[FPSPACE] Griffin: NASA to put Astronauts on Mars by 2037

[pjp]

Prior to reading this, here are my questions:

 

--Has there been any metal cut, any metal cast, any final blue-line drawings
approved for a prototype rocket engine for any of the manned exploration
initiative at this time?

 

--has there been any metal cut for a prototype spacecraft to be launched and
tested in earth orbit?

 

--has there been any site-specific training by actual selected astronauts,
or any simulators built to train for the anticipated missions of the alleged
new spacecraft?

 

--Do we have anything other than super fancy, Powerpoint presentations (that
have cost US taxpayers many millions of dollars) about these aspirations?

 

--to paraphrase a friend of mine in Russia (commenting on Perminov's manned
Mars schedule):  "It's easy to promise a benchmark activity achievement date
when it will be beyond the speaker's own lifetime.  There is no weight to
such words."

 

 

 

 

 

>From Agency France Presse:

 

http://rawstory.com/news/afp/NASA_aims_to_put_man_on_Mars_by_203_09242007.ht
ml

 

NASA aims to put man on Mars by 2037

 

NASA aims to put a man on Mars by 2037, the administrator of the US space
agency indicated here Monday.

This year marks the half-century of the space age ushered in by the October
1957 launch of the Sputnik-1 by the then Soviet Union, NASA administrator
Michael Griffin noted.

In 2057, the centenary of the space era, "we should be celebrating 20 years
of man on Mars," Griffin told an international astronautics congress in this
southern Indian city where he outlined NASA's future goals.

The international space station being built in orbit and targeted for
completion by 2010 would provide a "toehold in space" from where humanity
can travel first to the moon and then to Mars, Griffin said.

"We are looking at the moon and Mars to build a civilisation for tomorrow
and after that," Griffin added in his remarks at a conference session
attended by heads of the world's space agencies.

President George W. Bush in 2004 announced an ambitious plan for the US to
return to the moon by 2020 and use it as a stepping stone for manned
missions to Mars and beyond.

NASA's Phoenix spacecraft is scheduled to land on the northern plains of
Mars next year to determine if the Red Planet could support life.

The agency's Mars rovers Opportunity and Spirit resumed their three-year-old
mission this month after surviving giant dust storms that nearly destroyed
the twin robots.

The rovers were placed in hibernation mode in July to save power because the
dust storms were covering their solar panels, impeding their ability to
absorb energy from the sun.

And on September 15, 10 gerbils took off from the Russian-run Baikonur space
centre in Kazakhstan for a 12-day voyage to test the possible effects of a
human mission to Mars.

Missions to the moon and Mars, amid a renewal of global interest in space
exploration, are at the top of the agenda for the 2,000 space scientists,
astronauts, satellite manufacturers and launchers who gathered in Hyderabad.

NASA is due to start sending a series of robotic missions to the moon
starting next year to prepare for future spaceflights and do research on the
effects of extended space travel on human beings.