Yes, the agency really is reconsidering it.
One can understand why PAO has to deny it, though.
[Update a few minutes later]
This looks like an interesting seminar. Things like this are why I sometimes regret not living in DC.
6 thoughts on “NASA And The Moon”
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The New America Foundation is holding Giant Leap: The Race To Mars and Back on Thursday. I plan on going. I am busy Tuesday and Wednesday.
I really wish NASA would GTF out of the way, and let Elon go to Mars. He’ll get plenty of one-way volunteers to precede him, and it won’t cost a fraction of what Gerst thinks it would.
I think this is just a sign of the current budget constraints. Back then you also had LUNOX and the ilk. Unfortunately they didn’t stick to those ideas.
What budget constraints?
“Because President Obama told NASA to skip the moon and go straight to Mars.”
Sort of like his decision to pull the troops out of Iraq.
“NASA has not laid out details of how it will actually get humans to Mars, and the lack of concrete plans has caused much consternation among the spaceflight community.”
Yup but this way allows the administration and NASA to claim they are going everywhere and anywhere while going nowhere. It’s great for PR.
“NASA and outside experts told the committee that the current administration regards the lunar surface as the purview of other nations’ space programs and that it is not of interest to the U.S. human exploration program.”
Wow… And people wonder why other people think Obama hates the USA. It’s like saying that we have no right to traverse the open seas. And Obama probably thinks other countries should control those too.
” The President, in 2010, made it clear that he wanted to avoid the moon, perhaps partly because that was part of President George W. Bush’s space policy.”
What?! Not the great uniter who views people only as Americans rather than colors and dollar signs. I guess this would explain why Obama cut funding for Bush’s AIDS programs in Africa all while having his party scream racist at the top of their lungs.
The cynic in me is saying that now that they’ve gone ahead and built the Ares-V maybe it’s time to give it a mission. Build it and they (Congress) will spend. I worry that this becomes the mother of all boondoggles. As designed this does squat for getting us to Mars. Mars is 30 years out. Always has been, always will be….