On July 20, we marked the 45th anniversary of the
first human landing on the Moon. Like most
people, I was pinned to the television to watch the grainy pictures of the
first steps by Apollo 11 astronauts on an alien world. Once Apollo was over, human exploration of
the Moon ended. In fact, we retreated to
near Earth orbit and left exploration farther out to automated probes and instrumented
landers. I must admit that I am
disappointed when I realize that my grandchildren have never seen a real live
person walk on the Moon. Apollo is
ancient history for them.
In addition, the United States no longer has an active crewed
spacecraft capable of achieving orbit. With
the end of the Space Shuttle program, Americans are dependent on Russians to
take American astronauts into space.
NASA talks about human missions to Mars, but I would not hold my breath
about the possibilities. The United
States Air Force seems more interested in drones and surveillance satellites
than putting people into space.
The future of space exploration and exploitation is primarily
in the hands of commercial entrepreneurs like SpaceX, Orbital Sciences, and
Virgin Galactic. Perhaps this is the way
that it should be. Those who take the
risks will receive the rewards. These
are the entities that will reap the benefits from asteroid mining, power
generation, and space factories. Exploitation
will trump exploration with the latter done only by instruments.
The downside is that governments will eventually find
themselves completely dependent on independent contractors for space
services. With military downsizing, this
is the approach now used in Afghanistan and other places where the U.S.
military has a presence overseas. Much
of the support, technical, and even security responsibilities are
outsourced. This may seem the most
economical approach right now, but will it always be so?
Whenever the first human craft lands on Mars, expect it to
carry as many logos as a NASCAR contender.
And that’s the way it is . . .
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