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NASA Chief, Accident Investigator to Appear before Senate Committee

Posted on: Wednesday, 3 September 2003, 06:00 CDT

Sep. 3--WASHINGTON -- For the first time since the release of the independent investigation into the loss of space shuttle Columbia, the man who led that probe and the man who must reinvent NASA will appear this morning before congressional inquisitors.

NASA chief Sean O'Keefe and retired Adm. Harold Gehman, leader of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board, face the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee today.

The House Science Committee will kick off a series of hearings on Thursday, with Gehman as the first witness.

Lawmakers, returning to Capitol Hill after the August recess to a laundry list of big tasks, are nonetheless expecting answers to the questions they've been asking in the seven months since the Feb. 1 accident, which killed the seven astronauts on board.

The early hearings will likely cover much of the same ground as the board's report -- namely, what went wrong inside the National Aeronautics and Space Administration that allowed the accident to happen. Politicians are particularly interested in how the agency's budget affected the shuttle program and how NASA can make the shuttle safer to fly.

U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, a Florida Democrat and a space advocate, said his first questions will be about the board's findings and how NASA is going to hold people accountable for what happened. But he also wants to know what happens next.

"I want to know what they're going to do about it, and I want to additionally ask about the vision for the future," Nelson said.

His comments were echoed by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, who also sits on the subcommittee that controls NASA's budget -- and will consider the agency's 2004 budget request at a separate hearing today.

"I'm looking for a signal that there will be fundamental changes at NASA," said Hutchison, R-Texas. "I believe the agency needs a new culture of bold innovation and creativity."

NASA's long-term direction -- and, perhaps, its very survival -- depends on whether lawmakers like what they hear, and whether there is enough money to pay for it. Few dispute the fact that an ambitious space program is almost impossible to pull off on the $15.5 billion per year that NASA requested before the accident. But there may not be enough money to go around for lofty goals such as a manned mission to Mars.

David Goldston, majority staff director for the House committee, said the panel is aiming for six to eight hearings before Congress adjourns for the year. While some of the discussion will focus on the Columbia board's findings, he said, the committee will also look at subjects that weren't examined in great depth in the report, including how NASA handles risk, what kind of reorganization the agency needs, the future of private shuttle contractors and what the program's longer-term goals and budgetary needs will be.

Congress also needs details on the proposed orbital space plane, which NASA wants to build to ferry astronauts to and from the international space station.

Goldston and his counterpart on the Democratic side, Bob Palmer, said the committee still hasn't decided whether to produce its own report on the accident -- which it did after the 1986 Challenger disaster -- or how far down the chain of command the panel wants to go in questioning those who made crucial decisions about Columbia.

The House committee hopes to at least lay out some of the long-term issues before the end of the year, Goldston said, and then return to the debate early next year.

U.S. Rep. Bart Gordon, the ranking Democrat on the Science Committee's space and aeronautics subcommittee, and others in Congress who follow NASA say that ultimately the impetus for long-term change will have to come from the agency itself -- and the White House.

"It is difficult for Congress to be appropriating money at a phantom," said Gordon, D-Tenn. "There has to be a goal."

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(c) 2003. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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