Congress to NASA: build powerful moon rocket ASAP

Found this recent article and thought Id share with you guys.

I for one agree that we need to get back into manned space exploration, but is there an underlying non-financial reason as to why the programs are being delayed, and our shuttle program is being scrapped?

Barack Obama's White House wants to cancel both Ares rockets. Under its new plan, commercial space taxis would be used to ferry astronauts to the space station. A so-called heavy-lift rocket with similar capabilities to the Ares V would be developed to fly astronauts to asteroids and ultimately to Mars, but that costly effort would not begin until 2015.

But many members of Congress, which will have to approve the White House's new plan for it to proceed, have been sceptical of the proposed change in course. They fear that the heavy-lift rocket is being pushed too far into the future, delaying NASA's return to human space exploration.

Now it seems Congress will try to tweak the plan so that NASA starts work on that rocket much sooner. Florida senator Bill Nelson, who chairs a Senate committee that oversees NASA policy, has sent a letter to Maryland senator Barbara Mikulski, who chairs the Senate committee that sets NASA's budget, recommending that work begin on the heavy lifter in 2011.

www.newscientist.com...

--GeminiSky

I think the reasons for this ARE financial, but not in the way people would think. If we were to mine the moon, asteroids, ect- the untold wealth would make EVERYONE happy, content, and life would be livable- new technologies, no fighting over resources...

And for control, we cant have that now, can we?

www.nasa.gov...








First test flight to be in 2018, but not now I guess



I think commercializing space to an extent isn't bad, but their are some things that JUST a well funded national government can afford, such as going to Mars. But I think under supervision(at first) commercial taxis are fine but canceling the ares v rocket is a mistake!

Would it cause too many problems if the Ares5 was funded by international cooperation i.e. with help from the ESA, JAXA and the Russians ? Maybe the Chinese too ?

A manned trip to Mars would stretch the budget of the USA even in a much healthier financial climate than today ... I think a bit of togetherness wouldn't go amiss when it comes to the Moon and beyond.

I can't see privately funded/commercial space flights extending beyond communications satellite launches, unfortunately, or the "day trips" planned by Virgin Galactic for low earth orbit.

There is NO money to help lift up the unemployed and those living in tents, but there IS money to build more rockets to the moon?

It wouldn't be so bad if that fund could give an immediate return or in the short term, but it isnt likely, afterall, the trips to the moon over decades had not given up any commercial exploitation worth a cent from it except the tech involved which trickled down to industries. But now, rocket tech is old tech.

May that proposal fail. Better to sort out the mess with the economy, the threats of wars and the devastating oil spill first before even contemplating space. The time will come but not today.

Perhaps Obama doesn't want to spend a whole lot of money on rocket technology, because they are now close to finishing the reverse engineering on a downed ET ship.

Until they have finished their work, and a have a functioning prototype, they would not want to make any announcements. So, they simply push the deeper space exploration time window out a decade or two, making it seem that they are still interested in advancing this old method of getting off of the planet...but just having a few budget issues at the moment...

Plus, one would think, they will need to do the whole disclosure thing on some kind of schedule they are comfortable with - before they announce they have a working ET propulsion system.

Just a different speculative take on why Obama, a self-confessed space enthusiast, would seem to be purposely delaying new exploration initiatives.

reply to post by GeminiSky


It looks like the rats (elites) are preparing to desert the ship (earth).