A Presidential panel is putting a damper on NASA’s ambitious plans to return to the Moon by the 2020s:
WASHINGTON – A White House panel of independent space experts says NASA’s return-to-the-moon plan just won’t fly.
The problem is money. The expert panel estimates it would cost about $3 billion a year beyond NASA’s current budget.
“Under the budget that was proposed, exploration beyond Earth is not viable,” panel member Edward Crawley, a professor of aeronautics at MIT, told The Associated Press Tuesday.
The panel’s report provided options for President Barack Obama but said NASA’s current plans would have to change in any case. Five years ago, then-President George W. Bush proposed returning astronauts to the moon by 2020. To pay for it, he planned on retiring the shuttle next year and shutting down the international space station in 2015.
All those deadlines would have to change, the panel said. Space exploration would work better by including other countries and private for-profit firms, it said, and NASA’s budget would have to be increased in order to move forward with “an exploration program that will be a source of pride for the nation.”
If America cannot achieve the goals set for space exploration, even after international and commercial partners pitch in, “it should accept the disappointment of setting lesser goals,” the report said.
Hardly the spirit that sent us on a road to the stars nearly 50 years ago:
o
Sadly, though, I think it’s correct, and that the next flag that gets planted on the lunar surface very well may not be American.
I have a feeling the future of space flight is going to come from the private industry. The Feds may be better off chalking NASA up to lessons learned and sunk cost and sell all the space flight capital to the highest bidder (if they can find anyone to buy it).
Amagi writes-
The Feds may be better off chalking NASA up to lessons learned and sunk cost and sell all the space flight capital to the highest bidder (if they can find anyone to buy it).
If they can make a profit, maybe the Ferengi would be interested.
Now that it’s looking like the ISS was just another space-race type stunt (yep, done that, CHECK, now we can let it crash back to Earth), why should we consider funding *any* more of these projects with taxpayer money?
Beats me why the gov’t agonizes over a measly couple of billion for NASA anyway… why not just borrow it and let future generations pay, just like the bailouts, the stimulus, etc.?
The abandonment of manned space flight would be the worst decision this administration or any administration could make. I do however believe that there needs to be far more involvement by private businesses and the international community. Space exploration is a human endeavor, not simply an American one.
This defeatism is one reason why so many JFK Democrats are not EMK/Pelosi/Obama Democrats.
chsw
Back in 1969 a bunch of White Men who wore those nerdy birth-control glasses and pocket protectors beat the Soviets to landing Men on the Moon.
Today, NASA has a hard time keeping a shuttle from falling apart.
Today, we have “diversity” instead of a merit-based society.