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

Wasted tax dollars

[grumpygrodyguy]

Or is this all a ploy to recapture the hearts of the public?

It is, and if the US would spend the money on the following we would all be a lot better off:

1) Renewable Energy R&D(petroleum costs are the single greatest drag on the world economy)
2) Nanotechnology (for a programmable autonomous robotics infrastructure)
3) Broadband (How much would it really cost to get everyone 30Mbps? If 250 million people could video-conference and telecommute, how much gas would that save?)

I'm perfectly content going to mars or the moon via my home theatre and PC thankyou.