In the News: Sean O'Keefe

"Each day we tolerate President Trump’s behavior we aren’t just humoring an incumbent who refuses to accept the election results. We are putting American citizens at risk," says University Professor Sean O'Keefe.

“There’s no doubt that we are not going back to the way it was. There will be a—quote unquote—new normal," says Catherine Gerard, associate director of Executive Education, about the short- and long-term effects of the novel coronavirus pandemic. “This has been an incredible disruption,” University Professor Sean O’Keefe said. “This disruptive change is having a global consequence.”

University Professor Sean O'Keefe recently participated in a study by the National Academy of Public Administration on which agency was best to handle civil space traffic management. O’Keefe believes the Office of Space Commerce is best suited for the task.

University Professor Sean O’Keefe reflects that working in both the legislative and executive branches "are both rewarding in their own different ways, as long as you don't confuse that bright line of distinction between policy formulation and program implementation. It typically works very successfully."

University Professor Sean O’Keefe analyzes that advancements during these past three administrations are proof that a NASA strategy can withstand nearly two decades of leadership transitions and annual appropriations. "Did it take a different route? Yup," says O’Keefe. "…But it’s still very much on exactly the same path."

"It’s an important inflection point, if you will, of now seeing the opportunity for commercial transportation of humans into space," says University Professor Sean O’Keefe, former administrator of NASA. "This is much akin to the transition when the first civil aviation aircraft took off decades ago after many decades of it being exclusively a public endeavor."

"This is a remarkable chapter in NASA’s history that has lived for 50 years to remind everybody at that remarkable storied agency what a tremendous accomplishment can be yielded even in moments in which it appears to be on the verge of failure," University Professor Sean O'Keefe says. "It reminds us of our humanity." 

"You can’t just turn the lights out and say, we’ll be back," says University Professor Sean O’Keefe. "[The space station] is an asset that needs constant operational attention."

"At its core, this is about an aircraft carrier skipper who sees an imminent threat and is forced to make a decision that risks his career in the act of what he believes to be the safety of the near 5,000 members of his crew," says University Professor Sean O’Keefe.

"Contamination from the president’s approach is amplified when his judgment is largely shaped by television commentators and his decision announced by tweet," write University Professor Sean O'Keefe and his co-author. "No one is as well positioned to balance the exigencies of combat and the demands of law and ethics as a panel of fellow sailors, Marines, airmen or soldiers," they add.

"We're seeing some really, really inventive entrepreneurs with grand visions that are basically just getting started to move towards that same pattern that we saw for commercial aviation that made traveling around the globe a relatively easy proposition," says Sean O'Keefe, University Professor and former NASA administrator.

Former NASA Administrator and University Professor Sean O'Keefe spoke with several media outlets about the July 20, 1969, landing of Apollo 11 on the moon and the possibility of future space exploration. "It is a common aspirational goal as big as what we saw in the 1960s," O’Keefe told the Gazette. "Could we see convergence around a common goal that could benight this era? Absolutely." 

"It’s too early to tell what the implications may be," says Sean O'Keefe, University Professor, about the SpaceX crew capsule accident setback.

"With the technology we have today, returning to the moon is within reach in five years. As we keep rediscovering, exploration really is a journey. It only gets longer when we take a break," writes Sean O'Keefe, Howard G. and S. Louise Phanstiel Chair in Strategic Management and Leadership.