President Obama's new space plan, announced in February, cancelled NASA's moon-oriented Constellation program set forth by former President George W. Bush and called for more ambitious deep space missions to an asteroid and Mars. The Constellation program was responsible for the Orion space capsules and Ares rockets set to follow the shuttle program.
Obama's space plan tasks NASA to draw on commercial space vehicles to ferry astronauts to and from the International Space Station. Until those commercial vehicles are available, the U.S. would rely on Russian Soyuz craft to fly humans in space and unmanned Russian, Japanese and European freighters to launch cargo.
It also allows NASA to extend its role in the International Space Station through at least 2020 and sets aside $1.3 billion over three years to support the development of commercial spacecraft, less than half of the $3.3 billion the White House has requested.
Big new rocket
Obama's space plan also calls for astronauts to visit an asteroid by 2025 and then aim for a manned Mars mission in the 2030s. A heavy-lift rocket for those missions was slated to begin development in 2015.
Under the spending bill approved Wednesday, NASA would be directed to begin work on that heavy-lift rocket in 2011 – four years earlier than the White House proposal.
"Our future in space is not in low-Earth orbit. We have to go beyond," Olson said during the vote's debate. "A heavy-lift vehicle will enable us to achieve the true mission of the agency ... to explore.
The bill should help NASA and its workforce get on with the transition from its previous Constellation program to the new deep space exploration plan set forth by President Obama, House officials said.
Think about it, this is deep space funding to put us (humans) in deep space. Other planets and worlds. Remember it was Obama that help anchor the human race into deep space. The future is bright and finding life other than ourselves is next. MADONE.
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