Constellation: December 2007 Archives

The following blog is an update of the 14 August 2006 Flight International blog posting

NASA administrator Michael Griffin announced at the 9th International Mars Society Convention in Washington DC on 3 August 2006 that his agency would undertake studies of manned Mars missions this year.

It won't be the first time NASA has carried out such a study. This year it is 10 years since the 237-paged "Human Exploration of Mars: The Reference Mission of the NASA Mars Exploration Study Team" was published. But this time we already knew largely, what we now know is called the Mars Design Reference Architecture 5.0, would be saying.

Aviation Week's senior space editor Frank Morring has posted a story about NASA's Constellation programme with some detail on developments its going through

And this week Boeing won the Ares I crew launch vehicle (CLV) instrument unit (IU) contract. Useful as Boeing is building the Ares I CLV upper stage that houses the IU

But you have to wonder what progress NASA can make in future with reports about its budget situation like this

And Space Politics is also reporting this Florida Today article that questions Constellation's viability

Transterrestrial Musings has linked to this Spaceref.com article about US president George W. Bush's vision for space exploration and its gloomy future