http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45007639/ns/technology_and_science-space/
Low-Earth orbit activity must be handled by partners, so NASA can aim higher
LAS CRUCES, N.M. — For NASA to achieve any of its lofty goals for the future, the commercial space industry must succeed, NASA deputy administrator Lori Garver said.
The space agency has bet big that private spaceships will be ready to carry cargo and astronauts to orbit soon. The future of the International Space Station, as well as the future of NASA's robotic science missions and human deep space ambitions, depend on that outcome, Garver said yesterday (Oct. 20) here at the International Symposium for Personal and Commercial Spaceflight.
"In order to make good on the entire plan, it is this part of the plan that must be successful," Garver said.
After 30 years of carrying astronauts into low-Earth orbit, NASA retired its space shuttle program earlier this year.
"Contrary to what you might have heard, that marks the beginning, not the end," Garver said. "With the support of the president and Congress, NASA has made a renewed commitment to human spaceflight."
One leg of that commitment is a plan to build a new heavy-lift rocket (called the Space Launch System) and a deep-space crew capsule (called the Multipurpose Crew Vehicle) to take people first to an asteroid and then on to Mars.
But in order for NASA to devote its resources to that ambitious pursuit, private industry must take over transportation to low-Earth orbit and the International Space Station, Garver said.
NASA and its partners plan to operate the space station through at least 2020, but without the space shuttle, Russia's Soyuz spacecraft is the only means of getting there. Until commercial spacecraft are ready, NASA must rent rides on the Soyuz for its astronauts.
For fiscal year 2012, NASA requested $850 million to devote to its Commercial Crew Development Program, which supports the development of these private vehicles.
The agency hopes to end its outsourcing to Russia by the year 2016, but "if we don't get full funding in 2012, this is at risk," Garver said. That could prove costly down the line. "One additional year from the Russians will cost us $450 million," she added.
что я вижу здесь? наса почему-то хочет отказаться от кооперации с русскими, это раз.
наса не уверены в собственных бюджетах и надеются на ракеты, которые возможно ещё взлетят, это два.