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STATE OF NASA 

ADMINISTRATOR BOLDEN 

Kennedy Space Center, FL 

Feb. 2, 2015 

Thank you, Bob (Cabana). It’s great to be here today at the 

Kennedy Space Center, where so many giant leaps have been 

made – and where so many of our future dreams will take flight. 

It was just a few short years ago that President Obama stood 

here in the Armstrong Operations and Checkout building and 

committed us to a Journey to Mars, beginning with an 

unprecedented mission to send astronauts to an asteroid as part 

of a stepping stone approach to reach the Red Planet. 

Thanks to the hard work of our NASA team – and the work of our 

contractor, academic and entrepreneurial partners all across 

America -- we’ve made a lot of progress on that journey. 
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This includes progress in integrating all of our work in a structured 

roadmap that is leading us to breakthroughs in new advanced 

technologies, driving us to new destinations and generating the 

inspiration on which future generations will thrive. 

Just behind me are some tangible examples of our progress. The 

Orion spacecraft, which recently performed a near flawless flight 

test on its first journey to space, is being taken apart right now so 

it can reveal its secrets about that amazing flight. What we learn 

will prepare us for its next launch aboard our Space Launch 

System rocket (SLS) and its future with astronauts aboard 

exploring farther into our solar system than ever before. 

Thanks to grit, determination and American ingenuity, we’ve 

returned cargo resupply missions to the United States, insourcing 

these jobs and creating a whole new private market in low Earth 

orbit. 
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Now U.S. companies, large and small, are developing the new 

systems in which our astronauts soon will travel from right here on 

the Space Coast in Florida to low Earth orbit. This initiative, 

where we hand off low Earth orbit transportation to the private 

sector, is critical to our journey to Mars. 

The Boeing CST-100 mockup behind me that features the 

company’s first-generation weld structure is a prime example of 

how the American aerospace industry is rising to the challenge of 

increasing crew safety while bringing down the cost of space 

travel. 

This CST-100 weldless structure is an example of the innovative 

engineering that makes the spacecraft reusable up to ten times. 

This pressure dome has no welds, which allows for a short 

turnaround time between flights, increases simplicity of production 

and drives down costs. 
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SpaceX also is working on a Crew Dragon to complement the 

successful cargo capsule that has now been regularly delivering 

cargo and science experiments to the International Space Station 

(ISS) for more than two years. The Dragon cargo module behind 

me flew SpaceX’s first mission to the ISS, becoming the first 

spacecraft produced by a private entity to be launched into space, 

rendezvous with and be berthed to an orbiting outpost and deorbit 

and land in tact back here on Earth. 

A version of the Crew Dragon is being prepped for shipment and 

is set to arrive just down the road at Cape Canaveral Air Force 

Station in the next couple weeks for an upcoming pad abort test 

flight. Both SpaceX and Boeing have set up operations here on 

the Space Coast, bringing jobs, energy and excitement about the 

future with them. 
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To further advance these plans and keep on moving forward on 

our journey to Mars, President Obama is proposing an FY2016 

budget of $18.5 billion dollars for NASA, building on the significant 

investments the Administration has made in America’s space 

program over the past six years. That’s a half billion-dollar 

increase over last year’s enacted budget, and it is a clear vote of 

confidence in you – the employees of NASA – and the ambitious 

exploration program you are executing. 

Your work is part of a vital strategy to equip our nation with the 

new advanced manufacturing and space technologies for the 

future and inspire a new generation of explorers to make the next 

giant leaps in human experience. NASA is firmly on a Journey to 

Mars. Make no mistake, this journey will help guide and define 

our generation. 
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This year we celebrate 50 years since Edward White left his 

Gemini capsule to become America’s first spacewalker. It was 

only a few years later that we landed humans on the moon, and 

not too long after that the United States became the first, and still 

only nation, to successfully land a spacecraft on Mars. 

Our incredible 30-year Space Shuttle Era followed from the early 

‘80’s through July 2011, during which the science community saw 

the deployment of three of the four Great Observatories deployed 

from the shuttle during the decade of the ‘90’s – the Hubble 

Space Telescope (Apr ’90), the Compton Gamma Ray 

Observatory (Apr ’91) and the Chandra X-Ray Observatory (Jul 

’99) – contributing to a golden age of planetary and astrophysics 

exploration and discovery. It was through the Space Shuttle 

Program that NASA opened space flight to many who had 

previously had no chance of flying – bringing diversity in our 

crews to include women, minorities and astronauts from many of 

our partner nations – perhaps its greatest legacy. 
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Using shuttle as our transportation for our astronaut construction 

crews, we then spearheaded assembly of the International Space 

Station (ISS) in which humans have now lived continuously for 

more than 14 years. Over the past six years, we’ve taken the 

most concrete steps ever to advance a human mission to Mars.

This journey to Mars, indeed our entire path to the future, starts 

now, right here on Earth. Our commercial crew work, for 

example, is headquartered here at Kennedy, but encompasses 

efforts in 37 states from Nevada to Montana to Kansas, 

Wisconsin, New Jersey and North Carolina. Whether you're 

working in a family-run composite fabrics mill in Pennsylvania or 

developing the next generation of Mars rovers in California; from 

the Ohio Space Corridor to the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport in 

Virginia, you're part of our Journey. 
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Right now in Mississippi at our Stennis Space Center, we just 

tested the RS-25 engines from the space shuttle, four of which 

will power our new Space Launch System to carry Orion on future 

missions to deep space. In just a few weeks, the solid rocket 

booster for that rocket will be fired up in Utah. 

Students from the Governor’s School for Science and Technology 

in Hampton, Virginia, winners of the Lockheed Martin – NASA 

Exploration Design Challenge, flew radiation shielding 

experiments on Orion and continue to use our commercial 

partners to send experiments to the Station, nurturing not only 

new discoveries, but the hands-on experience of a new 

generation hungry to make space their own. 

This summer, NASA plans to once again test our Low Density 

Supersonic Decelerator off the coast of Hawaii to continue 

proving in flight the new technologies critical for landing larger 

payloads on the surface of the Red Planet. 
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We know that technology drives exploration and our journey to 

Mars. We also will continue to develop advanced solar electric 

propulsion systems needed for the Asteroid Redirect Mission 

(ARM) and other deep space missions and to make advances in 

the atomic clocks and green propellants that will guide and power 

our future missions. 

Landing on an asteroid traveling through space or retrieving a 

piece of it requires advanced autonomous robotics and guidance 

and control technologies. These NASA-developed technologies 

will be applicable to commercial satellite servicing, future 

exploration, resource extraction, mining, in situ resource utilization 

and planetary sample return. The asteroid mission also will 

demonstrate advanced high-power Solar Electric Propulsion 

(SEP), critical for future NASA and commercial uses. The 

mission will test asteroid deflection techniques and may provide 

information to inform future work to help us protect our home 

planet. 
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We have identified several asteroids that could be good 

candidates and will make a decision soon on a capture option. 

As we advance our journey to Mars, we’re also focusing here on 

Earth on making aviation greener, quieter and more efficient. 

Every U.S. aircraft and U.S. air traffic control tower has NASAdeveloped-technology on board. NASA scientists and engineers 

are working on new composite materials that will make future air 

and spacecraft lighter and more durable. NASA is with you when 

you fly and we’re committed to transforming aviation by 

dramatically reducing its environmental impact, maintaining safety 

in more crowded skies and paving the way toward revolutionary 

aircraft shapes and propulsion systems. 

As we all know, the most important planet we study is the one on 

which we live - Earth. The reality is our planet is changing – and 

the data continues to prove this, but we’re on it. 
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NASA is a leader in Earth and climate science and our constantly 

expanding view of our planet from space is helping us understand 

Earth and its changes. 

When natural disasters impact us, the Space Station and NASA 

satellites are there to help make time-critical observations and aid 

in recovery. In the last twelve months, we’ve launched five Earth 

science missions – five! The last in these “Year of Earth” 

missions, Soil Moisture Active Passive, or SMAP, was launched 

just this past Saturday. These missions are studying such diverse 

things as ocean winds, components of our atmosphere such as 

clouds and aerosols and precipitation on a global level. 

SMAP will give us for the first time EVER a picture of soil moisture 

on a global scale. The mission will help improve climate and 

weather forecasts and allow scientists to monitor droughts and 

better predict flooding caused by severe rainfall or snowmelt. 
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SMAP data will allow nations to better forecast crop yields and 

bolster early-warning systems. 

The Airborne Snow Observatory uses instruments aboard aircraft 

to tell, again -- for the first time EVER -- how much water is stored 

in the mountain snowpack and how that changes from week to 

week. This is critical to helping evaluate and plan strategies to 

combat the intense drought plaguing California and many 

southwestern states and help protect their businesses and 

communities. In Colorado, the observatory is flying in the 

Uncompahgre Basin and the headwaters of the Rio Grande, 

which also stretch to Texas. NASA is leading the way in 

understanding local, regional and global water cycles – 

information critical to understanding our environment and 

supporting our economy and national security. 
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The technologies we develop to explore space have practical 

applications right here on Earth. One example is the shock 

absorbers used during space shuttle launches that are now being 

used to brace buildings during earthquakes, preventing damage 

and saving lives; or a NASA-simplified bacteria test being used to 

monitor water quality in rural communities around the world and 

cabin pressure monitors that alert pilots when oxygen levels are 

approaching dangerously low levels in their aircraft. 

As we strive to achieve the dream of sending humans to Mars, it’s 

important to remember we’re already there. 

For 40 years, increasingly advanced robotic explorers 

have studied the Red Planet. This has dramatically increased our 

scientific knowledge and helped pave the way for astronauts to 

travel there. 
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Our latest Mars spacecraft, MAVEN, arrived last September to 

study the upper atmosphere and joined a fleet of orbiters and 

rovers on the surface. Next year, we will send the InSight lander 

to study the planet’s core. In 2020 a new rover building on the 

incredible success of Curiosity will help us prepare for human 

arrival at Mars and, for the first time ever, will cache a sample for 

later return to Earth. 

Mars is a key destination, but it’s only one point on our journey of 

discovery. It’s a journey across and out of our solar system to the 

farthest reaches of the universe and the frontier of the human 

capacity to explore. 

I was privileged 25 years ago this April to pilot the Space Shuttle 

Discovery’s STS-31 mission, during which we deployed the 

Hubble Space Telescope. Hubble is still doing amazing science, 

and the last textbook that will have to be rewritten because of its 

discoveries hasn’t even been drafted yet. 
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In just three years, we’ll launch the James Webb Space 

Telescope, Hubble’s successor, and continue to reveal the 

unknown with the largest observatory ever put in space. That 

amazing telescope is taking shape right now in suburban 

Maryland, where the mirrors have arrived and the “heart” of the 

telescope that holds its instruments successfully completed a 

nearly four-month test in a cryogenic thermal vacuum chamber. 

After nearly nine years and three billion miles of travel, the New 

Horizons spacecraft was awaken last month in preparation for its 

arrival in the Pluto system in July. Right now Dawn is 

approaching the dwarf planet Ceres. Juno is speeding toward 

Jupiter where it will not only send back unprecedented data from 

a first ever polar orbit of our giant neighbor, it will demonstrate 

how solar power can work at great distances from the sun. 

Looking to the future, we’re planning a mission to explore 

Jupiter’s fascinating moon Europa, selecting instruments this 

spring and moving toward the next phase of our work. 
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The Kepler mission continues to discover new planets outside our 

solar system. It has confirmed more than 1000 planets, some of 

which could be rocky like Earth. The Solar Dynamics 

Observatory just took its 100 MILLIONTH image of the sun and in 

dozens of other Astrophysics and Heliophysics missions, the data 

streaming back to us is bathing us in information through which 

scientists will sort, decipher and make discoveries for years to 

come. 

Our journey of discovery has only just begun. Together, humans 

and robots will pioneer Mars and the solar system. In fact, they 

already work closely together aboard the Space Station. As the 

President said in his State of the Union speech two weeks ago, 

“[we’re] ...pushing out into the solar system not just to visit, but to 

stay.” 
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Next month we launch astronaut Scott Kelly and his Russian 

counterpart, Mikhail Kornienko, on a one-year mission aboard the 

Station to learn more about how to live and work in space for the 

long term. We’ll compare his vital signs to those of his twin 

brother, Mark, here on Earth in a first ever experiment using 

identical twins to learn more about the effects of living in space. 

So as I stand before you today, in front of these very tangible 

examples of our progress and our future, I can unequivocally say 

that the State of NASA is strong. 

Our newest rocket, the Space Launch System, has moved from 

formulation to development, something no other exploration class 

vehicle has achieved since the agency built the Space Shuttle. 

AND RIGHT HERE AT KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, the ground 

systems team has also moved from formulation to development, 

making steady progress toward modernizing and advancing our 

ground systems to be ready to launch the SLS. 
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We have two commercial providers bringing cargo and research 

to the Space Station, something that would have been science 

fiction just a few years ago is now fact. This success and the 

rapid progress our commercial crew providers are making validate 

our faith and investment in commercial space. 

Science maintains its intense grip on the world’s imagination in 

the handful of examples I mentioned and there are dozens more. 

None of this happens by accident. We outlined a vision, got bipartisan support for it and then let the most talented workforce on 

or off the planet go execute the plan. 

Some have said that NASA is adrift. If you look at everything I 

talked about today – at the spacecraft of the future behind me and 

the concrete plans in development for human and robotic 

exploration in cis-lunar space and beyond. 
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If you visit our various NASA and commercial manufacturing 

facilities where work is ongoing for our future such as Michoud, 

here at KSC, in Utah, Texas or California. If you travel the world, 

as I regularly do, and see the enthusiasm I see for NASA 

everywhere I go, or interact with, as I do regularly, the tens of 

thousands of students around the world from elementary through 

graduate school who are excited about the dream of one day 

traveling into space and visiting Mars, I think you’ll come to a 

different conclusion. That the idea we’re adrift is an empty hook 

trying to catch yesterday’s fish. 

I couldn’t be more excited about our future! We’re making steady 

progress and continuing to reach for new heights. 

We’re making our mark on history, and along the way we’re 

inspiring a whole new generation of scientists, engineers and 

astronauts. That’s why we’re dedicated to STEM education and 

broadening the pipeline to develop the leaders of the future. 
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That’s why we’ve been inviting citizen scientists, makers and 

innovators from across America to share their best ideas through 

prizes and challenges. 

I want every American to feel the pride that all of us who work at 

NASA have for our space program. What we have accomplished 

in the past six years, and what we will do in the years ahead, is 

the surest way I know to achieve that. 

NASA is an incredible investment for our nation because what we 

do not only uncovers new knowledge; it helps raise the bar of 

human achievement. 

People everywhere are attracted to what we do, because 

exploration embodies our values as a nation - resilience, hope, 

overcoming the challenges faced. As the Best Place to Work in 

Government, we share a willingness to learn from our mistakes so 

that we can transform the impossible into the possible. 
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Because of the dedication and determination of each and every 

one of you in our NASA Family, America’s space program is not 

just alive, it is thriving! Together with our commercial and 

international partners, academia and entrepreneurs, we’re 

launching the future. With the continued support of the 

Administration, the Congress and the American people, we’ll all 

get there together. 

Thank you.