Right, this one I’m struggling to comprehend so I thought I’d put it out there and see what others think…
Firstly, who doesn’t love NASA? I mean come on, for most of us, they’ve been around pretty much all of our lives. (As near as makes no difference)
They opened for business (formally) on 1st October 1958 and have since done some genuinely amazing and inspiring things.
Obviously, there’s the fact they went from not knowing how to actually landing on the moon within just a few years. (1961 – 1969)
Then you move on from this to all of the Mars exploration vehicles they’ve sent up there.
There are approximately 16 successful orbiters and landers that have been sent to the red planet by NASA.
That’s a hell of an achievement in itself.
Then there’s one of my favourites. The shuttle missions.
These really took us to another level. A vehicle that can be launched, orbit, dock with the ISS, look after its crew, transport huge items such as space telescopes and ISS modules and then return home landing like a normal airplane!
And then they decommissioned them…
We haven’t been to the moon since 1972…
Humans haven’t left low earth orbit since 1972…
That’s now 50 years without further exploring our local solar system. (My brother will know that as he was born in ’72!)
During those years, we’ve now seen the growth of the private space sector. Elon Musk and Richard Branson are the 2 main ones here, with Jeff Bezos also pitching in his side of things.
These companies are proposing to create space tourism, build bases on the moon and Mars, and generally grow our space travel industries much further than is currently happening.
This is good in my mind. They’ve got a LOT of money between them, with some great minds working on their solutions. The nice thing about them, is they’re thinking outside of the box.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX has created that amazing self-landing rocket solution that is simply stuff from kids cartoons. (From my childhood anyway)
Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic not only has cool space vehicles, but also the coolest “Space Port” known as Spaceport America in New Mexico.
NASA…
Well, they’re currently testing Artemis 1 with ongoing issues. A rocket that whilst it is supposed to be able to do multiple types of missions, is still just using old engines that were all previously used on decommissioned shuttles!
Why is this? The fact is, that NASA is funded by the US government.
In the mid-sixties, NASA’s funding peaked at just below $60B.
Its highest peak since this was in the early ’90s at around $30B.
In 2022, the funding is $24B stretching to a proposed $26B in 2023…
If you consider how much the mid-sixties £60B converts to in today’s money, you’re looking at around five hundred and sixty billion!
SpaceX (Elon Musk’s) is currently worth approximately $125B.
Virgin Galactic (Richard Branson’s) is currently worth approximately $1.5B.
Blue Origin (Jeff Bezos) isn’t worth enough to consider as its own entity to be fair. (Not even $100M)
If you consider the short period of time that these new companies have existed, what they have actually achieved, it’s quite astonishing.
More likely because of outside thinking rather than just pure money available.
This all brings me to one thought…
Why are they not all joining together?
Think about it.
NASA – decades of experience, budgets, facilities, and technology.
SpaceX and Virgin Galactic (let’s ignore Jeff here) – Excellent ideas, incredible short-term achievements, and some incredible facilities.
Set up a meeting with the greatest minds from all 3. Include all budget decision-makers, funding members, etc.
Create a plan to join together and kick-start a proper space exploration programme capable of the following:
Designing futuristic vehicle solutions
We need to walk away from the old-school mindset of expensive rockets that are straight out of the 1960s.
Building landing zones, spaceports and launch zones on the moon
If we create this, not only do we have larger spaces for more crews to spend time, but we also have a place to start building bigger and better vehicles that don’t need so much power to break from the gravity and atmosphere we have here on Earth. (25,020mph needed to leave earth) (5,320mph needed to leave the moon…)
Not to mention the additional technologies that could be tried and tested in this environment.
Gravity / Anti-Gravity technologies
Synthetic water creation
Engine technologies
The list is quite honestly endless!
Getting us to Mars
We’ve sent a lot there already. It’s taking far too long to do the next step!
Having the base structures on the moon will seriously help push this forward.
Building zones on Mars
The same as the moon bases would help us get out to Mars quicker and easier, doing this on Mars would then mean much further/deeper exploration.
All of this probably sounds like science fiction to a lot of people.
The fact is there’s a hint of desire there by all these parties. But it’s not being taken far enough.
50 years without leaving our own low-earth orbit?
Still using old shuttle engines on new rockets while “thinking” about getting to the moon at some point?
Still creating old-school-type rockets?
YEARS before we actually try sending someone to Mars?
All of this is madness considering in 1961, President Kennedy made a statement he wanted us to get to the moon before the decade was done. And we did! We knew nothing about how to do it, but we did it.
Then we sat back and seemingly stopped trying.
Come on everyone. Where is the passion and determination we had 50+ years ago!?
NASA, Richard, and Elon (Jeff if he fancies playing with it too) need to sit down and sort this before we get to 2050 and have simply picked up some more moon dust…