TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/072489/07248900.063

Text File | 1992-09-23 | 7.6 KB | 150 lines

                e}                                                              SPACE, Page 50

The Next Giant Leap for Mankind


Two decades after its first moon landing, it is time for the
U.S. to head for Mars

By Michael D. Lemonick


    Three-quarters of a billion people peered at the murky
images on their television screens on July 20, 1969, as Neil
Armstrong became the first human to stand on another world. To
Americans, the spirit-lifting achievement was well worth the
cost and effort. The quest to reach the moon had revitalized
U.S. science and technology and yielded countless benefits to
industry and the military. Most amazing of all, the Eagle landed
only eight years after John F. Kennedy proclaimed the moonshot
a national priority.

    But after Apollo, something went wrong with the nation's
space program. Despite successes -- such as the Skylab space
station and the series of unmanned missions that will reach its
climax next month when Voyager 2 arrives at Neptune -- the
program seemed to founder. The space shuttle, for example, was
oversold as the one answer to U.S. space-transportation needs.
But it is too big to put astronauts in space efficiently, too
small to launch the largest payloads and too unreliable to live
up to the 60-flight-per-year schedule once promised. The result,
even before the Challenger accident: a backlog of unlaunched
missions.

    Now NASA is poised to make a similar mistake with its next
major project, the $32 billion Freedom space station, scheduled
to go into full operation in the late 1990s. Like the shuttle,
it is being presented as a widely versatile project that will
provide for the needs of scientists, engineers and space
explorers. But without a focused, long-range program, those
needs are not clear.

    The crux of the problem is that the leadership Presidents
Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson gave the Apollo program was not
continued by their successors. That leadership gap may soon
end, though. As early as this week, President George Bush is
expected to announce his vision for the U.S. space program. No
one knows what Bush will say, but some members of his National
Space Council, chaired by Vice President Dan Quayle, reportedly
favor a return to the moon, followed by a manned trip to Mars.

    That would be ambitious and expensive -- up to $150
billion. But the payback would be great. Such a specific,
long-term goal would invigorate NASA. It would revive public
interest in science, providing new pep for a sector of the
educational system that has become disturbingly weak. It would
stimulate innovation in everything from materials science to
computers to communications. It would create jobs. And, least
tangible but perhaps most important, it would add enormously to
the nation's prestige.

    Moreover, points out Eugene Cernan, who walked on the moon
in 1972, with such a long-range goal "we can then work backward
and take the steps to get us there." That would eliminate the
let's-build-it-and-see-what-it's-good-for approach. Far from
withering, other space initiatives would be lifted by the
rising tide of national interest and funding. Unmanned probes
to the planets would continue, and NASA would still be able to
launch the Mission to Planet Earth, a series of satellites
designed to study the planet's environment and give scientists
the information they need to head off ecological disaster.

    The most reasonable date for a Mars mission is 2020. That
allows plenty of time for a measured approach and spreads the
expenditure over a sensible period. It also gives NASA ample
opportunity to choose the next goal after Mars -- exploration
of the asteroid belt, for example, or a manned trip to the
outer planets. Robot probes would have to study the Red Planet
in depth first. One, the Mars Observer, is scheduled for a 1992
launch, and others would have to follow.

    Another logical stepping-stone is a lunar base, which could
be built by 2000, as a testing ground for technologies necessary
for a Martian sojourn. In particular, astronauts would
experiment with living quarters in which air and water are
recycled. Inhabitants of a lunar base would also begin learning
how to mine the moon for raw materials, including trapped gases
and minerals, that would permit the base to become almost
entirely self-sufficient and thus permanent.

    Before such a moon base can be built, NASA will have to get
some kind of space station: the massive components needed for
a lunar habitat are too heavy to lift from earth and will have
to be assembled in space. The station will also be needed for
assembling a bulky Mars vehicle and studying the effects of
long-term space flight. But a single station may not be the best
option. Several experts have suggested breaking it down into
smaller units. One such station, the Industrial Space Facility,
has already been designed by a Houston firm, Space Industries
Inc. At $900 million, it could be launched by 1994 and take over
most of the Freedom station's proposed experiments in space
manufacturing. Another mini-station could handle biomedical
studies, and others could be used as assembly and takeoff points
for the Mars and subsequent missions. Just as with the moon
base, these stations would operate indefinitely. Being smaller
and less complicated than Freedom, the mini-stations could
presumably be launched and built at a lower overall cost.

    NASA and the Defense Department have already begun work on
two new launchers to make space-station construction feasible.
One is a heavy-lift unmanned rocket for massive payloads. The
other is the National Aerospace Plane, or "Orient Express."
Smaller than the shuttle, it would take off like an airplane
from a runway, soar into space to deliver its human cargo, then
return and land. And NASA has plans to convert the present
shuttle into a cargo-only model, with a larger payload than the
manned version. Together, these launchers would give NASA much
needed flexibility.

    The cost of such a multi-step project would be large -- at
least $5 billion a year and maybe considerably more. But unlike
the $35 billion spent on the shuttle program, the expenditure
would produce a return not just in prestige and technological
leadership but also in the establishment of bases and stations
that can be used for future space projects. In order to ease the
costs, the U.S. should encourage as much participation as
possible by foreign governments. The Soviets, Europeans and
Japanese all have active space programs, and duplication of
efforts will increasingly be seen as an unnecessary waste. Many
countries are interested in participating in the Freedom project
or Mission to Planet Earth or both, and the Soviets have
accepted international help on their Mars probes.

    NASA's budget will have to be raised to pay for such an
ambitious program, perhaps even doubled from its current $11
billion a year. That will be hard in an era of budget deficits.
But there is support for a Mars mission in both the House and
the Senate. If the President comes out strongly for the
mission, Congress should be able to find a way to fund it. One
option: to siphon the money from Star Wars and other
questionable defense programs.

    The U.S. cannot remain a leading force in technology,
industry and science unless it is in the forefront of space
exploration. Throughout its history, America has been a nation
of discoverers and achievers. If it fails to take the next major
step in space, it will have given up an essential part of its
national character.


-- Glenn Garelik/Washington and Richard Woodbury/Houston