I had a conversation a few years ago with Buzz Aldrin. He was talking about his idea for a Mars Cycler which would travel continuously between Earth and Mars. I told him that I thought it was a great idea (especially as it would be investing in 'permanent' space infrastructure instead of a single-shot mission) but that I thought it was unlikely that the government would allocate enough resources to build it. He seemed very disappointed with me, as if by making a realistic assessment of today's politics that I was voting in that way. I'm all for spending money in Chryse Planitia instead of Helmand province. So is almost everyone I know. But I feel like the chance of the US government actually funding something serious in space is pretty much nil. And I have no idea how to go about changing that.
NASA admits it doesn’t have the funding to land humans on Mars
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Re: NASA admits it doesn’t have the funding to land humans on Mars
#12NASA has enough funding, they are just spending it on SLS and Orion(¹). It appears that if they were to pay the "new space" companies to get them to Mars, the money would be enough. (¹) because Congress wants them to, because ... jobs (as if "new space" companies weren't creating jobs, too... even competitive ones)
How do you propose we would get man to mars without a heavy lift rocket or manned capsules?
EDIT: the previous comment used to say that SLS and Orion was a 'waste of money'. I accept that spaceX proposals among others are cheaper, however NASA, the US government, and many scientists also have a vested interest in keeping at least some orbital capability in the public sphere, even if only for military reasons
Re: NASA admits it doesn’t have the funding to land humans on Mars
#13I have been watching this since 2000. New president comes in, scraps old programs, declares new "vision". NASA does a few incoherent things and the whole thing restarts after a few years. It's pretty sad. I wish they would commit to something and actually finish it.
It's also Congress' fault because they insist on extremely expensive programs such as SLS and Orion.
See https://arstechnica.com/science/2010/04/obama-resuscitates-o... and https://arstechnica.com/science/2009/10/nasa-panel-argues-fo...
Quote: "The committee has concluded that NASA now has plans that don't reflect any sort of budgetary reality". This is back in 2010.
More recommended reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Launch_System#Criticism
Re: NASA admits it doesn’t have the funding to land humans on Mars
#14I think anyone who remotely follows space exploration or NASA knew this.
Definitely. I've been in a number of discussions (read: arguments) about NASA's state of funding -- with some preferring to claim Trump has raised NASA's funding for space exploration substantially.
It takes 5 minutes on Google to find historic data of % of spending budget. To get to the moon ("and the other things") Kennedy/LBJ-era funding was between 1.19% and 4.7% if I recall correctly. During Obama's admin I think it reached a low of 0.46% after the recession. Trump raised that to 0.5x% I believe. Not exactly a windfall on NASA's scale...
I know I'm using relative figures here, but maybe somebody who's more informed can assess the reliability of a % of budgetary spending's impact on r&d in these cases vs. hard dollar figures which are probably a bit easier. USA budgets are not my strength. I just want to see Mars happen ("and the other things").
Re: NASA admits it doesn’t have the funding to land humans on Mars
#15NASA has enough funding, they are just spending it on SLS and Orion(¹). It appears that if they were to pay the "new space" companies to get them to Mars, the money would be enough. (¹) because Congress wants them to, because ... jobs (as if "new space" companies weren't creating jobs, too... even competitive ones)
How do you propose we would get man to mars without a heavy lift rocket or manned capsules? EDIT: the previous comment used to say that SLS and Orion was a 'waste of money'. I accept that spaceX proposals among others are cheaper, however NASA, the US government, and many scientists also have a vested interest in keeping at least some orbital capability in the public sphere, even if only for military reasons
Use Falcon Heavy by SpaceX or New Glenn by Blue Origin for a fraction of the cost of SLS.
Orion may be worth keeping. It is limited to 4 astronauts which is probably too small a crew for a 2.5 year Mars mission. I do think that it could be built much cheaper, however.
Re: NASA admits it doesn’t have the funding to land humans on Mars
#16I have been watching this since 2000. New president comes in, scraps old programs, declares new "vision". NASA does a few incoherent things and the whole thing restarts after a few years. It's pretty sad. I wish they would commit to something and actually finish it.
NASA programs typically span multiple decades and run in the billions of dollars, The political pendulum sways from one side to the other side every 4-8 years, every new administration is looking for ways to cut down taxes. It's amazing they get anything done imho.
I'm pretty sure the big reason Apollo was successful was that they had enough support to get the job done within that 8-year period. And, no surprise, Nixon's election heralded the end, although inertia kept it moving for a few years.
Re: NASA admits it doesn’t have the funding to land humans on Mars
#17NASA has enough funding, they are just spending it on SLS and Orion(¹). It appears that if they were to pay the "new space" companies to get them to Mars, the money would be enough. (¹) because Congress wants them to, because ... jobs (as if "new space" companies weren't creating jobs, too... even competitive ones)
How do you propose we would get man to mars without a heavy lift rocket or manned capsules? EDIT: the previous comment used to say that SLS and Orion was a 'waste of money'. I accept that spaceX proposals among others are cheaper, however NASA, the US government, and many scientists also have a vested interest in keeping at least some orbital capability in the public sphere, even if only for military reasons
With $10B and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qo78R_yYFA
Re: NASA admits it doesn’t have the funding to land humans on Mars
#18NASA has enough funding, they are just spending it on SLS and Orion(¹). It appears that if they were to pay the "new space" companies to get them to Mars, the money would be enough. (¹) because Congress wants them to, because ... jobs (as if "new space" companies weren't creating jobs, too... even competitive ones)
How do you propose we would get man to mars without a heavy lift rocket or manned capsules? EDIT: the previous comment used to say that SLS and Orion was a 'waste of money'. I accept that spaceX proposals among others are cheaper, however NASA, the US government, and many scientists also have a vested interest in keeping at least some orbital capability in the public sphere, even if only for military reasons
SpaceX's ITS could be developed for a similar cost as SLS+Orion, while being vastly more capable.
Re: NASA admits it doesn’t have the funding to land humans on Mars
#19Earlier quoted context omitted.
How do you propose we would get man to mars without a heavy lift rocket or manned capsules? EDIT: the previous comment used to say that SLS and Orion was a 'waste of money'. I accept that spaceX proposals among others are cheaper, however NASA, the US government, and many scientists also have a vested interest in keeping at least some orbital capability in the public sphere, even if only for military reasons
Use Falcon Heavy by SpaceX or New Glenn by Blue Origin for a fraction of the cost of SLS. Orion may be worth keeping. It is limited to 4 astronauts which is probably too small a crew for a 2.5 year Mars mission. I do think that it could be built much cheaper, however.
I don't think FH is enough for manned mars missions. It has enough delta V to land there but not to come back.
Re: NASA admits it doesn’t have the funding to land humans on Mars
#20Earlier quoted context omitted.
Use Falcon Heavy by SpaceX or New Glenn by Blue Origin for a fraction of the cost of SLS. Orion may be worth keeping. It is limited to 4 astronauts which is probably too small a crew for a 2.5 year Mars mission. I do think that it could be built much cheaper, however.
I don't think FH is enough for manned mars missions. It has enough delta V to land there but not to come back.
You're right. FH would be only an intermediate step until ITS becomes available.