Senate Commerce Hearing–NASA At a Crossroads: Reasserting American Leadership in Space Exploration, July 2016

The subcommittee on Space, Science, and Competitiveness of the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee held a hearing on July 13, 2016 entitled “NASA At a Crossroads: Reasserting American Leadership in Space Exploration.”   Chaired by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), the main theme was how to avoid a disruption in the human spaceflight program when a new President takes office in 2017 as occurred when President Obama cancelled the Constellation program.   SpacePolicyOnline.com published a summary of the hearing on July 24, 2016.  Witnesses were:

• Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA Associate Administrator for Human Exploration and Operations
• Mary Lynne Dittmar, Executive Director, Coalition for Deep Space Exploration
• Mike Gold, Vice President of Washington Operations, SSL (formerly Space Systems Loral)
• Mark Sirangelo, Vice President, Space Systems Group, Sierra Nevada Corporation
• Dan Dumbacher, Professor of Engineering Practice, Purdue University (formerly NASA deputy associate administrator for exploration systems development)