Tweet
The next mission to land a man on the moon will take place in 2015 at the earliest, the new chief of the United States' space program said on Monday, adding the mission could be followed by the construction of a multinational space station there.
NASA will make decisions on what craft will be used to reach the moon in the next few months, Griffin said: "I am hoping we will have some fairly firm conclusions by the end of this summer."
NASA is weighing up competing bids for the so-called Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV), the successor to the space shuttle, which will be retired in 2010. The new vehicle is expected to be compatible with the International Space Station and to play a role in a manned mission to the moon.
The space shuttle fleet has not flown since 2003, when the Columbia shuttle broke apart in mid-air, killing its crew of seven.
An executive of Boeing Co., which is teaming up with Northrop Grumman Corp. to bid for the multi-billion dollar CEV contract, said on Monday he expected to hear very soon whether its bid would move to the next stage of NASA consideration.
"We're expecting to get notification from NASA even possibly today on whether we are going to be selected to be in the final two competitors," said Jim Albaugh, president of Boeing's integrated defense systems unit, at the air show.
Rival Lockheed Martin Corp. is also bidding on the CEV contract.
NASA is weighing up competing bids for the so-called Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV), the successor to the space shuttle, which will be retired in 2010. The new vehicle is expected to be compatible with the International Space Station and to play a role in a manned mission to the moon.
The space shuttle fleet has not flown since 2003, when the Columbia shuttle broke apart in mid-air, killing its crew of seven.
An executive of Boeing Co., which is teaming up with Northrop Grumman Corp. to bid for the multi-billion dollar CEV contract, said on Monday he expected to hear very soon whether its bid would move to the next stage of NASA consideration.
"We're expecting to get notification from NASA even possibly today on whether we are going to be selected to be in the final two competitors," said Jim Albaugh, president of Boeing's integrated defense systems unit, at the air show.
Rival Lockheed Martin Corp. is also bidding on the CEV contract.
t/Space is a consortium including such groups as Burt Rutan's Scaled Composites, Elon Musk's SpaceX, and Red Whittaker (http://www.redteamracing.org/) of the Carnegie Mellon Robotics Institute.
EDIT: In a move that should suprise nobody NASA chose Lockheed and the Boeing/Northup-Grumman teams to compete for the CEV contract;
Dr. Mordrid