[inaudible] [inaudible] the hearing will come to order. 2020 has been a year of challenge and triumph for americas space agency. The covid19 pandemic has disrupted planning and daytoday operations, but nasa and its commercial partners have achieved many successful outcomes. These include launching american astronauts to the International Space station and returning them safely to earth. And returning that launch vehicle safely to earth. Launching a perseverance rover to mars and preparing the space launch systems sls rocket and orion crew capsule for the first deep Space ExplorationProgram Mission next year. Im pleased that nasa administrator Jim Bridenstine is here to provide us with an update on the missions and programs and the agencys plans for the future. Further progress on the program is critical to achieving the goals of landing the first woman and next man on the moon by 2024 and establishing a sustainable presence opresent on or around r circus by 2028. Congress has given support for many key components of the arguments, notably the sls rocket, the orion, the crew capsule, human lander competition and various rovers and instruments to study. Last week the administrator announced a detailed plan for the program predicting total cost of 28 billion between fiscal years 2021 and 2025. Attending bipartisan support for the arguments is essential. But the members need confidence and that is a small term plan. The administrator will lay out t the detailed cost and schedule to help give us that confidence. The Program Receives a justifiable large amount of attention. But we should also recognize the tremendous success of the commercial crew program on may 30th the greta launched american astronauts on american rockets from american soil for the First Time Since 2011. Commercial crew represents a true Publicprivate Partnership where the government binds services from space companies. It would be helpful if the administrator would highlight how nasa is implementing the Lessons Learned from the commercial crew development. November last year the committee passed the nasa authorization act demonstrating strong support for the commercial crew. The legislation also strongly supported the key science priorities, aeronautics research, planetary exploration, Stem Education and other initiatives. Today the administrator bridenstine can provide an update on these missions and describe the major impacts on cost. Nasa plays an Important Role in americas whole of government approach to security in the space domain for exploration science. Great power competition is a reality. The space ambitions are well known and the Chinese Communist party is devoted enormous resources to military and civil Space Programs. Nasa recently signed a memorandum of understanding that nearly created the space force to bolster collaboration on standards and best practices for Space Operations, Scientific Research and planetary defense. Administrator bridenstine may want to comment on the memorandum of understanding and where he Sees Opportunities for collaboration with the space force. Even with the successes, Program Vulnerabilities remain as the program progresses we should remain vigilant to protect and strengthen International Partnerships particularly those built around the International Space station and low earth orbit research. We should ensure that groundbreaking initiatives such as Robotic Missions and planetary observatories continue making progress and maintain forces, maintain focus on other missions will require continued support and funding from congress. So i look forward to todays conversation with the administrator i now turn to my dear friend and colleague, the Ranking Member, for her opening remarks. Thank you mr. Jermaine and thank you for the bipartisan leadership on that reauthorization bill. Im pleased to join you to offer the act of 2019. Among other things the legislation would provide authorization for the human exploration programs including the lunar lander needed to return humans to the moon. There is agreement between the bills authors about how to proceed on the authorization and i hope the senate will consider this important bill this year. The recent Economic Impact shows that in 2019 the agency generated more than 64 billion in economic output and supported more than 312,000 jobs nationwide, and nasa and the space industry particularly in washington where the space activities account for 1. 8 billion of the states economy is with Companies Like blue origin, space x and aero job, thousands are dependent on this growing space industry. I always say theres a reason we have the space needle. 2020 was significant for nasa. For the first time in nine years, astronauts were launched from the u. S. Soil and for the First Time Ever those astronauts launched on the commercial spacecraft marking the dawn of a new era. It promises to be an even bigger year. Two commercial providers will begin regularly carrying astronauts to the space station. 2021 will also see the first launch of the space launch system that will return astronauts deep space in a few years. I look forward to watching americans exit the lunar lander which will be built in the state of washington and step onto the surface of the moon for the first time in more than 40 years, and im very enthusiastic about the program that will put the first woman on the moon. We need more than just the womens first step, we need women and minorities to be represented at every level of the programs. So i look forward to working with you and the chair man on how we increase the diversity in all of the aerospace industry. Given the new rockets and spacecraft they will fly over the next decade it is in. If the agency remain committed to safety. It must always be the top priority and for that to happen, engineers and Program Managers must have insight into the design and testing of new spacecraft. A major safety issue is the threat of orbital debris. Just last week the space station was forced to move her away from a piece of space debris. February the Committee Held a hearing on threats to space, and i called for increased investment and mapping of debris and improved Space Situational Awareness. I know you are also committed to addressing the threat and i look forward to working with you on that issue. While the human spaceflight programs are often in the spotlight, the agencys other missions and research are also critical for the country. As i said in washington, many western states we face an unbelievable threat from wildfires nasa satellites provide data that enables Disaster Management teams to measure the intensity as they learn and i also want to highlight the space grant program. Again a consortium at the university of washington is doing work to engage high school students, undergraduates in these areas of research and study which i think helps us get the next generation of workforce. The covid19 pandemic has impacted many programs as well as the people that support them, whether they are employees, contractors or researchers, so i look forward to hearing how the committee might work to keep the program on track and keeping people safely employed. This is a challenge but obviously we want to keep moving ahead so we look forward to your comments and testimony. Thank you for being here today and thank you for holding this important hearing. I think i heard the state of washington mentioned several times in senator cantwells Opening Statement. Clearly i should have mentioned it in my Opening Statement of the Important Role of the state of mississippi in all of the activities that we have planned particularly at the space center in Hancock County mississippi. At this point, administrator bridenstine, we have your prepared statement consisting of seven pages in the small type and we will enter that into the record at this point and you are recognized for five minutes or so to summarize your statement. Thank you, chairman and Ranking Member cantwell. It is an honor to be here. I will tell you i want to start by thanking you for the support weve received in the cares act, which ultimately enabled us to move forward on some of our very Important Missions. We call them Mission Essential functions of nasa. We needed that personal protective equipment and ability to make sure that our bruise could socially distance and do all the things necessary to be safe and the cares act was a part of that and we thank you for that. So, nasa is up to some amazing things. The two of you highlighted them very well. Low earth orbit we are commercializing very rapidly. Weve been underway with commercial resupply for a number of years and now we are moving forward with commercial crew which we are all excited about. Demo number two is complete, it was geared at the end of october we were going to launch crew number one and have a full complement of the astronauts including one International Partner from japan. This is a very exciting time for the agency as we move to commercialize space, but its not just about the commercial resupply and crew. We also want the space stations themselves eventually. The International Space station has been an amazing asset to the United States and it will be for years to come. But we all know that a day is going to calm when it comes to the end of its useful life. When that happens, we need to have funded the resources necessary to commercialize the low earth orbit for habitation. We want to make sure that in the United States and with your help we can ensure we have no gaps in low earth orbit. We think about apollo. We had during the apollo era as much as we loved it it came to an end and we had a gap of about eight years before the Space Shuttle and after, we had another gap of about eight years before the commercial crew. We want to make sure there is no gap in low earth orbit for the United States of america as we transition from the International Space station to the commercial space stations. But as both of you have identified whats happening in the low earth orbit as often as it is pales in comparison to what we are going to see when we land the first woman and next man on the surface of the moon under the program. We are going to the moon for a lot of really important reasons. But the chief reason to go to the moon is because it accelerates our path to mars and we believe that its important for the first person to land on mars to be an american astronaut and we want to make sure when we do go to mars we go with our International Partners. This is about american leadership, and of course what we just saw yesterday, japan announced its biggest budget for its space agency and its history. In fact, it was a 50 increase over the previous year. That is a massive increase for a nation like japan and they are focusing it on the Artemis Program. They are focused on supporting us as we lead the world to the moon. I will say that that is not unique though. We have seen budgets coming from europe that are also increasing, commensurate with the Artemis Program and nasas budget, so a lot of exciting things in the future and of course im grateful to you, mr. Chairman and Ranking Member cantwell for the continued bipartisan support for these Important Missions for the country. With that, i will yield back whatever time i have remaining and certainly im open to any questions. Thank you very much. You recently announced that the mission will take place at the end of november of next year. Part of the amount of mississippi is in the testing space launch system engine. How is the green run testing as it is progressing and do you have a target date for the full duration hot fire test . Its progressing very well. This is the stage of the rocket and it is proving itself to be an extremely capable system. We have a good bit of testing including where we fire all engines at the same time and thats going to be an amazing sight to see, likely to happen in november so we are moving rapidly towards that. Weve had challenges of course with hurricanes and some other challenges with covid, but weve also had some successes, so we are moving forward and we think that the test will be done in november, early november and we also believe that this sets us up for the first launch with and orion crew capsule in november of 2021, so we are moving rapidly towards that. Do you think we are still on track to meet that date . As of right now, yes, sir, we are. There are challenges for sure and depending how covid affects us, it could be more challenging. But i would say because this is a mission that is so unique, we do have margin in the schedule. We have reserved in the schedule and the cost and nasa does it for all of its missions. As of this point, we havent determined that we need to move off of the november date of next year. Ive been very impressed with how nasa has moved forward on any number of target dates. Let me ask about the continuing resolution. The continuing resolution this week obviously that is never idea, but the covid19 pandemic pretty much dictated that. This is a brief cr. Doesnt carry on into next year. You have spoken about the problem longterm continuing resolution. If you will, please discuss the broad impact if we cant get our job done in november, december, what that would mean for your programs. Yes, sir. The hardest part right now is the human landing system. That is what right now we are not funded to develop in its entirety. We are funded through the base period. Weve got the resources to go through basically february of 2021. And so, between now and february of 2021, i think we are okay. If we get to february of 2021 without an appropriation, thats going to put the brakes on our ability to achieve a moon landing by as early as 2024. And so, it is important to get these appropriations. I will also tell you, sir, the sooner we get the appropriations, the higher the probability of success. We are very grateful and i know the house and the senate are moving towards acr rather than a shutdown. We are very grateful for that. And i speak for the entire workforce when i say that, but i would also say the sooner we can get an appropriation, the higher the probability of success to the moon landing as soon as 2024. Thats the appropriation. What about the authorization bill, how important is it to pass an updated authorization bill . In my view, very important. I was an authorizer in the house of representatives and i can tell you what it enables me to do as the administrator. It demonstrates that this has strong bipartisan support that is lasting. Appropriations are one year in nature and they give us what we need to fund the program. But an authorization bill, this is a fundamental question i get everywhere i go is a nasa administrator. People ask how do you ensure the program doesnt get canceled. Like weve had a program of seeing programs develop and then cancel. The answer is we need the authorization bill that codifies that what we are doing as Broad National consensus and bipartisan support. I think we are there but putting that into law would be meaningful for the agency. Thank you very much. Senator cantwell. Thank you mr. Chairman. Administrator bridenstine, one of the things we hear a lot about again as we change and innovate is the skill level of the workforce. We work very hard on Stem Education in the state of washington and certainly want to work on it on a national perspective, so want to hear your thoughts on what else we need to be doing and what does that a skills gap look like and also interested in Nasas Program for the transonic wing. One of the things we are interested in the composites and continuing to the development of composites and manufacturing, so i want to understand what you think we should be doing on that kind of technology for the future as well. Yes, very good questions. And i will tell you the transonic trust break wing has me very excited about the future of aviation. When we think about the value of an asset to the United States of america, a lot of people they think about space and the moon and mars and Robotic Exploration of the solar system, but the aeronautics piece is probably the most impact to the american economy. Because this is a major export for the country and we have been leading here for so many generations. Of course we have the challenge with covid and when we think about aeronautics, right now its being stressed significantly, but i think as a nation, we have to take this opportunity and lead. When i say that, that transonic trust break wing we are talking about increasing what we call the aspect ratio of the wing making it longer and thinner. The thing that does is reduces what we call induced drag which is what you get from the lift created by the aircraft. Basically it spreads out the amount of downward thrust you get from the wing. It does increase what we call the parasitic drag but that is