Why hasn't a human visited the moon since 1972?

Landing 12 people on the Moon is one of NASA's greatest accomplishments.

Astronauts collect rocks, take photos, carry out experiments, and put flags on the Moon, before finally returning to Earth.

However, the stay of the astronauts on the Moon during the Apollo program did not create an eternal human existence there.

More than 45 years after the landing on the Moon - via the Apollo 17 mission in December 1972 - there are many reasons why no human has been able to return and live on Earth's giant satellite.

Also Read: For the First Time, Water Detected in This Habitable Exoplanet

Researchers and entrepreneurs think that having an astronaut "base" on the Moon could evolve into a fuel depot for all space missions. This will lead to the creation of an unprecedented telescope, facilitate the study of life on Mars, and solve scientific mysteries about the universe. The Moon Base could even affect the world economy through the development of space tourism.

“Building a permanent research base on the Moon is a reasonable move. We can get there in three days from Earth, "former astronaut Chris Hadfield told Business Insider.

Even so, astronauts and experts say, there are such huge obstacles to carrying out the lunar mission that no one has been there for more than four decades. What are the factors preventing it?

Low budget given

The hurdles that any space program must face are high costs.

In a law enacted in March 2017, President Donald Trump provided NASA with an annual budget of $ 19.5 billion. This number is likely to increase to 19.9 billion US dollars in 2019.

The cost may seem enormous, but keep in mind that that figure includes several ambitious NASA projects, such as the James Webb space telescope, the Space Launch System giant rocket project, and several missions deep into Jupiter, Mars, the asteroid belt, and the outer solar system.

This NASA budget is relatively small compared to the past. "NASA's share of the state budget could reach 4% in 1965. But now, it's under 1% - for the last 15 years it's even only 0.4%," said Walter Cunningham, an Apollo 7 astronaut, at a congress in 2015.

The Trump administration has requested that the budget be used for missions to return to the Moon and visit Mars. However, given the inflated costs associated with NASA's SLS rocket, the funds are not sufficient to achieve the two missions.

A NASA report published in 2005 estimated that returning to the Moon would cost about $ 104 billion over 13 years. The Apollo mission alone cost $ 120 billion at current prices.

“Exploration of outer space with a crew is the most expensive endeavor. It is also the most difficult to get political support, ”said Cunnigham.

"If the country decides to give more money, then we can talk further," he added.

Presidential intervention

The Trump administration's ultimate goal is to send more astronauts to the Moon by 2023. It will be Trump's last term in power if he is re-elected. Another problem with this is: political interference.

From an astronaut's perspective, it's all about missions. The process of designing, building, and testing a spaceship so that it can get humans out of Earth, could take more than two presidents.

However, from the pattern that has taken place so far, new presidents and lawmakers will usually derail the prior administration's space mission priorities.

In 2004, for example, the Bush administration ordered NASA to replace its retiring spacecraft and carry out a mission to the Moon. The agency then created a program called Constellation to land astronauts on the Moon - planning to use the Ares rocket and the Orion spacecraft.

NASA spent US $ 9 billion over five years designing, building, and testing its hardware. However, after Obama was elected president, the Government Accountability Office released a report stating NASA's inability to continue with the Constellation program.

Obama encouraged NASA to cancel the program and sign an order to launch the SLS space rocket instead.

Trump hasn't canceled the SLS rocket project, but he's changed Obama's priorities by ordering astronauts to send missions to the Moon and Mars.


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