NASA may unveil manned Moon missions
NASA is serious about sending astronauts back to the moon's neighborhood and will likely unveil its ambitious plans soon now that President Barack Obama has been re-elected, experts say.
The space agency has apparently been thinking about setting up a manned outpost beyond the moon's far side, both to establish a human presence in deep space and to build momentum toward a planned visit to an asteroid in 2025.
The new plans have probably already been cleared with the Obama Administration but have been kept under wraps in case Republican candidate Mitt Romney won Tuesday night's (Nov. 6) presidential election, said space policy expert John Logsdon, a professor emeritus at George Washington University.
"They've been holding off announcing that until after the election," Logsdon added, noting that Romney had pledged to reassess and possibly revise NASA's missions and direction.
A new vision of human space exploration
In 2010, President Obama directed NASA to work toward sending astronauts to a near-Earth asteroid by 2025, then on to the vicinity of Mars by the mid-2030s. To reach such deep-space destinations, the agency is developing a huge rocket called the Space Launch System (SLS) and a crew capsule named Orion.
But astronauts likely won't head straight to a space rock when SLS and Orion are ready to fly together in 2021. In the last year, word has begun leaking out that NASA wants to explore Earth-moon L2, a point in space that lies beyond the moon's far side, as a precursor.
Rumors currently point toward parking a spacecraft at the Earth-moon L2 gateway, so NASA (and perhaps international partners) can learn more about supporting humans in deep space. Astronauts stationed there could also aid in lunar exploration — by teleoperating rovers on the moon's surface, for example.
NASA officials think they can pull off such manned missions without busting their budget, which stands at $17.7 billion in the proposed 2013 federal budget.
"They're not talking about plans that imply significant budget increases," Logsdon said. "It gives a more focused use for SLS and Orion before an asteroid mission."
Moon missions coming soon?
Exploration of Earth-moon L2 could get started as early as 2021 with the first manned flight of SLS and Orion, which NASA calls Exploration Mission 2. (Exploration Mission 1 is the initial, unmanned test launch of SLS, slated for late 2017.)
"I'm not privy to the specifics of this, but one could conceive of the second SLS mission being the start of activity in cislunar space, rather than just being a lunar orbit mission," Logsdon said.
We may know soon enough. NASA higher-ups have dropped hints recently that a big announcement may indeed be in the offing before too much longer.
"We just recently delivered a comprehensive report to Congress outlining our destinations which makes clear that SLS will go way beyond low-Earth orbit to explore the expansive space around the Earth-moon system, near-Earth asteroids, the moon, and ultimately, Mars," NASA deputy chief Lori Garver said at a conference in September.
"Let me say that again: We're going back to the moon, attempting a first-ever mission to send humans to an asteroid and actively developing a plan to take Americans to Mars," Garver added. - Fox News
Dark Mission: The Secret History of NASA, Enlarged and Revised Edition
21st Century Complete Guide to the NASA Lunar Prospector Mission to the Moon (CD-ROM)
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The Virgie, Kentucky UFO
My friend and colleague Rick Phillips report / updates on the Virgie, KY cylinder UFO at Oh, Much More About The `Virgie Kentucky Tube'
BTW, I think I was one of the first to report this phenomenon after I was alerted by 2 witnesses (one in Kentucky and the other, a teacher in Tennessee) just as the report and photos were filed with MUFON on 10/17/12. Here's the link - Cylindrical Shaped UFO Over Kentucky
Solving the Communion Enigma: What Is To Come
Kentucky UFO's & Extraterrestrials!: A Look at the Sightings &
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NASA may unveil manned Moon missions
Toledo, Ohio - 8/14/1972: I was 14 years old in 1972. It was August in a more innocent time and we had no air conditioner.My parents usually locked the screen door and sometimesI tried to sleep on the couch w/ the door open. At those times, there was very little crime in the area to worry about.I am not exactly sure of the exact date, but it was August and Hot! was dozing on the couch that night w/ my little dog, Kilo. Between 1-2am I was awakened by a knock on our BACK door. The little dogs ears went up. I went to the back door but didn't see anyone. I unlocked the door and stepped out. For some reason I looked up and hovering over our house was an elliptical object (a UFO) that appeared to have a white surface and had one very large light in the from underneath illuminating nearly the entire underside, with some left in darkness. I couldn't make out any lights, and I don't remember being the least bit surprised to see this object there. It hovered there silently for an unknown amount of time. I remember thinking," Oh! They came to say hi to me." There might have been an abduction because I lost time and don't remember seeing the object disappear. I also remember feeling that this had happened to me before - although I don't have any other recollections.
As far as what I thought the object was when I first noticed it, I knew what it was. It I know it was not a dream, and I felt like I had been visited before. The only other thing about the visitation that sticks in my mind is that the next morning I told my mother that they had come to visit me in a UFO. Instead of calling me crazy, she told me I should have come to wake her up. For some reason the visit seemed entirely natural. To this day I never told anyone else, although I did see a report on line that was written in 1997 where the person states he saw a UFO in Toledo in 1972 or 1973 near a hospital. We lived about 5-10 miles from the nearest hospital. I had the feeling that they came specifically for me. - MUFON CMS
Alien Nightmares: Screen Memories of UFO Alien Abductions: Abducted by Aliens for Decades
Grey Aliens and the Harvesting of Souls: The Conspiracy to Genetically Tamper with Humanity
Unexplained: Strange Sightings, Incredible Occurrences & Puzzling Physical Phenomena (The Seeker Series)
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2 dead candidates win seats
A Republican nominee who died almost month before Election Day beat the Democratic incumbent for a seat on the Bibb County Commission on Tuesday.
Probate Judge Jerry Pow says Republican nominee Charles Beasley defeated Democrat Walter Sansing despite having died on Oct. 12. Beasley carried about 52 percent of the votes.
Beasley wasn't the only dearly departed to win his election this year. In Florida, Democrat Earl K. Wood died on October 15 from natural causes at age 96, during his campaign for a 12th term as Orange County Tax Collector in Orlando, Reuters reports.
Criticized for rarely coming into the office while collecting a $150,000 salary and $90,000 pension, Wood initially announced he would step down, only to change his mind when a longtime political foe made plans to seek the seat.
Wood's wide name recognition after almost half a century in office scared off several serious contenders, Reuters reports, adding he took 56 percent of the votes to 44 percent for a Republican who promised to eliminate the office altogether if elected.
In Alabama, officials say some voters probably didn't know Beasley died before the election, but others did.
The 77-year-old Beasley previously served one term, but the Democratic Sansing won four years ago.
The ballots were printed before Beasley's death and couldn't be changed before the vote.
Probate Judge Pow says the Bibb County GOP will recommend a successor to Gov. Robert Bentley, who will appoint a new commissioner. - WTSP