Moon Advocates On NASA 'Prize' Scheme: "Ridiculous"
Plan to award private aerospace developers for successes
derided as "just another bureaucratic joke"
LUNAR JOURNAL STAFF
|
|
|
NASA Administrator Sean
O'Keefe (above) is advocating the use of taxpayer funds
to pay "prize money" to private companies for
accomplishments that include orbiting Earth.
|
NEW YORK / 23 JUNE / -- A plan by
NASA, the United States' space agency, to pay prize money to
private aerospace developers for their accomplishments has drawn
immediate derision from an international space advocacy group.
"The first thought I had when I heard
this was that it had to be just another bureaucratic joke," said
David Jackson, North America market director of the
Lunar Republic Society. "It was too ridiculous to be
true."
According to
a report from Reuters, the NASA prizes might include
$200 million for the first private, piloted mission to orbit
Earth and up to $30 million for the attainment of goals such as
a soft lunar landing or bringing back a piece of an asteroid.
"It's unbelievable,"
Jackson said. "I
can just imagine a group of NASA bureaucrats sitting around the
meeting table, loading up on taxpayer-supported Krispy Kremes
and grande lattes, trying to come up with their next brilliant
plan for wasting more taxpayer dollars when one of them leaps up
and says, 'I've got it! How about paying $200 million to a
private company if they can build something that's already been
built: a spacecraft that can orbit Earth?'
"The United States has schools that
can't afford to pay teachers," Jackson said. "It has highways
that are falling apart. It has working people who can't afford
health care for their families. And these idiots want to give
away money? It's just another bureaucratic joke, and it boggles
the mind."
Jackson said that NASA already has
accomplished everything it proposes to reward with prize money.
"NASA should not be giving away money
for commercial aerospace companies to reinvent the wheel,"
Jackson said. "We were orbiting Earth 40 years ago. We were on
the Moon 35 years ago. NASA has already used taxpayer funds to
develop all of the facilities and space vehicles necessary. Why
not make the facilities, equipment and technology available to
the private companies and charge them for it — make it a
revenue-earning enterprise, rather than wasting taxpayer funds
to reward businesses for attaining goals that have already been
reached?"
Michael Lembeck of NASA told Reuters
that prizes would go to private ventures for milestones such as
"the first soft landing on the Moon, or for returning a piece of
an asteroid to Earth." Lembeck said in a telephone interview
that there was even discussion of offering "a couple hundred
million dollars for the first private orbital flight."
"We have to take on the roles that
are more risky, that require a large capital investment to
achieve the goals," Lembeck said. A human mission to the Moon
might be one such venture, he said.
The New York-based Lunar Republic
Society, founded in 1999, is advocating a privately funded
program to return to the Moon by the end of this decade. The
plan is being subsidized through contributions, an endowment
fund, and a plan which offers lunar land claims to the public in
order to raise more than $3 billion needed to accomplish the
mission.
The Society's program incorporates
currently available technologies — including launch vehicles
from India and facilities in Russia — as the starting point for
human-based exploration, settlement and development of the Moon,
including a permanently occupied base for scientific research,
civilian tourism, and as a stop-over point for journeys to Mars
and beyond.
NASA has a budget of $16.2 billion
for the current fiscal year. Among other things, the budget must
cover the return to flight for the space shuttle fleet, grounded
since the 2003 Columbia disaster, as well as continuing
construction on the International Space Station and an
assortment of other scientific projects.
This report was
compiled by Lunar Journal from staff and wire service reports.
RECENT HEADLINES:
·
Moon Advocates: First Private Space Flight "Not Enough"
·
Moon Over Ohio: Residents Claimed Lunar Ownership
In 1966
·
Advocacy Group Says Bush Space Plan ‘Doomed From The Start’
·
Fugitive Lunar Embassy Operator Arrested
MORE LUNAR JOURNAL HEADLINES
|
