Lunar Water, Lunar Rockets

In my almost daily dive into the informational smorgasbord of the net, I often happen upon essays or articles that peak my interest. If the topic inspires new thought or ideas, I copy down and save off the links for further review and comment. As it is difficult to carve out time for writing in the midst of work and family time, I have assembled quite a backlog of topics for blog posts.

Since I last posted on the topic of manned space flight, the presence of water has been discovered on the moon. Are you kidding me!? This is a monumental discovery that dramatically changes the math for moon exploration. This news came within days of the release of the Augustine Panel's summary report - which among other things suggest that NASA's budget is insufficient to support a moon-to-Mars set of milestones. With the planned retirement of the shuttle next year, and the developmental delays besetting the Ares program, the United States is on the verge of conceding the pioneering edge to other nations. While the vision of both the government and NASA bureacracies bear much of the blame, the issue is a matter of will. In today's political climate, you get the sense that space exploration is fading fast as a national priority. Yet I wonder, how will we as a nation "feel" when countries like India are the ones making discoveries of water on the moon, as perhaps China or the Europeans or even the Russians push towards the moon to exploit the discovery of a potentially viable resource that enables semi-permanent colonization (think Gold Rush here)? I had not yet been born when Sputnik launched, but I would anticipate a similar sense of defeatism should the future of manned space flight be relinquished to others. This is another reason I am an advocate of commercializing the venture. If governments lead the way, space exploration will be as nationalized as our planet. Who gets to draw the borders on the moon? Those who get there first and stay there.

Nevertheless, there are some cool things happening. I don't remember how I found it, so I cannot provide the standard obligatory hat/tip, but a contest is underway called the 2009 Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge. The video embedded below is one of two in this brief article at SpaceFellowship.com. You'll have to watch the video until the end to get the proper size perspective of the vehicle. While it might be worth a comment to consider how a vaunted contractor such as Grumman (okay, Northrup-Grumman) has to consider subcontracting designs of a lunar lander after their dominance of the technology during Apollo, I love the fact that innovation hasn't yet disappeared from the American landscape.



The X-Prize Foundation, which is sponsoring the challenge, has more information, including additional video of lander designs from other competitors. Check it out.