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Bush To Announce Manned Trip To Moon, Mars
edmunz writes "Foxnews just placed an article on their website saying that Bush is expected to make an announcement towards the middle of next week, proposing a manned mission to Mars as well as a return to the moon. Bush hopes to spark a renewed public interest in space exploration. No mission would happen any time soon, rather a preparation of over a decade would take place before the first men/women set out to explore Mars."
nasa has a plan for a lander on europa complete with a sub-ice probe that's been sitting on the backburner for years.
I wouldn't even call these plans; at the moment, the only Europa-relevant mission currently under consideration by NASA is the Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter (JIMO). Unfortunately, as its name implies, JIMO won't have a lander facility. The mission, if it goes ahead, will be launched no sooner than 2011.
Tubal-Cain smokes the white owl.
here. They have links to other news sites. In particular, the UPI article has a mention about a presidential commission to review Nasa's plans. Interesting...
I am not particularly happy with the statement that all other Nasa programs that do not support the new effort are to be scrapped. Indeed. Perhaps this whole proposal can be amended to include a peer review of top scientists in reign in some of this...
Regarding the forthcoming Bush announcement on space policy: From the various sources reporting on the subject, here's what the Presidents plan will look like. 1. Manned space flight will be NASAs only priority. Almost all non-manned projects will done away with or rolled into the manned program if appropriate. 2. The space shuttle fleet will be retired. Done. Finished. They will stay in service long enough to finish construction of the space station in the next few years. 3. A new space vehicle, the CEV (Crew Exploration Vehicle) will be built and rolled into production in place of the shuttle. The era of winged spacecraft is over for nasa, the CEV is akin to a large Apollo capsule, only able to carry up to 6-8 crew. The CEV is usable in earth orbit AND lunar orbit. The shuttle was only capable of reaching earth orbit, the CEV will be able to leave earth orbit and fly to the moon! 4. Europe's Ariane rockets and Russia's Soyuz capsules will be used to access the space station until the CEV in finished and ready for use. 5. The hierarchy of NASA will be changed so that the Defense Department is now included in the planning and future use of future technology. Expect big stuff from this. Having the military involved is a GOOD thing. 6. The first return trip to the moon is planned for 2013 and the following missions will begin the process of building a permanent, manned presence there. 7. Also starting in 2013, NASA will end almost all involvement with the ISS. Expect this to possibly become a private venture. 8. The CEV and moon base construction will be a test-bed for the Mars missions that will follow. 9. MARS 10. After mars, there will be manned missions to the asteroids. NASA will become one of only 3 federal agencies to get a spending increase (5%) in its budget over the next 5 years. The other two being the Department of Defense and Homeland Security. In 2005 a lump sum of $800 Million will be awarded to NASA. If this is indeed the Presidents plan, it is nothing short of remaking NASA in the image of what it once was in the days of Apollo. Manned space flight with a purpose, the days of space truckers in orbit is *over*.
*Fortitudo, aequitas, fidelitas.*
Amoung other things they are saying that they plan to scrap the shuttle fleet after ISS is finished.
It also says that NASA will be the only department other than homeland security and the military to get a budget increase. Personally, I'm not sure this will really happen, since they are planning through 2013, which is (including the current) four presidential terms away. The US goverment isn't very good at sticking with one plan that long.
plus-good, double-plus-good
There is no ice on the moon?
stuff
Y'know...
First of all, nice rhyme. Don't know if it's original or not, but well done.
The same argument was made in 67, when they started to pour tons of money into the first moon landing, and continued for ages. There was a comic in Mad Magazine, from roughly 1972.
Q "How come the guvmint can put people on the moon, but they can't feed us poor people?"
A "Who wants poor people on the moon?"
No, it is not original. In fact, it is a rather famous poem, Whitey on the Moon by Gil Scott-Heron.
For the lazy slashdotters who need not click links for fear of evil pictures (and now popups! damnit goatse.cx trolls, quit with the popups! goatse was enough already!) I have reproduced it here:
Whitey on the Moon
A rat done bit my sister Nell.
(with Whitey on the moon)
Her face and arms began to swell.
(and Whitey's on the moon)
I can't pay no doctor bill.
(but Whitey's on the moon)
Ten years from now I'll be payin' still.
(while Whitey's on the moon)
The man jus' upped my rent las' night.
('cause Whitey's on the moon)
No hot water, no toilets, no lights.
(but Whitey's on the moon)
I wonder why he's uppi' me?
('cause Whitey's on the moon?)
I wuz already payin' 'im fifty a week.
(with Whitey on the moon)
Taxes takin' my whole damn check,
Junkies makin' me a nervous wreck,
The price of food is goin' up,
An' as if all that shit wuzn't enough:
A rat done bit my sister Nell.
(with Whitey on the moon)
Her face an' arm began to swell.
(but Whitey's on the moon)
Was all that money I made las' year
(for Whitey on the moon?)
How come there ain't no money here?
(Hmm! Whitey's on the moon)
Y'know I jus' 'bout had my fill
(of Whitey on the moon)
I think I'll sen' these doctor bills,
Airmail special
(to Whitey on the moon)
Yeah, because that $400 million, extensively-tested and over-engineered Spirit rover was a disaster, while the $65 million, under-tested Beagle 2 is sending back useful data.
While I'd like nothing more than to see NASA become more efficient money-wise, cutting corners isn't the right way to do it. There's a reason NASA's projects cost a lot: they check, double-check, then triple-check everything. Their systems tend to be over-engineered, which is exactly what is needed when travelling to another planet.
And before anybody trots out Mars Polar Lander, remember that the problem was, or so I have read, with one of the contractors not building its part of the spacecraft according to NASA's specifications (using Imperial measurements instead of metric). In fact, recent evidence suggests that Mars Polar Lander may have landed intact, which means that it failed for some other reason.
A human scientist on-site could probably learn much more than all the landers and rovers combined. During the course of its entire mission, the Mars Pathfinder rover only travelled a grand total of something like 40 feet. The reason the mission ended (and the reason that the Spirit and Opportunity missions will end, if everything goes well): dust gathering on the solar cells until they can no longer provide enough electricity for the vehicle to function. Not a problem with internally-powered humans.
Communications lag means that rovers can't be controlled in real-time, and the people involed with the mission don't want to risk getting the rover stuck (rightfully so), so each destination, and the best way to get to that destination, are carefully planned out. Combine that with the rover's low speed, and it's easy to see why Mars Pathfinder didn't travel very far. On the other hand, a human walking around on the Martian surface can decide which rock looks the most interesting and pick it up in a matter of seconds.
Lastly, NASA's budget is much smaller than many other federal agencies, as others have already mentioned.
NASA budgets since fiscal year 1992:
# 1993 $14.309 billion, existing NASA budget when Clinton took office;
# 1994 $14.568 billion, $259 million increase, first Clinton budget;
# 1995 $13.853 billion, $715 million decrease;
# 1996 $13.885 billion, $32 million increase;
# 1997 $13.709 billion, $176 million decrease;
# 1998 $13.648 billion, $61 million decrease;
# 1999 $13.654 billion, $6 million increase;
# 2000 $13.601 billion, $53 million decrease;
# 2001 $14.253 billion, $652 million increase;
# 2002 $14.892 billion, $639 million increase, first Bush budget;
# 2003 $15.000 billion, $108 million increase (estimated);
# 2004 $15.469 billion, $469 million increase (proposed);
CNN has some more info like dates etc...
Seriously. If you look back, every war to this date can be traced back to some form of colonization or another.
That's not true. Economics dictates war, not simple colonization. It's true that colonization is a form of economic expansion, but it by no means is it the sole reason for war. For a good overview of why people do what they do, check out the highly respected book Cows, Pigs, Wars, & Witches: The Riddles of Culture.
In particular, you might be interested in the chapter titled Primitive War.
"History books brim with details of wars in which the combatants struggled for mastery over trade routes, natural resources, cheap labor, or mass markets." - p. 51
Looks like Bush Jr. is fixated on finishing up what his Dad couldn't: He announced this 15 years ago and it was ultimately scrapped because it was too expensive...even without the record deficits we face now.
---Technology will liberate us if it doesn't enslave us first.
Space travel with chemical propulsion is never going to get any better. Chemical fuels are as good as they're going to get. There's been essentially zero progress in thirty years.
Building more chemically-fueled spacecraft is a dead end. The weight reduction required for them to work at all makes them so fragile that they'll never be reliable. If you could build a spacecraft with the weight budget of an airliner, (40% or so of the gross takeoff weight is fuel) spacecraft would be affordable and reliable. But when you have to build something that's 90+% fuel, (SSTO machines are something like 97%+ fuel, which is why nobody has built one), it has to be a fragile balloon full of fuel.
Nuclear power, maybe. But chemical fuels? Been there, done that.
An unmanned lunar orbiter would be worth doing. Last time, in the early 1960s, the US sent five orbiters, which used 70mm film, a chemical film processor, and a scanner to transmit the images back. So they only took 1654 images, and the imagery is only 60 meters per pixel. Putting a modern survellance camera in lunar orbit would get us 1m imagery of the whole moon, if not better. Maybe we'll find something worth checking out.
As the alternative to more GWB is one of the Democratic candidates slugging it out, a quick survey of their attitudes to space exploration in general and Mars in particular seems appropriate.
Howard Dean is the only one I know of that has explicitly stated his support for a manned Mars program. He stated in a press conference that "we should agressively begin a program to have manned flights to Mars.", though he did hedge on the potential cost (a reasonable point, given how far down the toilet the US government's finances will be in a few years without radical spending cuts or tax rises).
As far as I can google, Wesley Clark hasn't expressed an opinion on the future of manned space exploration, but he did issue a press release heartily congratulating NASA on the Spirit rover. He seems to still be formulating his policy on NASA.
Dunno about the others..
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Both yas have been missing the polls. Bush doesn't need a mission to a planet that less than a 10% of the US population cares about. Infact, according to every credible poll, he doesn't need Mars or the Moon period to win the next election. Taking out Afaganistan and Iraq and capturing Saddam already did that for him (whether you agree with the reasoning behind them or not).
It'll certainly raise his coolness factor up a point or three, but his reelection was a forgone conclusion long before this.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Do a google search for the first line of the parent's post... they come from either freerepublic or newsmax, both sources of untrustable right-wing propaganda. Anyone have stats from a real source?
The reason the mission ended (and the reason that the Spirit and Opportunity missions will end, if everything goes well): dust gathering on the solar cells until they can no longer provide enough electricity for the vehicle to function.
Actually I was under the impression that the reason the missions end is due to loss of battery performance from discharge and thermal cycling. Dust on the solar panels could easily be cleaned off, as someone suggested, by a wiper. If there is nowhere to store the energy from the panels, then there is a problem.
Consider this:
Wise up. This announcement has nothing to do with space exploration. It has to do with November, nothing more.
There is much pleasure to be gained in useless knowledge.
Orion was a great idea, but the original plans were to launch the ship from earth. Let's hope that if they ever plan to revive it, they will launch from the moon (preferably the far side),since setting off nukes on or near earth would be far too disruptive. (early high-altitude tests like the Starfish test took out several communication satellites)
1. The moon is only 3 days away. Mars is months away. Logistically, it's easier.
Untrue. Most of the energy to get to the moon (which is proportional to the size of the rocket you need) goes into getting out of Earth's gravity well. Getting to Mars is a bit more expensive than the Moon in terms of propulsion. However, once you get to the moon, you need a big rocket to slow you down to land, and a big rocket to send you back to Earth. For Mars, you could use the atmosphere to slow down (parachute), and then produce fuel for the return trip in situ using atmospheric consituents and power from a nuclear reactor.
Bottom line is that Mars, if done right, is EASIER to get to than the Moon.
Luna's lack of gravity makes it easier to land, refuel, refill, maintain, take off. It is an excellent storage post for mined resources and medium-scale manufacturing.
Too bad the Moon is stationed near that huge gravity well known as "the Earth". To get from the Moon to Mars you have to spend nearly as much energy than the same trip from the Earth, and if you add in the energy needed for the initial Earth-Moon trip that's even worse. A Lagrange Point space station or no space hub at all make more sense.
Maybe we deserve this world ?
The moon IS the road to Mars. If we can't inhabit the moon for 18 months at a time, we sure can't go to Mars.
Sorry, but you are wrong, and Dr Zubrin explains why at great length in his books. Summary: it is far easier to get to Mars and make use of locally available resources (primarily the atmosphere which is easy to convert to fuel, oxygen, etc, using a catalytic process, this has been demonstrated on Earth) than it is to ship everything you need to the Moon from Earth, because on the Moon there are almost no resources in a usable form.
"I for one welcome our new asteroid mining overlords. (I've no idea what this means, but it seemed the Slashdot thing to do...)"
It's a reference to a sentence in this Simpsons episode..
Really the whole think about bombing the Balkans, Afganistan, Iraq, and the Sudan was a hoax? The USS Cole was not bombed under Clintons watch?
economy was great
Had as much to do with the Republicans in congress as it did the president..
That's an "urban" legend, up there with the supposed bureaucratic folly behind NASA's pens, which is also nonsense. When it shut down the Apollo program, NASA didn't shrug and say "Nice trip, let's throw away the map." They kept the Saturn V plans for the future, of course. The problem with a new Saturn V would be recreating old technology -- making boosters would be a particular sticking point -- and getting the launch pad stuff ready for them rather than, say, shuttles.
(Not that going to Mars necessarily has anything to do with Saturn Vs -- or Atlas-Agena B target ships for that matter, as long as we're assuming we're re-creating old technologies.)
Look at the failures of unmanned Mars spacecraft. Even if we had the technology, you would expect a few human-less dry runs first, much like the Apollo missions.
What does that have to do with anything? Um, yeah, speaking of Agena-B unmanned docking ships, they'd obviously have some steps along the way.
The loss of robotic probes, meanwhile, is a reflection of the way those programs work; they accept higher risks in exchange for the lower costs, because there's not the same safety concern. The rover on Mars right now landed in the higher-risk of the two landing sites chosen by the science team. They played the odds, hoping they'd get at least one of them down safely. You can take chances with robots. Beagle 2 was made on the cheap, for an example, with little redundancy in systems. (Oh, well -- it was really the orbiter with its deep-scanning radar that's the bread and butter of that mission, though we're disappointed in the lost chance on the ground.)
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
Don't forget the energy to get out of Mars' potential well. Mars has a lot more gravity than the Moon.
Or were you planning on a round trip?
"We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them." -- Albert Einstein
From George Orwell's 1984. The enemy of the totalitarian
government. He likely did not exist but was
used as the public enemy and scapegoat for everything (and
used for the state of eternal war which could be used
to keep the population opressed).