$100 million for NASA asteroid mission

[Sidney]

Like the title says. Lots of money being funnelled to this program. Whats the real reason??



http://science.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/04/05/17620570-nasa-to-get-100-million-for-asteroid-mission-senator-says?lite

NASA will likely get $100 million next year to jump-start an audacious program to drag an asteroid into orbit around the moon for research and exploration purposes, U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., says.
The $100 million will probably be part of President Barack Obama's federal budget request for 2014, which is expected to be released next week, Nelson said. The money is intended to get the ball rolling on the asteroid-retrieval project, which also aims to send astronauts out to the captured space rock in 2021.
"This is part of what will be a much broader program," Nelson said Friday during a visit to Orlando. "The plan combines the science of mining an asteroid along with developing ways to deflect one, along with providing a place to develop ways we can go to Mars."
NASA's plan involves catching a near-Earth asteroid (NEA) with a robotic spacecraft, then towing the space rock to a stable lunar orbit, Nelson said. Astronauts would then be sent to the asteroid in 2021 using NASA's Orion capsule and Space Launch System rocket, both of which are in development.
The idea is similar to one proposed last year by researchers based at Caltech's Keck Institute for Space Studies in Pasadena.
"Experience gained via human expeditions to the small returned NEA would transfer directly to follow-on international expeditions beyond the Earth-moon system: to other near-Earth asteroids, (the Mars moons) Phobos and Deimos, Mars and potentially someday to the main asteroid belt," the Keck team wrote in a feasibility study of their plan.
Cosmic Log: Asteroid miners get a boost from NASA
NASA will need much more than this initial $100 million to make the asteroid-retrieval mission happen. The Keck study estimated that it would cost about $2.6 billion to drag a 500-ton space rock back near the moon.
Nelson said he thinks the Obama administration is in favor of the asteroid-retrieval plan. In 2010, the president directed NASA to work to get astronauts to a near-Earth asteroid by 2025, then on to the vicinity of Mars by the mid-2030s.
News of the potential $100 million allocation is not a complete surprise, as Aviation Week reported late last month that NASA was seeking that amount in 2014 for an asteroid-retrieval program.

[dynamo]

$100 million is peanuts when you can print a trillion (and skim a few billion for yourself and your cronies) in a couple of weeks LOL

[MorningSong]

I'm not sure that playing asteroid cowboy is a good idea.

Thoughts flash through my mind: some energy propells asteroids and they themselves push energy in front of them. What long-range effects will upsetting that energy flow have? And they want to put it into the moon's orbit (or to orbit the moon, can't tell by the wording of the articles I've read)? What will that do to the Earth's tidal cycles? Will that have an effect of the Moon's orbit eventually?

I don't like this idea too much....

[ExomatrixTV]

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23039-nasa-mulls-plan-to-drag-asteroid-into-moons-orbit.html

[Nanoo Nanoo]

Thats funny , they cant even take care of the population down here so they wish to drag a rock to get it in orbit with the moon .. hmmm i can see the benefit ..

humans , very strange species

N

[ghostrider]

100 million to pick up a rock... how bout stopping world hunger ???

[Sidney]

100 million to pick up a rock... how bout stopping world hunger ???

I agree. The priorities of our species is enough to make me gag. On a side note, when ever I see articles like this, I have to ask myself, what is this smokescreen covering up,(I think they have most likely already been practicing this anyway), and is it just a public announcement to explain "unesplainable" fireballs in the sky. Not really about the money, because it only takes a printing press for that.

¤=[Post Update]=¤

Thank you exomatrixtv- Here is the updated article on this subject as per your link.

NASA mulls plan to drag asteroid into moon's orbit

15:15 02 January 2013 by Jeff Hecht
For similar stories, visit the Spaceflight and Comets and Asteroids Topic Guides
Who says NASA has lost interest in the moon? Along with rumours of a hovering lunar base, there are reports that the agency is considering a proposal to capture an asteroid and drag it into the moon's orbit.

Researchers with the Keck Institute for Space Studies in California have confirmed that NASA is mulling over their plan to build a robotic spacecraft to grab a small asteroid and place it in high lunar orbit. The mission would cost about $2.6 billion – slightly more than NASA's Curiosity Mars rover – and could be completed by the 2020s.

For now, NASA's only official plans for human spaceflight involve sending a crewed capsule, called Orion, around the moon. The Obama administration has said it also wants to send astronauts to a near-Earth asteroid. One proposed target, chosen because of its scientific value and favourable launch windows for a rendezvous, is a space rock called 1999 AO10. The mission would take about half a year, exposing astronauts to long-term radiation beyond Earth's protective magnetic field and taking them beyond the reach of any possible rescue.

Robotically bringing an asteroid to the moon instead would be a more attractive first step, the Keck researchers conclude, because an object orbiting the moon would be in easier reach of robotic probes and maybe even humans.

Catch and release

The Keck team envisions launching a slow-moving spacecraft, propelled by solar-heated ions, on an Atlas V rocket. The craft would then propel itself out to a target asteroid, probably a small space rock about 7 metres wide. After studying it briefly, the robot would catch the asteroid in a bag measuring about 10 metres by 15 metres and head back towards the moon. Altogether it would take about six to 10 years to deliver the asteroid to lunar orbit.

The project still needs some technical and scientific fine-tuning, says co-leader Louis Friedman of the Planetary Society, but he sees it as an important boost to exploration.

For instance, NASA has also expressed interest in putting astronauts on an outpost parked in orbit at the Earth-moon Lagrange point 2. From there they could study a captured asteroid using telepresence technology, or even practise human landings on its surface.

Such work could help develop ways to use asteroid material for construction or spaceship fuels, making the captured asteroid a stepping stone for human missions to larger asteroids and eventually to Mars.

A moon-orbiting asteroid would probably also be of interest to private companies proposing human missions to the lunar surface for scientific exploration and mining studies.

[ghostrider]

I get it, they announce a project to grab an asteroid and put in around the moon for study, all along , they have already done it... this is a cover to spend large amounts of money and hide the true purpose of the need for resources ... How many homes could be bought for one hundred million ??? You could even build a hospital for that amount ...

[Sidney]

I get it, they announce a project to grab an asteroid and put in around the moon for study, all along , they have already done it... this is a cover to spend large amounts of money and hide the true purpose of the need for resources ... How many homes could be bought for one hundred million ??? You could even build a hospital for that amount ...

Actually the amount is now 2.6 BILLION, according to the above article. : / You are right ghostrider, a smokescreen for whatever they are really spending the money on. Can you imagine how much it is costing to keep all the spray planes in the air 24/7 around the globe. Too much to even calculate IMO.

[Nanoo Nanoo]

Clearly they are all double blind moves to fund the weaponisation of our immediate space.

Gaining control wether it be down here or out there ... its a venture for the bored with more money than cents. forgive my criticism , perhaps my birds eye view is different to yours ...

putting up or manipulating rocks in space is a weaponisation , if ones were to fall " accidentally " and say wipe out certain parts of this planet in an attempt to de populate it then one would understand the weapons are not for space invaders but rather creating more " accidents " to de populate.

Possibly why being under ground is a good thing ?

hmmm

N
N

[Vitalux]

$100 million is peanuts when you can print a trillion (and skim a few billion for yourself and your cronies) in a couple of weeks LOL


:blabla:

I am surprised that they did not announce to the world that they were going to land 3 astronauts on it, and then hire Stanley Kubrick (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000040/?ref_=tt_ov_wr) to come back from the grave and do it for them again ;)

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_zGhweqq03h4/S0m0eF2CqYI/AAAAAAAABWI/N9Jk0QQEhO0/s200/apollo_11_hoax1fffff.jpg

[sheme]

http://earthsky.org/space/proposed-budget-includes-100m-to-place-asteroid-in-orbit-around-moon?utm_source=EarthSky+News&utm_campaign=96f8dc8ea0-EarthSky_News&utm_medium=email

I think this is because they have been banned from the moon, because they nuked it the last time. I hope our ET friends will just not let this baby play God until it has had a chance to grow up.

I think they will just throw stones at the moon from it! who knows they might be planning on hurling it at Earth!

[Star Tsar]

Dr Farrell on this matter...


Giza Death Star Community

News & Views From The Nefarium

Streamed & Published 5th March 2020

https://hips.hearstapps.com/hmg-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/images/phobos-1582310814.jpg

Dr Joseph P. Farrell shares some facts on JAXA's newly announced mission to Phobos...

Related article: https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/moon-mars/a31044959/jaxa-phobos-mars-mission/

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[Le Chat]

Fascinating talk there. I'd not encountered this guy before but will investigate more on what he has to say on other topics.
On the right-hand side of the photo of Phobos (above) looks like some sort of circuit board.

[ExomatrixTV]

Turns Out, There Is a Way to Nuke a Dangerous Asteroid As a Last Resort:

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