Antares rocket explosion: Will it set back the commercialization of space?

The explosion of anunmanned commercial supply rocket bound for the International Space Station has raised some questions as to whether the incident will pose a significant setback ofthe commercializationof the space industry.

"The big fear here is that the reputation of this private company, Orbital Sciences, which is one of several private companies, that are going up into the International Space Station, whetherthis isgoing to erode the confidence that private companies can actually do this job," said Bob McDonald, host of CBC Radio's Quirks & Quarks.

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Orbital Sciences Corp.'s unmanned Antares rocket blew up just moments after liftoff Tuesday evening from the Virginia coast. The rocket was carrying a capsule loaded withspace station experiments and equipment for NASA. No one was injured when it exploded, shooting flaming debris down onto the launch area and into the ocean.

'Don't have much margin for error'

At the beginning, private companies, theyre going to make mistakes and things will go wrong. The problem is they dont have much margin for error, McDonald said. And so its sad that after 50 years in spaceflight, that rockets still blow up like this and it'sjust hoping theyll be able to recover from this tragedy.

In recent years, particularly after retiring the space shuttle program, NASA has relied on private companies for certain tasks, including providing supply rockets to the International Space Station. Supporters of commercialization say themove to the private sector has andwill save the government space program millions of dollars.

Accidents do happen, and we've seen catastrophic accidents happen on NASA missions.- MarkSundahl, Cleveland State University law professor

"With the departure of the shuttle missions, the fact that the United States, who is supposed to be this space superpower, can't launch their astronauts into space, is a really big thing," saidRyanMarciniak, a host and astronomer at the Ontario Science Centre, "The fact that theyhave to get to Russia to send theirastronautsto theISS, that definitely kicked off all these private companies coming up."

NASA is paying $1.9 billion to Dulles, Virginia-based Orbital Sciences for eight cargo hauls and $1.6 billion to California's SpaceX for 12 shipments. So far, all private space ventures to the space station have involved unmanned flights carrying cargo. ButMarciniak said that hebelievesin a couple years, some of these flights will be taking crew along with cargo.

"At the end ofthe day it's beneficial for NASA whowill be able todirectits funds to missions onlyNASAcan do because they're not profit-bearing missions such as deepspaceexploration," said MarkSundahl, Cleveland State University law professor who specializes in space commercialization.

I think some skeptics of this move from government resupply missions to theISStotheprivate sector may point at this [accident] and say 'Itold you so, you can't count on private companies.'But Ithinkthat's anabsolutelyunfair reaction. Accidents do happen, and we've seen catastrophic accidents happen on NASA missions.

The explosion won't likelyhave any long-term implications, Sundahlpredicted, adding thatprivate industry has beenremarkably successful with commercial cargo deliveries, including companies like Orbital,which hasalready had two successful resupply missions to the space station.

"We will learn from this accident, see whathappensand what went wrong and willensuresuccess in future missions. There will be a silver lining in all this."

Marciniak saidhe expects the accident will cause aripplethrough the industry, forcing companiesto second guess their systems and take extra precautions.

Industry 'growing unbelievably quickly'

"I think it's goingtobe inpeople's minds moving forward with the rest of the launchesthat are goingon but Idon't think it will slow it down at all. This is an industry that is growingunbelievably quickly."

"Unfortunately when you havesetbacks like this it raises questions with folks," said Eric Stallmer, president of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation."I'm sure there will be elements of Congress thatraise questions on whether this is the right path NASA should be going on, using the commercial sector.

"Personally I'm not concerned," he said."I think this is just one small aspect of thewholecommercialspace industry andthese things happens. This is not the first launchfailureand itprobablywon't be the last unfortunately."