Leaving Earth
As humanity pushes to find peace on Earth, perhaps one day we can look toward the calm of space. We can leap past the boundaries and history that divide, and reunite once again as a culture dedicated toward something more, something better, something larger than what we know.
Space can unite. As different nationalities mix in the International Space Station right now, the future may hold the same promise of uniting cultures and histories and traditions that, otherwise, may never be known. Perhaps one day, without the burdens that tug upon our civilization and among the weightlessness, space will be a dedicated enclave of understanding and respect.
The Federal Aviation Administration holds its roots in the Department of Commerce from the 1930s. As aviation began to sprawl, as its convenience was understood and then needed, as the jet age captured the imagination of hundreds, then thousands, and now millions of people, the FAA grew to accommodate that surge. So too will the Office of Commercial Space Transportation.
In the next decade there will continue to be renewed discussions of a return to the moon. There will be arguments about whether it is possible to place humankind's first footprint on Mars. There will be sadness at the retirement of the space shuttle orbiter, which for nearly three decades has at times held the public speechless, both for its accomplishments and tragedies.
But as the government looks past Earth’s orbit, the time is approaching where the general public will plant their own flag, a flag of personal experience, in space.
Ribbons will be cut at spaceports. Engineers race to develop the next reusable launch vehicle. Blog sites, twitter accounts, and new forms of social media bloom to build that momentum. It may happen slowly, it may not happen fast enough for some. Yet it is an inevitable fact that space will become a part of daily culture in the future.
And throughout the timeline that commercial space transportation creates for itself, the Office of Commercial Space Transportation will assume the burden and the privilege of watching it grow, of helping it blossom, of doing all it can to ensure the safety of those who choose to push the natural physics of nature, to shake the bonds that hold us down, and explore a new frontier.