It's almost official ...

pilot602

If specified, this will replace the title that
It\'s almost official ...

See "Fly me to the moon, letm e play among the stars" thread.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush next week will lay out his "vision for expanding the space program," which is expected to include long-term proposals for manned missions to the moon and an eventual manned mission to Mars, senior administration officials say.

NASA's target for a moon mission is 2018, an official said.

Bush's speech will come just a couple of weeks before the anniversary of the breakup of the space shuttle Columbia as it returned to Earth last February 1. All seven astronauts aboard were killed.

The official declined to say where or when Bush will give the speech, but it will likely be after he returns from a summit in Mexico, possibly as early as Wednesday.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan, traveling with the president in Florida, confirmed the announcement will take place next week, and said it would be an outgrowth of a review of the space program that began after the shuttle disaster.

He declined to give further details.

Some of the things that had been under consideration were a proposal for a permanent presence on the moon, setting a target for retiring the shuttle fleet, and a plan to phase out the international space station.

An administration official said the president is not expected to immediately discuss the potential cost of his new space vision.

The announcement would come more than 31 years after the last moon mission. The last moon flight was December 1972 and some in Congress have argued that it's time to go back.

Last month, administration sources told CNN that NASA was urgently debating and refining the proposals. A senior administration official said Vice President Dick Cheney had initial consultations with key members of Congress on the possibility of a revamped and expanded American space program.

The Bush administration review also includes choosing a new space vehicle for manned flights.

The president had planned to deliver a speech to mark the 100th anniversary last month of the Wright brothers' first manned airplane flight, but the initiative was not ready.

After the Columbia disaster, the president quickly committed to resuming shuttle flights. The current NASA target is fall of 2004.


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Re: It\'s almost official ...

George has been watching Space 1999 reruns!
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George has been watching Space 1999 reruns!
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Just wait til he breaks out his "laser"

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George has been watching Space 1999 reruns!
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Moon Base Alpha..If memory serves me well the moon was blasted out of Earth's orbit. Space 1999 great show from my childhood.
 
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phase out the space station? that's the best thing we've got up there... from that we could go further than building homes on the moon - we could build "the enterprise"....hehehehe
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I wonder which airline wil have the first non-stop daily service to the moon? Remember in 2001: A space oddessy.. Pan Am had like service to a space station or something.
 
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phase out the space station? that's the best thing we've got up there...

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Station may not be manned much longer if they can't find the source of their air leak(s).
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It takes the same amount of energy to hoist those hydrocarbons, tinfoil and water into LEO and then kick it out into the solar system either way. Why add the extra burden of having to make precise fits where stuff can wobble and float away in a vacuum?

I think it is going to be really cool to return to the moon and go on to Mars ... just because they're there!
 
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You are talking about a miniscule air leak!

The space station will not be abandoned for THAT reason for several hundred years.
 
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You are talking about a miniscule air leak!

The space station will not be abandoned for THAT reason for several hundred years.

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Last I had read, the pressure was down from 14.7 psi to 14 since Christmas. First equipment problems (and air contaminant monitor) could be experienced at 13.9, hence the concerns.

Regardless, there's still enough air for someone to breathe, and their talking about replenishing with nitrogen to bring the pressure back up, but it doesn't sound like a situation that can be worked around for several hundred years.
 
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phase out the space station? that's the best thing we've got up there... from that we could go further than building homes on the moon - we could build "the enterprise"....hehehehe
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Been there done that! One of the Space Shuttles named Enterprise.

If we can build a base of operations of the moon, that would make space travel simpler, no gravity on the moon. Problem with getting things off the planet is the little thing called gravity. Now getting from the moon to Marrs is childs play, launch the ship from the moon and away you go.

The moon called also be used as a "warehouse" for the space station folks.

WOW, so many possibilities. Let's see, with the Apollo missions we got: Tang, Velcro, WD40, and others, what inventions will come out of future space missions!
 
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If we can build a base of operations of the moon, that would make space travel simpler, no gravity on the moon.

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Oh boy, the grammar pol.......er, I mean physics police are going to have fun with that one!
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I’ve always found the space shuttle concept wanting. When I was a kid we were going to the freakin moon! In my twenties and thirties we’re boldly going back into low earth Orbit. Not much of an inspiration for future generations.

My kids don’t get excited by the space program like kids in the Sixties did. My dad and I would build models of every rocket. Posters of astronauts covered my bedroom walls; it was a huge source of inspiration. Remember schools being open so the whole community could gather in the Gym to watch a launch or a splash down? I do, and it was awesome. The Gemini, and Apollo projects mesmerized the nation in a way that I’ve not again seen in my life.

Humans need a to be challenged. Lets get going to Mars. Big dreams yield big results.
 
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Humans need a to be challenged. Lets get going to Mars. Big dreams yield big results.

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Scares me when I agree so strongly with DTA!!!
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We're explorers, yes, but we've got a mountain of debt in the country.

I think of it like this. There's a family with a big backyard, a crapload of credit card debt and a nasty lein against the house.

Putting in a pool would improve everyone's quality of life, give the father potential opportunity to throw a pool party or two and perhaps network.

But the pool costs $30,000 today.

Space exploration is fantatic, but we've got a growing mound of fiscal problems, international relations problems and a nasty terrorist threat.

I think we really oughta finish the meal before diving headfirst into dessert.

(Two cliches in 38 seconds, a new world record!)
 
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We're explorers, yes, but we've got a mountain of debt in the country... Space exploration is fantatic, but we've got a growing mound of fiscal problems, international relations problems and a nasty terrorist threat.

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Not that we should ignore these problems at all, but if we wait for everything to be perfect before we ever try to get back on the moon or put men on Mars we're never gonna get there.

I think its a question of what are the best ways we can commit resources to improve the average quality of life. (e.g. should we send lots of money to programs that increase the demand for well-educated and skilled people, or do we send lots of money to programs that offer housing and medical care for the people who can't afford it?).

One statistic that always amazes me is the amount of money sent to manned space programs. From the beginning of the Mercury program to the last Apollo lunar landing used roughly $120 billion dollars in today's money over a period of twelve years. That works out to about $95 dollars anually per household in the US. Sounds good to me!
 
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It seems very sad that the human race cannot advance to technology such as space travel just because of MONEY.
 
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Well, I wonder how much it would cost to establish a universal health care system? I'd like to see that priced (we know how to do it, we're supposed to be doing it in Iraq), and compared against the potential space exploration program.

Yes, they would both be an advance to mankind, but one would help to fuel a future economy to achieve the other.

I'm not against space exploration at all. I'm was a physics major... this was and is still fascinating stuff to me... but we're in a difficult economic state at the moment. Doesn't seem like the time to be launching abitious and risky exploration programs?
 
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I like bold ideas. But we're looking at six trillion bucks in debt, and that debt is swelling at the rate of half a billion bucks a year. The IMF, which many people call a pawn of the United States, says that the US debt will knock a few percentage points off the growth of the world economy.

This is not a time to be going after an expensive program that is such a huge jump forward in what we can do right now.
 
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Nobody knows what the economy will look like 1 year, 2 years, 5 years, 10 years from now...
There willalways be good reasons not to do something like this. I say do it anyway - it's going to be worth the time and effort in the end.
This country wasn't made great by being timid.
 
Re: It\'s almost official ...

Mongoose good point about health care. Consider though, how many serendipitous results have come out of the space program - advances in medical technology etc.

I can't believe that it wouldn't pay off somehow!
 
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