Administrator Says Attempting Such A Mission Would Likely Jeopardize All Of The Agency's Human Exploration Efforts

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said at a joint meeting of the Space Studies Board and the Aeronautics and Space Engineering Board in Washington on Thursday that NASA would not be leading an effort to return men to the Moon "probably in my lifetime." He said that NASA will be focusing on human missions to asteroids and Mars, but "NASA does not have a human lunar mission in its portfolio."

Bolden's remarks came after a presentation by UCLA's Al Carnesdale pointing to resistance in the space community to NASA's stated goal of a human mission to an asteroid by 2025. He said that there is not a great deal of enthusiasm for a mission to an asteroid, and suggested that the Moon would be a better goal.

But Bolden was steadfast in carrying the administration's message. He said that he has told the head of each of NASA's partner agencies that if they plan a mission the Moon, NASA would participate. But the agency would not be taking a lead role in such an endeavour. Space Politics reports on its website that Bolden said that if NASA were to attempt to "change the course of human exploration" it would mean that "probably, in our lifetime, in the lifetime of everybody sitting in this room, we are probably never again going to see Americans on the Moon, on Mars, near an asteroid, or anywhere."

Bolden said NASA can 'only do so many things," and that while he thinks another agency could successfully lead a manned mission back to the lunar surface, "NASA is not going to the Moon as a primary project probably in my lifetime."

FMI: www.nasa.gov