INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Senator Bill Nelson said the White House decision to return to the Moon could drag down the processTampa, United States: The United States
has vowed to send the first humans to Mars by the 2030s, but space experts and lawmakers on Wednesday expressed concern that poor planning
and lack of funds will delay those plans.President Donald Trump has touted a goal of sending Americans to the Moon again for the first time
since the Apollo missions of the 1960s and 1970s, building a lunar gateway to test the technology and spacecraft that will carry humans to
Mars.At a hearing in Washington, Senator Bill Nelson said the White House decision to return to the Moon -- a program former president
Barack Obama halted in order to focus on reaching Mars -- could drag down the whole process."We don't want to rob the NASA budget of what is
the goal, and the goal is to get to Mars with humans," said Nelson, a Democrat from Florida, which is home to Cape Canaveral and Kennedy
Space Center."Do these missions help us achieve our goal of getting humans to Mars" he asked.In 2009, an independent expert panel known as
the Augustine Commission warned that NASA's resources did not match its lofty goals.With an annual budget of around $18 billion, NASA would
need an extra $3 billion per year to make it to Mars, it found.NASA officials have said as recently as this year they are trying to craft a
deep space program with far less, using only inflation-based increases in the budget.And the National Academies of Science has calculated
that if NASA's budget continued on its current path, "forget the scenario of getting to Mars by the 2030s
It would take us until 2050," Nelson added."I don't think we want to wait that long." Global partners concernedIn 2017, Congress's NASA
authorization bill required NASA to define and deliver to Congress a step-by-step plan for reaching Mars."We don't have this roadmap yet
It is seven months overdue," Nelson said."What gives Let's see the program for going to Mars and see where all this other fits
in."Testifying at the hearing, Chris Carberry, chief executive of Explore Mars, said international and private partnerships could help the
United States make it more affordable to reach Mars."Our international partners want us to lead," he told lawmakers."But they have concerns
that we keep changing directions
They are not sure that we are going to stick with the direction."Even more, aerospace experts have identified about a dozen technologies
that "we need to start working on pretty much immediately if we have any hope of landing humans on Mars in the 2030s," Carberry added.These
include developing spacecraft that can survive the harsh entry into Mars and land softly enough, as well as the ability to lift people off
the surface and head back to Earth."Some will take quite awhile to achieve, Carberry said
"We have to start working on them now."Praising the bipartisan support for NASA he sees among lawmakers, Texas Senator Ted Cruz, a
Republican who heads the Senate subcommittee on space, said he hopes Congress's next NASA funding bill will lay out a longer term vision,
rather than going year to year."This next NASA authorization, the hope is that it will reach further and be bolder in its aspirations," he
said.Cruz then asked retired NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, who has spent a US record of 665 days in space, for her view on what is needed
going forward."The one most important thing is constancy of purpose," she answered."We have to have a vision that lasts more than one
We have to have a budget line that will support those goals and objectives that we are trying to reach."(Except for the headline, this story
has not been edited by TheIndianSubcontinent staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
