Asians to dominate space too?

C'mon Bush; FUND "Project Orion."
http://www.islandone.org/Propulsion/ProjectOrion.html


Three ships and space becomes
America's domain exclusively.



The United States risks "loss of leadership" in space exploration, if
it fails to replace quickly its ailing shuttle fleet with a new
reliable space vehicle, the head of NASA has warned.

And that will not be possible without sacrificing some valuable
science programs, Michael Griffin, head of the National Aeronautics
and Space Administration, told Congress Thursday.

The warning came as the House of Representatives Committee on Science
pondered options in the face of the continued grounding of the space
shuttle after a chunk of insulating foam fell off Discovery's external
fuel tank during lift-off last July.

The spacecraft completed its mission without problem. But the space
agency has grounded the whole fleet until engineers can figure out how
to avoid such problems in the future.

A large piece of foam separating from the external tank and hitting
the shuttle Columbia's protective thermal tiles is blamed for the 2003
fiery demise of the craft and its seven-member crew.

The shuttle fleet is now slated for retirement in 2010 and replacement
by a new-generation spacecraft called the Crew Exploration Vehicle.

But contracts for the vehicle are not even expected to be awarded
until the second half of this year, and Griffin said that if the new
spacecraft is not operational in 2014, loss of critical expertise
could occur.

"A longer gap in US human spaceflight capabilities will increase risk
and overall costs and lead to even more delays," he told the
committee.

"In addition," he added, "the US may risk a perceived, if not real,
loss of leadership in space exploration if we are unable to launch our
astronauts into space for an extended period when other nations are
establishing or building on their own abilities to do so."

The US space agency is facing what some lawmakers characterized as a
"lean year" following President George W. Bush's 2007 budget proposal
that calls for allocating less than 16.8 billion dollars for its
needs.

The White House intends to spend 72.4 billion dollars on military
operations in Iraq and Afghanistan this year.

Griffin said now "NASA simply cannot afford to do everything" and will
have to sacrifice a scientific mission to Jupiter's moon Europa,
several endeavors in the area of space astrophysics as well as
projects it had planned to undertake aboard the International Space
Station.

The budget crunch comes amid intensifying international competition in
space, once dominated almost exclusively by the United States and
Russia.

India, lawmakers pointed out, is preparing for a lunar orbital mission
in 2007, while Japan plans to send a robotic rover to the Moon by
2013.

They also noted that China, which is quickly gaining experience in
manned spaceflight, is planning an astronaut landing on the Moon in
2017.

The United States planned a return to the Moon in about 2018.

Concern about the future of the US space program was echoed by
Republican Science Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert, who said he
was "extremely uneasy" about the budget proposal.

"This budget is bad for space science, worse for earth science,
perhaps worse still for aeronautics," Boehlert said in an unusually
blunt statement.

He said the White House proposal "basically cuts or de-emphasizes
every forward looking, truly futuristic program."

The budget funds shuttle flights, which are tentatively scheduled to
resume in May. But Griffin would not firmly commit to the timetable,
saying NASA "will launch when we are ready."

© 2006 AFP




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