2, 2008, accessed September 22, 2017, http://www.spacex.com/news/2013/02/11/plan-going-forward.
“rather than Falcon 9”: Elon Musk, “Falcon 1, Flight 3 Mission Summary,” SpaceX blog, August 6, 2008, accessed September 19, 2017, http://www.spacex.com/news/2013/02/11/falcon-1-flight-3-mission-summary.
“one number, nothing else”: Rebecca Hackler, “Interview with Hans Koenigsmann,” NASA Oral History Project, January 15, 2003.
“(starting the company)”: Elon Musk, “Flight 4 Launch Update,” SpaceX blog, October 7, 2007, accessed November 14, 2017, http://www.spacex.com/news/2013/02/11/flight-4-launch-update.
“I love you guys!: Scott Pelley, “Billionaire Elon Musk on 2008: ‘The Worst Year of My Life,’” 60 Minutes, CBS, March 28, 2014, accessed November 12, 2017, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/billionaire-elon-musk-on-2008-the-worst-year-of-my-life.
10. Change Versus More of the Same
“for another year”: Rebecca Hackler, “Interview with Mike Horkachuck,” NASA Oral History Project, November 6, 2012.
over two decades: Cristina T. Chaplain, “Ares I and Orion Project Risks and Key Indicators to Measure Progress,” Government Accountability Office, April 3, 2009, GAO-08-186T.
“decisions on a launch architecture”: Rebecca Wright, “Interview with Michael Griffin,” NASA Oral History Project, September 10, 2007.
to replace the space shuttle: Cristina Chaplain et al., “Agency Has Taken Steps Toward Making Sound Investment Decisions for Ares I but Still Faces Challenging Knowledge Gaps,” Government Accountability Office, October 2007, GAO-08-51.
asking friends to sign it: Seth Borenstein, “NASA Chief’s Wife: Don’t Fire My Husband,” Associated Press, January 1, 2009.
to protect the program: Robert Block and Mark K. Matthews, “NASA Chief Griffin Bucks Obama’s Transition Team,” Orlando Sentinel, December 11, 2008.
“come and talk to me”: Block and Matthews, “NASA Chief Griffin.”
“for fifteen years”: Wright, “Interview with Michael Griffin,” 2007.
For Constellation to succeed: Augustine et al., “Review of US Human Spaceflight Plans Committee,” NASA, October 2009, 83.
“this commercial stuff”: Rebecca Hackler, “Interview with Valin B. Thorn,” NASA Oral History Project,” December 17, 2012.
“the future of human spaceflight”: Joel Achenbach, “Obama Budget Proposal Scraps NASA’s Back-to-the-Moon Program,” Washington Post, February 2, 2010.
“the nation’s human space program”: Congressional Record, Proceedings and Debates of the 111th Congress, Second Session, March 8, 2010.
“didn’t receive it very well”: Hackler, “Interview with Mike Horkachuck.”
“instead of an i”: Wright, “Interview with Gwynne Shotwell.”
temporarily in-house: Debra Werner, “SpaceX Leaves Searing Impression on NASA Heat Shield Guy,” SpaceNews, March 9, 2015, accessed September 27, 2017, http://spacenews.com/spacexs-high-velocity-decision-making-left-searing-impression-on-nasa-heat-shield-guy.
in one legal filing: Amended Complaint, Space Exploration Technologies Corp. v. The United States, Civil Action No. 14-354C, United States Court of Federal Claims, May 19, 2014.
11. Capture the Flag
“human certification requirements”: Philip McAlister, “Selection Statement for Commercial Crew Development Round Two,” NASA, March 4, 2011.
contaminated by bacteria or fungus: Kathy Lueders, “ISS Crew Transportation and Services Requirements Document,” Commercial Crew Program, John F. Kennedy Space Center, CCT-REQ-1130, March 23, 2015.
“interminable management of risk”: William Gerstenmaier, “Staying Hungry: The Interminable Management of Risk in Human Spaceflight,” Journal of Space Safety Engineering 4 (2017): 2–4.
argued in a 2012 speech: Michael Griffin, “Why Do We Want to Have a Space Program?,” remarks prepared for Gebhardt Lecture, Georgia Institute of Technology, September 6, 2012.
“The first market really is people”: Hackler, “Interview with Bretton Alexander.”
“but that seems unlikely”: Irene Klotz, “Amazon Founder Bezos’ Space Company Loses Challenge over NASA Launch Pad,” Reuters, December 12, 2013, accessed March 14, 2017, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-space-launchpad/amazon-founder-bezos-space-company-loses-challenge-over-nasa-launch-pad-idUSBRE9BB1CI20131213.
“dancing in the flame duct”: Dan Leone, “Musk Calls Out Blue Origin, ULA for ‘Phony Blocking Tactic’ on Shuttle Pad Lease,” SpaceNews, September 25, 2013, accessed October 21, 2017, http://spacenews.com/37389musk-calls-out-blue-origin-ula-for-phony-blocking-tactic-on-shuttle-pad.
12. Space Race 2.0
“our collective business”: Cristina Chaplain et al., “Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle: DOD Needs to Ensure New Acquisition Strategy Is Based on Sufficient Information,” Government Accountability Office, September 2011, GAO-11-641, 11.
without getting fleeced: Chaplain et al., “Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle.”
fou
rth-biggest procurement: Government Accountability Office, “Defense Acquisitions: Assessments of Selected Weapon Programs,” March 2014, GAO-14-340SP.
“effectively idle personnel”: Gary R. Bliss, “PARCA’s Root Cause Analysis of the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle Program,” letter to the Secretary of Defense, June 21, 2012.
“misleading” and “remarkable”: Bliss, “PARCA’s Root Cause.”
“record of SpaceX yet”: Brendan McGarry and Tony Capaccio, “$70 Billion Military Launch Market Is the Next Frontier for SpaceX,” Washington Post, December 4, 2012, A10.
Between 2012 and 2014: Government Accountability Office, “Assessments of Selected Weapon Programs,” March 2016, GAO-16-329SP.
“you don’t sue them”: Ledyard King, “McCain Dresses Down Senior Air Force General for Comments,” Gannett Washington Bureau, July 16, 2014, accessed October 10, 2017, https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/2014/07/16/mccain-dresses-down-air-force-general-comments/12748363.
“sole source contract”: Tim Fernholz, “Elon Musk Says He Lost a Multi-Billion-Dollar Contract When SpaceX Didn’t Hire a Public Official,” Quartz, May 23, 2014, accessed November 30, 2017, https://qz.com/212876.
“the court does not request”: SpaceX vs. United States, “Adjudication Scheduling Order and Denial of Defendant-Intervenor’s July 2, 2014 Motion to Dismiss,” US Court of Federal Claims, 14-354, July 24, 2014.
leaked online: Tim Fernholz, “This Rocket Executive Pissed Off Everyone in Space and Lost His Job the Next Day,” Quartz, March 17, 2016, accessed November 30, 2017, https://qz.com/641738.
13. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle
“the field of launchers”: Vincent Lamigeon, “The Serious Doubts of Arianespace on SpaceX’s Reusable Rocket,” Challenges, December 22, 2015, accessed October 22, 2017, https://www.challenges.fr/entreprise/aeronautique/le-lanceur-spatial-reutilisable-de-spacex-une-equation-economique-incertaine-pour-arianespace_30254.
“associated systems and methods”: Bezos et al., US Patent 8678321, “Sea Landing of Space Launch Vehicles and Associated Systems and Methods,” March 25, 2014.
engineer, Yoshiyuki Ishijima: Petition for Inter Partes Review of US Patent No. 8,678,321, Space Exploration Technologies Corp., Petitioner v. Blue Origin LLC, Patent Owner; August 25, 2014.
“Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly”: Elon Musk (@elonmusk), Twitter, June 15, 2016, 8:07 a.m., https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/743097668725940225.
“get you back down again”: David Woods, “The Saturn V Launch Vehicle,” Omega Tau podcast, episode 239, March 12, 2017, http://omegataupodcast.net/239-the-saturn-v-launch-vehicle.
14. Pushing the Envelope
“don’t take a week off”: Matt McFarland, “Elon Musk Needs a Vacation,” Washington Post, September 29, 2015, accessed November 11, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2015/09/29/elon-musk-needs-a-vacation.
“fault tree analysis”: Elon Musk (@elonmusk), “There was an overpressure event,” Twitter, June 28, 2015, 8:48 a.m., https://twitter.com/elonmusk /status/615185076813459456.
“Thanks :)”: Elon Musk (@elonmusk), Twitter, June 28, 2015, 8:23 a.m., https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/615178702343786498.
“punch line to a joke”: Chris Anderson, “Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars,” Wired, October 21, 2012, accessed October 14, 2017, http://www.wired.com/2012/10/ff-elons-musk-qa.
included two NASA employees: NASA Office of Inspector General, “NASA’s Response to SpaceX’s June 2015 Launch Failure: Impacts on Commercial Resupply of the International Space Station,” June 28, 2016, IG-16-025.
“during the assembly process”: NASA Office of Inspector General, “NASA’s Response to SpaceX’s June 2015 Launch Failure.”
“and telemetry systems”: NASA Office of Inspector General, “NASA’s Response.”
after the accident: Rolfe Winkler and Andy Pasztor, “Exclusive Peek at SpaceX Data Shows Loss in 2015, Heavy Expectations for Nascent Internet Service,” Wall Street Journal, January 13, 2017.
“a lot of these with SpaceShip One”: Tami Abdollah and Stuart Silverstein, “Test Site Explosion Kills Three,” Los Angeles Times, July 2, 2007.
in a single day: Richard Branson, Finding My Virginity: The New Autobiography (New York: Portfolio, 2017), 212–14.
exited the lower atmosphere: National Transportation Safety Board, “In-Flight Breakup During Test Flight Scaled Composites SpaceShipTwo, N339SS,” Public Meeting of July 28, 2015.
the vehicle’s rocket engines: Andy Pasztor, “Problems Plagued Virgin Galactic Rocket Ship Long Before Crash,” Wall Street Journal, December 11, 2014.
“has to be stick-and-rudder”: Ian Parker, “The X Prize: Competing in the Entrepreneurial Space Race,” New Yorker, October 4, 2004.
chance of a successful landing: Elon Musk (@elonmusk), “Just reviewed mission params,” Twitter, December 20, 2015, 12:51 p.m., https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/678679083782377472.
“suborbital booster stage”: Jeff Bezos (@JeffBezos), “Congrats @SpaceX,” Twitter, December 21, 2015, 5:49 p.m., https://twitter.com/JeffBezos/status/679116636310360067.
15. Rocket Billionaires
“sound they may be”: Alexander MacDonald, The Long Space Age: The Economic Origins of Space Exploration from Colonial America to the Cold War (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2017), 135.
within sight of the accident: Christian Davenport, “Implication of Sabotage Adds Intrigue to SpaceX Inquiry,” Washington Post, October 2, 2016, A15.
as much as $81 million: NASA Office of Inspector General, “NASA’s Commercial Crew Program: Update on Development and Certification Efforts,” September 1, 2016, IG-16-028.
“full reusability” of the rockets: Tim Fernholz, “The “Super Chill” Reason SpaceX Keeps Aborting Launches,” February 29, 2016, accessed November 14, 2017, https://qz.com/627430.
“actual operational environment”: Patricia Sanders et al. “Annual Report for 2016,” NASA Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel, accessed November 17, 2016, https://oiir.hq.nasa.gov/asap/documents/2016_ASAP_Annual_Report.pdf.
fined them $400,000: Ron Nixon, “Africa, Offline: Waiting for the Web,” New York Times, July 22, 2007, accessed October 29, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/22/business/yourmoney/22rwanda.html.
for military customers: Peter B. de Selding, “Once-Mocked O3b Investment Now Force Multiplier for SES,” SpaceNews, July 13, 2015, accessed October 14, 2017, http://spacenews.com/2014-top-fixed-satellite-service-operators-once-mocked-03b-investment-now-force-multiplier-for-ses.
“pipe dream we have seen before”: Alistair Barr and Andy Pasztor, “Google Invests in Satellites to Spread Internet Access,” Wall Street Journal, June 1, 2014, accessed November 30, 2017, https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-invests-in-satellites-to-spread-internet-access-1401666287.
“about the architecture”: Ashlee Vance, “Revealed: Elon Musk’s Plan to Build a Space Internet,” Bloomberg News, January 16, 2015, accessed November 30, 2017, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-01-17/elon-musk-and-spacex-plan-a-space-internet.
by 2025: Rolfe Winkler and Andy Pasztor, “Exclusive Peek at SpaceX Data Shows Loss in 2015, Heavy Expectations for Nascent Internet Service,” Wall Street Journal, January 13, 2017.
“can do a competing thing”: Ashlee Vance, “The New Space Race: One Man’s Mission to Build a Galactic Internet,” Bloomberg Businessweek, January 22, 2015.
16. Beyond Earth Orbit
“invest in Blue Origin”: Irene Klotz, “Bezos Is Selling $1 Billion of Amazon Stock a Year to Fund Rocket Venture,” Reuters, April 5, 2017.
Index
A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z
A;
Adams, Douglas, 46
Adams, Mike, 94
Aerojet Rocketdyne, 188, 191–92
aerospace industry
investors, 1, 39, 55–57
methodology of development, 64
problems of, 79–80
Airbus, 210, 234
Albrecht, Mark, 100, 104, 124, 172
Alexander, Bretton, 168, 191, 239–40
Allen, Paul, 2, 6, 26, 93–94, 97, 210
Alsbury, Michael, 213–14
Altan, Bulent, 110
Amazon, 3–5, 236–37
beginning and development of, 18, 27, 55, 71
philosophy of, 204
American Rocket Company, 53
Amos-6, 221–24, 247
Andreessen, Marc, 27
Ansari, Anousheh, 6
Ansari X Prize, 5–7, 53, 93–95, 97
Apollo program, x, 48, 65, 139–40, 150, 240
engineering design, 197
heat shield, 156
moon landing, 240
Rockwell International builders, 19
Arianespace, 24, 82, 171–72, 227–28
purchase of Soyuz rockets, 59
reusable rockets, 250
Armstrong, Neil, 94
Ashcroft, John, 189
Astrobotic, 242, 244
Atlas V, 9, 31–33, 35–36, 59, 165, 176
Russian engine, 182–83, 185–86
Augustine, Norman, 143
Augustine Commission, 144, 147
B;
Beal Aerospace, 87–88
Beck Acain, Erin, 209
Behnken, Robert, 163–64, 166
Belfiore, Michael, 89
Bezos, Jeff, 3, 26, 122. See also Blue Origin
business acumen applied to space travel, 70
deliberate approach, 238
entertainment value of space travel, 245
