Hopes To Have The List Down To Three Missions By Next Week

The commission charted by The Obama Administration to set the country's post-shuttle space goals has winnowed the number of potential missions down from 864 to seven, with a goal of reaching three potential scenarios by next week.

“That’s not a joke,” said Edward F. Crawley, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a panel member. The suggestion had drawn laughter from the panel.

The New York Times reports that three of the options under consideration stay under the reduced budget figure proposed by the Administration. One is to continue the plan laid out by President Bush in 2003 to return to the moon, but scraps the 2020 deadline. A second extends the ISS mission for 5 years to 2020, and a third scraps ISS and the Ares I program, focusing instead on a larger Ares V rocket that would get humans back to the moon, but does not have a timeline for that to occur.

The other four do not have budget constraints, and include a Mars mission that does not include landings, as well as exploration of asteroids and Mars' moons. One builds a disposable cargo container which could forestall the retirement of the shuttle. One option dispenses with a lunar colony in lieu of multiple short-stay missions, and the final option proceeds directly to Mars.

The panel is charged with putting together it's final recommendations, and budgets, by it's final meeting Wednesday.

FMI: www.nasa.gov