“This is America’s Rocket”
I found this video via NASAWatch just now — apparently it’s been making the rounds but hasn’t reached my work inbox as of yet:
While it was amusing to see one of my friends from New Orleans and what I think was the back of my boss’ head in a couple of the clips, I have to agree with Keith that the video is propaganda. And not merely propaganda aimed at saving Constellation, but saving Ares I in particular – made clear by the emotional manipulation towards the end of the vehicle, where images of children set to funereal music segue into an image of Ares I, equating it with The Space Program and describing it as “America’s Rocket”.
But nearly as apalling in this regard is the map which appears at about 6:25. Notice anything missing from this map purporting to show the players in Constellation? It isn’t ATK, Boeing, or Pratt & Whitney. While Turzillo may have merely scavenged this animation from other public video, the way that it is used here suggests that these contractors, with NASA, are the only ones taking part in Constellation. It is spliced in under the “Who Are You Guys?” segment, after all, the question in-context implying Constellation as a whole – were this video explicitly showcasing Ares I, I’d see no problem with it, but as it very clearly attempts to encapsulate the whole program it comes across as a slap in the face to the rest of us.
About three or so years ago, when Ares I’s many, many problems really started coming to light andthe fixes started to eat away at other areas of the agency’s budget, I cynically speculated that at some point all other money at NASA’s disposal would be used up, and Orion itself would have to be cancelled in order to fund the development of the vehicle meant to launch it. In Gift of the Magi fashion, we might eventually end up with a rocket that worked, but it would come at the cost of sacrificing the purpose for which it was supposedly built.
I may be reading too much into this single video by a Ares I engineer (made on his own time, and not sanctioned by his employer), but I have to wonder if this is what it will come to when the new space policy is taken up by Congress. I’m certainly no less cynical about such things than I was three years ago, so I can readily imagine the absurd prospect of the rest of Constellation getting the axe, while Ares I is saved by grace of its stronger Congressional backing – despite being shorn of its stated reason for being.
