NASA Scraps Shuttle And Returns to Rockets

nathanh writes "NASA is building a launch system that they've informally dubbed Apollo On Steroids. It's a hybrid design of the Apollo capsules and the Shuttle's booster rockets and engines. Crew and cargo are lifted by two different rockets: the crew use a single-booster/single-engine rocket and the cargo is lifted by an awe-inspiring two-booster/five-engine rocket. NASA reckons this craft will take humanity back to the Moon and then to Mars. Has NASA realised that the old designs were better? Or is this all a ploy to recapture the hearts of the public?"

Comments

Yippie-cai-yay

[Doc Ruby]

The Shuttle was born in the era when oil crises, skyrocketing (pun intended) energy prices, and terrorists demonstrating the folly of America's dependence on Mideastern energy showed America it needed a reusable launch system. This new system is born in the era when all that is the same, and much worse (after using up 30 years more fuel), but instead with a stupid oil cowboy running the show.