The president of the United States, Barack Obama, will suspend in the draft of the state budget for 2011 the financing to send a new mission to the Moon. The document, which will be released today, does not provide funding for the continuation of theNASA Constellation program, in which around 9,000 million dollars have already been invested.
Among Obama’s future plans also highlights his intention to encourage private companies to build, launch and operate the ships destined to transport astronauts from NASA and other agencies to the International Space Station (ISS), in a way fromspace taxis. In this way, NASA could dedicate itself “to other more important things”, such as studying the Earth with new satellites or continuing to explore the Solar System. Of course, without manned flights, since at the momentthere will be no funds to send astronauts to the Moon or Mars.
Although the measure will stimulate the development of the aerospace industry, some experts are concerned about thesafety. Space, they say, is still too dangerous a place to leave transportation in the hands of private companies.
The main candidates to lead the future of space transportation could beSpace Exploration Technologies, the couple formed byBoeing Co.YBigelow Aerospace, YOrbital Sciences Corp.
The ferries retire
NASA plans to take its antiquated space shuttles out of circulation this year . The agency will carry out only five more flights to the ISS with these ships, the first in early February with Endeavor and the last in September, aboard Discovery . After the “retirement” of the shuttles, NASA will be able to carry out sorties into space only with the help of the Russian Soyuz spacecraft.
