Future astronauts face tricky transition

By Tariq Malik

Senior editor

updated 4:48 p.m. ET Sept. 16, 2008

NASA’s astronaut corps has long been a symbol of American exploration and drive, but as the agency turns 50 the cadre of U.S. space explorers faces some difficult challenges.

With NASA’s 50th anniversary approaching on Oct. 1, today's astronauts are looking ahead at the looming 2010 retirement of the agency’s aging space shuttle fleet and at least a four-year gap before the replacement spaceship — the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle — lifts off with spacefliers aboard.

There is even worry that NASA astronauts won’t have rides to the international space station during the hiatus unless the agency gets a vital waiver to buy seats aboard Russian Soyuz spacecraft after 2011. 

It’s enough to give some veteran astronauts food for thought on what the future holds for them beyond the shuttle, while others remain committed to the long-duration missions that will be the only available rides until NASA renews manned lunar treks by 2020.

“One of the things that you’re seeing now is exactly what happened with Apollo,” said Roger Launius, a former NASA historian who chairs the Division of Space History at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum in Washington. “As people began to see that program wind down literally … astronauts were beginning to leave the corps.”

NASA’s Astronaut Office is doggedly working to preserve its base of experienced spacefliers and planning to swell its ranks with a new group of up to 15 astronauts in the summer of 2009.

“We’ll certainly have people retire as they get older, and they decide to go off and do another career. We’ll see a lot of that happening,” said four-time shuttle flier Steve Lindsey, chief of NASA’s Astronaut Office. “What I don’t want to see is us hit 2010 and all of our experience walk out the door.”

There are about 90 astronauts on NASA’s flight roster today, with less than six still waiting for that first assignment to a space-bound crew, Lindsey told Space.com. Somewhere between 10 and 15 new astronauts may join up in the new class, though the actual number remains to be seen, he added.

“One of my objectives is to get everyone in the office flown by 2010,” Lindsey said. “And my current projection is we’re going to be easily able to do that.”

The goal, he said, is to ensure that NASA’s astronaut corps is as experienced as possible before the shuttle fleet retires and ready to withstand the departure of retiring spacefliers. NASA will have to retain enough veterans to lead next year's incoming class of astronaut candidates, Lindsey said.

“They said the Astronaut Office may decrease in size from 90 to about 60,” said astronaut biographer Michael Cassutt, author of “Who’s Who in Space.” The drop, Cassutt said, would follow a pattern similar to that seen during the Apollo-shuttle transition.

Heavy decisions
While some short missions are expected during Orion test flights, the majority of post-shuttle spaceflights will be long-duration expeditions to the space station and, ultimately, the moon. But the years of training for those flights, which include long trips to Russia and other countries, can be challenging for families at home.

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“I think a lot of people in our office are looking into their hearts to see if they want to stay on, and if they stay on, do they want to fly long-duration missions?” said astronaut Mike Fincke, who is training for his second six-month station flight as Expedition 18 commander this fall. “I know for me, that this is definitely where I want to be and hopefully I’ll be able to get back in at the end of that long line and back up.”

To make long-duration spaceflights more palatable, NASA is working with its international partners to streamline space station training wherever possible, Lindsey said. That includes assigning astronauts to prime crew slots before they’ve ever served on a backup team, then folding their backup training in as part of their primary mission preparations, he added.

“We’ve been able to reduce the training template, the amount of time from assignment to launch,” Lindsey said, adding that the training flow should now typically run about two and a half years.

But some veteran astronauts have already taken their leave, as demonstrated by last month’s retirement of teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan and the May departure of spacewalker James Reilly II, who left the corps after three spaceflights, five spacewalks and 13 years at NASA.

“I had three excellent flights and three great teams,” said Reilly, adding that NASA astronauts had a challenge ahead in crossing the gap between shuttle and Orion. “I look backward on that, and we had a lot more folks that needed to fly, and I had done everything that I had pretty much thought I could do as an astronaut.”

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