SCIENCE NEWS

January 14, 2004

Next Stop for NASA: the Moon!

President Bush wants to send astronauts on space missions to the moon and then Mars

President Bush wants NASA astronauts to return to the moon as early as the year 2015 and then travel to Mars. In a speech at NASA headquarters in Washington D.C. Wednesday, President Bush said, "It's time for America to take the next step" in space exploration. He is asking for an extra $1 billion to be added to NASA's budget over five years to pay for both missions.

Mars and Moon Landings

Bush wants the U.S. to develop a new spacecraft. This new "Crew Exploration Vehicle" would first carry astronauts to the International Space Station after space shuttles are no longer in use. Eventually, he hopes that the spacecraft will carry astronauts to the moon. The first time a person landed on the moon was in 1969. The last time was in 1972.

Bush also wants to create a base on the moon that could eventually help the U.S. explore other areas in space, including Mars. "The experience and knowledge gained on the moon will serve as a foundation for human missions beyond the moon, beginning with Mars," said a White House statement.

The Debate Over Space Exploration

Not everyone thinks expanding the space program is a good idea. Some question whether the U.S. should spend billions of dollars on space exploration when there are so many problems here on Earth. NASA's budget for 2004 is almost $15.5 billion.

"You can't have a war, cut taxes, have the economy in a garbage pail and spend billions going into space," said Dallas Hodgins, a 76-year-old retired University of Michigan researcher from Flint. "How are they going to pay for all this?"

Sean O'Keefe, NASA's administrator, said the space agency spends just a fraction of U.S. government money. "We're spending less than one percent of the federal budget on the science and technology that NASA employs for exploration objectives, and that won't change," O'Keefe said on the "Today" show Wednesday.

Other critics of Bush's plan question the timing of Bush's announcement because it was made at the beginning of an election year. According to an Associated Press poll conducted last weekend, 55 percent of the 1,000 people polled prefer to spend money on domestic programs rather than on space research.

http://www.timeforkids.com/TFK/news/story/0,6260,577018,00.html