[FPSPACE] editorial about Apollo 8 and the current condition of NASA

[Peter Pesavento]

>From the (UK) Telegraph:

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/barackobama/39030
72/Nasa-future-in-doubt-as-space-agency-marks-Moon-mission-anniversary.html

 


Nasa future in doubt as space agency marks Moon mission anniversary 


The 40th anniversary of Nasa's first manned mission to the Moon is being
overshadowed by doubts over the future of its space programme. 


By Toby Harnden in Washington 
Last Updated: 2:44PM GMT 23 Dec 2008

US astronauts at the international space station will on Wednesday honour
the first crew to circumnavigate the Moon. 

Members of the Expedition 18 crew have broadcast a video message from space
hailing the feats of the Apollo 8 astronauts Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and
Bill Anders, who began their circumnavigation of the Moon on Dec 24, 1968,
after a 238,000-mile trip. 

The voyage, during which photographs of the earth were taken, set the stage
for the first moon landing by the Apollo 11, led by Neil Armstrong, who
became the first man to walk on the moon on July 20 1969. 

But a cloud hangs over the Constellation programme, the successor to the
Space Shuttle, which was designed to set up a permanent manned base on the
Moon by 2020 and then launch missions to Mars. 

Tensions between Michael Griffin, the Nasa administrator, and
President-Elect Barack Obama's transition team have boiled over into heated
public exchanges amid reports of rising costs and mission delays. 

In March, Mr Obama said: "I grew up on Star Trek. I believe in the final
frontier." 

But he expressed dismay about the way the space shuttle programme was being
run and said funding would be cut until mission objectives were more clear. 

"Nasa has lost focus and is no longer associated with inspiration," he said.
"I don't think our kids are watching the space shuttle launches. It used to
be a remarkable thing. It doesn't even pass for news anymore." 

Mr Obama had earlier raised the possibility of delaying Constellation, based
on President George W Bush's 2004 "Vision for Space Exploration", for five
years as a way of boosting education funding. With Florida playing a key
role in the US election, he later proposed $2 billion in extra funding for
Nasa and endorsed a lunar mission by 2010. 

But questions from Obama transition officials about costs, have led some in
Nasa to conclude that the incoming president will scrap Constellation and
with it hopes of sending humans back to the Moon. 

 

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