Monday, February 24, 2020

Space Adventures proposes an orbital cruise on the SpaceX Dragon

Recently, Space Adventures announced that it will offer an orbital cruise on board the SpaceX Dragon, the same craft that will shortly take astronauts to and from the International Space Station (ISS). Up to four adventurous and well-heeled people will be rocketed into space in an orbit that will be farther away from Earth than any human has flown since the Apollo 17 mission, two to three times higher than the ISS.

Saturday, February 22, 2020

Tuesday, February 18, 2020

The real reason SpaceX hired former top NASA official

Last summer it looked as if the long, celebrated career of Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA’s associate administrator in charge of human spaceflight, had reached a somewhat ignominious end. NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine had removed Gerstenmaier from his post because it was felt that the man who had guided the shuttle, the ISS, commercial crew, and both the previous and current attempts to send astronauts back to the moon was ill-suited for guiding NASA’s effort to send the first woman and next man to the lunar surface by 2024.

Tuesday, February 11, 2020

Trump goes all in for NASA's Artemis return to the moon program

Several media sources indicate that under the FY2021 budget proposal, the Trump administration will propose a nearly $3 billion increase for NASA, with most of the extra money going to building commercially operated lunar landers. By so doing, Trump has decided to go all-in for landing the “first woman and the next man” on the moon by 2024. He is also going to directly challenge some in Congress who have expressed reservations about that goal.

Monday, February 03, 2020

House panel proposes NASA bill that would scrap the lunar base — or maybe not

Recently, the House Aeronautics and Space Subcommittee of the House Space and Science Committee unveiled a proposed NASA authorization bill that would end the space agency’s plan to establish a continuously occupied lunar base under the Artemis return to the moon program. The bill also proposes several other things that fly in the face of Trump administration space policy.