Opinion | Next space explorers must go boldly — and safely

Richard Hagar
Guest columnist
Last week's launch of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying a Telstar 19v communications satellite launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. An approximate three minute time exposure of the launch illuminating the sky over Port Canaveral viewed from Exploration Tower.

Space exploration in the 21st century offers the possibility to reach new frontiers, from developing a lunar gateway for deep space travel, returning American astronauts to the surface of the Moon and eventually putting humans on Mars.

With NASA preparing to return crewed astronaut launches to the U.S. for the first time since the end of the Space Shuttle program in 2011, and return astronauts to deep space for the first time since the end of the Apollo program in 1972, we are on the cusp of an exciting new era in human spaceflight and exploration.


I spent much of my career developing and supporting the Apollo program that landed NASA astronauts on the Moon. The experiences our engineers learned on the first Apollo launches shaped the steps in place today to ensure the safety of the entire team and success of the program.

Apollo 1 would have been the first manned flight, with astronauts Virgil “Gus” Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chafee onboard. That 1967 mission was supposed to be simple — fly the vehicle, fire the Module Engine and return to Earth.

Apollo 1 astronauts, from left, Virgil "Gus" Grissom, Edward White II, and Roger Chaffee pose next to their Saturn 1 launch vehicle in this Jan. 17, 1967, photo at Launch Complex 34 at Cape Canaveral Air Station in Cape Canaveral, Fla.


I was the first launch crew member to enter the spacecraft after removing the crew to try and determine if there was an obvious cause for the fire. After months of investigations by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), one specific cause could not be identified.

Thankfully, we learned from the disaster that day in January. Over the years and subsequent missions, our procedures changed, methods got better and we improved the process to put man in space. NASA human spaceflight programs carefully incorporated these lessons throughout their safety requirements and the talented men and women throughout the agency work hard to make spaceflight as safe as possible for astronauts.


This “load and go” process allows SpaceX to inject more fuel without the cost or expertise necessary to build a larger rocket, but it may come at a heavy price. Mr. Musk already lost one unmanned rocket to this risky technique.

I suppose for Mr. Musk, inexperience is replacing the abundant safety protocols drilled into us after witnessing the Apollo 1 disaster. Astronaut safety is NASA’s number one priority on any space mission. There is no reason it should not be for private space travel, but commercial space companies like SpaceX play by different rules.



We owe it to future astronauts to remain diligent with our innovations and not blindly rush while possibly revisiting the mistakes we made decades ago.

Congress and the administration should overturn these shortsighted restrictions on commercial spaceflight safety standards, and NASA must ensure that before they put an astronaut on a commercial spacecraft that it lives up to the strict standards we have learned over the last 60 years of spaceflight.


Richard Hagar