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FLORIDA, July 28 – Sixty years ago, stimulated by competition with the Union Soviet, the United States created NASA, launching a journey that would lead Americans to the moon in a decade
. The US Space Agency has enjoyed glorious successes and overwhelming failures in its efforts to push the boundaries of space exploration, including a deadly fire in 1967 that killed three and two deadly shuttle explosions in 1986 and 2003 that claimed the lives of 14 people. NASA is struggling to redefine itself in an increasingly crowded sector of international space agencies and commercial interests, with the goal of returning to the distant space.
These bold goals make rhetoric, but the experts worry. to reach the horizon of the moon in the next decade and March in the 2030s.
And the inability of NASA to send astronauts into space – a capacity lost in 2011 when the Shuttle Program has ended, as pl While US private industries are working hard on new spacecraft, NASA still has to pay Russia US $ 80 million (RM 326 million) per seat for US astronauts go in the space.
How It Started
In 1957, the Soviet Union launched the first satellite in space with Sputnik 1, while American attempts failed miserably
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President Dwight D. Eisenhower called on Congress to create a separate civil space agency to better focus on space exploration.
He signed the National Aeronautics and Entry into force of the Space Authorization Act on July 29, 1958.
NASA opened its doors in October 1958, with approximately 8,000 employees and a budget of 100 million US dollars.
Race to Space
Soviets won another key p The art of space race in April 1961, when Yuri Gagarin was the first to orbit the Earth .
A month later, John F. Kennedy unveiled his plan to land a man on the moon at the end of the decade
space project in this period will be more impressive for humankind, or more importantly for long-term exploration of space; "The Apollo Program is Born
In 1962, astronaut John Glenn became the first American to gravitate around the Earth.In 1969, NASA astronaut Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon
The American astronauts of the time were national heroes – military pilots with a combination of brains, courage and courage known as "The Right Stuff"., the title of the classic book by Tom Wolfe
The words of Armstrong while he was stepping on the lunar surface – "a small step for the man, a giant step for the first time" Humanity "- were heard by millions of people around the world – Apollo was a unilateral manifestation of national power," recalls John Logsdon, professor emeritus at the George Washington University Space Policy Institute.
"Kennedy decided to use the space program as an instrument of obvious geopolitical competition. 1965-19007 In total, 5% of the national budget went to NASA during the Apollo era.
NASA now receives about $ 18 billion a year, less than half a percent of the federal budget, "and this is no longer the same instrument of national policy," said Logsdon.
New era
. 1980 with the birth of NASA's shuttle program, a reusable spacecraft the size of a bus that transported astronauts into space, and finally to the International Space Station, which began its operations in 1998.
Donald Trump defended a return to the moon, calling for a lunar gateway that would allow a continuous stream of spaceships and people to visit the moon, and serve as a starting point for Mars.
Trump also called for the creation of a "Space Force," a sixth branch of the military that would focus on defending US interests.
NASA has long been considered a world leader in space innovation, but today the international field is vastly more populated than 60 years ago.
"Now you h" Instead of competing with international space agencies, "the focus has been on cooperation" to reduce costs and accelerate innovation, said Tresel Muir, about 70 countries that are one way or another involved in space activity. Harmony, curator at the National Museum of Air and Space
"How Nasa can he benefit?"
Jim Bridenstine, NASA Administrator He mentioned the possibility of strengthening cooperation with China, and how he recently traveled to Israel to meet commercial interests working on a lunar lander.
Bridenstine says that the reason for his visit was "how do you do that, what are you doing and can Nasa benefit?"
NASA moves away from low Earth orbit, seeking to space statio After spending millions of dollars in seed capital to help private companies like SpaceX and Boeing to build capsules to transport humans in space in the coming years,
Bridenstine said in this environment to understand what NASA is doing, versus what it buys as that service with commercial suppliers will be "one of the fundamental challenges that I will have to face during my mandate".
Bridenstine said Trump's budget demands for NASA were "very generous."
With his eyes on a crew mission on the moon in five years, NASA plans to spend about 10 billion US dollars on his exploration of the moon for 2019.
Bridenstine's predecessor at the NASA, retired astronaut Charles Bolden warned of the repeated mistakes of the era of the shuttle, when the United States put an end to their human exploration program without that another spaceship is ready to take its place.
"It is really essential for NASA to facilitate the success of commercial entities to take over" in low Earth orbit, some 400 kilometers above the planet.
"And then for NASA to do what it does so well … Be the leader of the lunar orbit." – AFP
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