Word: lunar
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...getting hard to find many Americans who remember where they were the last time men set foot on the moon. Not only had most of us quit paying attention to lunar landings by then, but 48% of us hadn't even been born by December 1972, when the last moon walkers left the lunar surface and headed for home...
...first encouraging sign that NASA means business is the sensible hardware it's envisioning for the lunar portion of the moon-Mars program. The new vehicles are based on proven--if souped up--Apollo technology, with an orbiter that looks a lot like the old Apollo command module and a lander that resembles the familiar spindly lunar module. The new lander could carry three or more crew members down to the surface and drive them around the lunar landscape, doubling as a sort of extraterrestrial pickup truck. Crews would live for up to 180 days at a time in trailer...
...site for the moon settlement is uncertain, but the best candidate is near Shackleton Crater at the south lunar pole. Parts of the region are bathed in sunlight more than 70% of the time, just the thing for the outpost's solar panels. What's more, ridges and hills cast patches of ground in equally deep shadow, meaning a possible supply of ice that could be used for drinking water and hydrogen and oxygen fuel...
Astronauts who set up camp at the site would have a lot to keep them busy. NASA is exploring 180 areas of scientific research and other projects for its moon crews, from the lofty (solar physics) to the frankly commercial (installing lunar robots that could be driven remotely from Earth by paying customers to help defray costs...
...space officials insist they're wise to their own worst tendencies. "We will go as we can afford to pay," says deputy administrator Shana Dale. "Our charge is to build a program that is sustainable." One indication that NASA takes this seriously is that the equipment being developed for lunar exploration is intended to be adaptable to Mars exploration as well, eliminating the cost of entirely retooling when there's a shift to a more distant, less hospitable destination...