"Apollo on steroids" - NASA

[Ted-Maul]

Shoals of dead fish float on the lake - but Uncle Sam's on Mars.

"Science is making the same mistakes - but Uncle Sam's on Mars.

"And no-one down here knows how to work the brakes - but Uncle Sam's on Mars

Robert Calvert

[fanny splendid]

No pessimist ever discovered the secret of the stars or sailed an uncharted land, or opened a new doorway for the human spirit.

Helen Keller

[hencole]

I want to do more than go to Mars. Getting people on Mars is unambitious science wise, whilst overly ambitious in it's achievability

[Mr. Analytical]

One of the advantages of there not being a God is that we can quite reasonably decide that the whole universe belongs to us.

Let the colonisation commence!

[fanny splendid]

If you don't want to do something, one excuse is as good as another.

Yiddish Proverb

[Santa's Boyfriend]

astronaughts

:-)

Bunch of zeroes, the lot of 'em.

[Santa's Boyfriend]

No pessimist ever discovered the secret of the stars or sailed an uncharted land, or opened a new doorway for the human spirit.

Helen Keller

Yeah, but she was a communist so her opinion can't be trusted.

[Wilbur]

Looks like a typical distraction for the American people to me. Its so predictable. They roll out a "never to be delivered" space program every time things are going badly elsewhere. You have admire their gall. This at the same time that  US politicians are jumping the pro Iraq conflict position like rats from the sinking ship that it is.

[Brutus Beefcake]

I'm not interested unless they name it "Moon Unit Zappa".

[Pinball]

One of the advantages of there not being a God is that we can quite reasonably decide that the whole universe belongs to us.

Let the colonisation commence!

I'm looking forward to the Chinese planting their red commie flag on the Moon, hehe. It's just a new Space Race, not science. Science would dictate we send out large numbers of relatively cheap robotic probes, not a handful of expensive hairless chimps in suits, closely followed by Fox News.

[Alberon]

Yeah, sadly the driving force here is a new Space Race not science. It's China wanting to prove it's the new superpower and America not wanting to look past it that is driving this.

Personally, though I don't give a fuck. As long as we get out there that's the important thing.

If the Russians had ever got their lunar rocket to work we'd have had moon bases twenty years ago.

[weekender]

Looks like a typical distraction for the American people to me. Its so predictable. They roll out a "never to be delivered" space program every time things are going badly elsewhere. You have admire their gall. This at the same time that  US politicians are jumping the pro Iraq conflict position like rats from the sinking ship that it is.

Distraction for Americans, looks like.

Predictable, it is.

Elsewhere look bad, space program reveal they.

Gall admire you must.

Politicians in US jump ship, like rats, they are, at same time, mmm?

[Alberon]

http://space.newscientist.com/article/dn11112-budget-cuts-may-delay-shuttle-replacement.html

Probably as a surprise to no one the date for the Shuttle replacement may start to slip as NASA can't get its funding requests through Congress. The claim is probably made to put pressure on the US government, but even so I'd be surprised if it makes the goals of a first flight by 2014 and a lunar mission by 2020.

[Alberon]

BUMP

More problems for the shuttle replacement. Recently the date set for the first manned launch of the new Ares I rocket (Orion 2) was pushed back from late 2013 to late 2014, though still inside NASA's set deadline of March 2015.

More worringly is the problems NASA are having with Ares I. The main one at the moment is the likelihood of vibrations in the rocket so strong it could kill the crew and destroy the spacecraft. NASA says it can solve the problem and is looking at the idea of fitting springs to dampen vibrations.

http://space.newscientist.com/article/dn13597-nasa-says-spaceships-violent-vibrations-under-control.html

Hopefully, NASA has learned from the mistakes of the Shuttle programme where it made design compromises in the mid-seventies that effectively finished any chance the Shuttle had of fulfilling its initial goal of being a cheap, reusable spacecraft.

America has a more pressing problem caused by Russia's invasion of Georgia. The shuttles will be retired in 2010, but Ares I won't start flying manned missions until 2014 at the earliest and won't go into full operation (where it can dock with the ISS) until maybe early 2016. This leaves five or six years where the only manned access to the ISS will be through the Russians.

The current arrangement between America and Russia runs out in 2011. According to a 2000 law, the US cannot pursue purchases from countries that have engaged in nuclear program related transactions with either Iran or North Korea. So far the Russians have recieved $719 million for the 2005-2011 period. Congress will probably eventually re-ratify the waiver NASA needs, but negotiations with the Russians are going to be tricky as they'll know they have the Americans over a barrel for the next six year period. If relations between the two countries get worse Russia could raise the price of putting Americans in Soyuz capsules beyond the point Washington is willing to pay.

[PAGATRON]

Can't we just mug a UFO off someone?

Or maybe we've already done that EH, CONSPIRACY THEORISTS ,EH!!!