Should NASA Go to the Moon or the Asteroids First?
By Steven Ashley
This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American
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Craig Covault, one of the nation's top aviation/space journalists, recently published a story in Aviation Week and Space Technology that describes a lobbying campaign by influential members of the space community who are pushing for NASA to forgo returning humans to the Moon in favor of traveling to the asteroids or the Lagrangian points, where the Sun's and the Earth's gravity cancel out so that space platforms could park there over the long term. These individuals fear that Moon landings and a moon base would suck so much effort and resources out of America’s space agency that it could delay a crewed trip to Mars for decades. This “alternate vision” for space exploration is bound to create a good deal of controversy in the coming months.
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