SKIRMISHER

Lockheed Martin has just out-bid the Boeing and Northrop Grumman duo on the development of the new Orion “Apollo on steroids” space ship. NASA awarded the multi-billion dollar contract to Lockheed because of its “achievable” design, implying that the Orion will be using known technologies, and not new, bold innovations.

Orion is to carry up to six astronauts to the International Space Station; a later version would take four astronauts to the moon, where they would use a separate lander ship to reach the surface. Still later versions could serve as crew-return vehicles for ships that one day may take humans to Mars, NASA officials said.

The shuttle fleet is to be retired in 2010. Orion is to make its first human flight by 2014, but at Congress’s urging NASA hopes to fly at least a year earlier to minimize a gap in the nation’s ability to send people into space. The agency is also developing new booster rockets, based on space shuttle technology, to launch Orion and cargo to the moon. The rocket to launch Orion is set to make its first flight in 2009.

Now all we have to do is wait for the ensuing sarcasm to creep into our daily rhetoric, in the same way Apollo’s moon landing gave birth to brilliant-but-eventually-overkilled smart-aleckisms like “If you could bring men to the moon, why couldn’t we solve world hunger?” This time, it might sound like, “If you could build Orion and send men beyond the moon, why do we keep on giving nincompoops juicy government positions?” Unfunny, I know, but wait till you hear what China’s taikonauts will say.

Stumble it!