Posted on 07/01/2008 12:45:42 AM PDT by Names Ash Housewares
Captain Eugene (Gene) Cernan, the last man to walk on the moon, has called for the shuttle to be extended past 2010 - so long as it doesn't damage Constellation's manifest - in order to reduce the gap in US manned space flight capability. In an inspiring interview, Captain Cernan spoke on a variety of topics, ranging from his concerns about presidential candidate Barack Obama's plans for NASA, to his wish that he had flown the space shuttle.
(Excerpt) Read more at nasaspaceflight.com ...
'So I'm not too excited about him, for a number of reasons quiet frankly - lots of reasons actually, politically and on ideology and on the space program - I'm just not too excited about the potential of him being the president of the United States."
We feel your pain Gene, we surely do. Obama would drag the whole nation down the least common denominator rather then keep us on the leading edge of space exploration. The nations that lead on the frontier, dictate the course of human history.
PS
Read the whole interview.
Inspiring, and this nation would be WISE to listen to such men. It’s about a lot more then just NASA stuff. What it means beyond the obvious, how it inspires in so many different ways.
Makes you realize the WRONG people are running for President.
That was an outstanding article. A genuine breath of fresh air amid the political mire. Much appreciated.
US public education is a pit into which endless amounts of money can be thrown with little discernible benefit. The cry will also come for more and more money for social programs, Medicare, Medicaid, etc. The slowdown could well become the signature decision of the US to pass the future to other countries. The left would be proud.
How beautifully put!
Yeap, and flaunt our failures to the world. ‘What a miraculous thing we’ve done! We went from being #1 to #nothing in 4 short years. Who knows what other miracles we can perform: “Yes We Can” destroy America in our lifetime; if only we believe in the hope of change, etc…
bttt
I think the democrats are like a race of apes that diverged from the path of evolution to return to the rain forests, while the other apes, republicans, explored and built boats...They’re analogous to these radical ARabs who want us to return the 8th century and read the Koran all day and masturbate...
Obama will insulate himself, smack dab in the middle until the election. He will promise everyone everything, and thus people will hear what they want...And all he’ll be is words...just words...
I’m not buying that we’re number 4.... We’ve learned alot, as one does during wartime...medically, scientifically, communications...etc....
Captain Cernan was one of fourteen astronauts selected by NASA in October 1963. He occupied the pilot seat alongside of command pilot Tom Stafford on the Gemini IX mission in 1966.
Cernan, the second American to walk in space, logged two hours and ten minutes outside the spacecraft in extravehicular activities. Cernan subsequently served as backup pilot for Gemini 12 and as backup lunar module pilot for Apollo 7.
On his second space flight, he was lunar module pilot of Apollo 10, May 18-26, 1969, the first comprehensive lunar-orbital qualification and verification flight test of an Apollo lunar module.
Cernan's next assignment was backup spacecraft commander for Apollo 14. However, he made his third space flight as spacecraft commander of Apollo 17 - the last manned mission to the moon for the United States - in December 6, 1972, which was the first manned night time launch of the Saturn V.
Captain Cernan - who has logged 566 hours and 15 minutes in space-of which more than 73 hours were spent on the surface of the moon - retired from NASA in 1976, just as the program was heading into a long gap in US manned space flight, prior to the debut launch of the space shuttle in 1981.
Now, with the current plan to retire the shuttle in 2010, the US faces another lengthy gap in manned capability, ahead of the 'no sooner than' Orion missions in 2015/2016.
This new gap concerns Captain Cernan, who was available for an interview during his media promotion of the Discovery Channel's series 'When We Left Earth'.
'The gap bothers me quiet(sic) a bit, because we're going to be at the mercy of other people - you know who they are (the Russians) - and I'm just not too comfortable with that quite frankly,' responded Captain Cernan to my question about the gap, adding that he would support the shuttle's proposed manifest extension.
'I'm not sure what we do about it. There's been some talk about additional funding and extending the shuttle, and it's amazing to be even considering at this point in time that the shuttle is obsolete, because it does the job. If it works, we might use it for a while.
'Having been to the moon twice - and I don't want to sound arrogant about this - staying at home isn't good enough, but the fact of life that the only place we've got to go is in Earth orbit, and the shuttle is the only way of getting there.
'So I would like to see it funded a little bit further, to maintain our ability of access to the International Space Station (ISS).'
Cernan also added that he's an admirer of the shuttle, and wishes he still had the opportunity to ride onboard with an orbiter - if only for a couple of days.
'I'd love to fly the shuttle today. I don't want to spend two weeks travelling around the Earth, as I've done that, but I'd like to fly the shuttle for a day or two and run her through her paces. The shuttle is still the greatest flying machine that we've ever designed, built, and flown and I haven't had the chance to fly one.'
As noted by Constellation management and even NASA administrator Mike Griffin, simply extending the shuttle does not close the gap, given it would mean another two years the Ares and Orion programs would be without the huge percentage of the NASA budget which is eaten up by the shuttle program.
Captain Cernan understands that concern, and should such an extension fail to be funded at a rate that would not be to the detriment of the Constellation program, his priority remains with returning to the moon.
'I don't want to (extend the shuttle) at the expense of taking funds away from Constellation, because I'm one of those firm and strong believers that we must go back to the moon, and we must go beyond.
'I keep telling those fourth and fifth graders that they are the ones that it's carrying on the legacy of the Wright Brothers and to go make it happen, and they are the ones that are going to take us to Mars. There's no question in my mind that it will happen.'
While there has been a level of concern about the technical challenges the Ares program is suffering from, Captain Cernan is at least supportive of the decision to use Apollo heritage via Orion.
'They call Orion 'Apollo on steroids' - as far as I'm concerned, that's fine. What we did the first time worked pretty well,' the Captain added.
'The thing we have to remember, and is a real credibility to American ingenuity, not withstanding the sacrifices that were made and the people we lost - truly beginning with Apollo 1 before we ever got an Apollo spaceship off the ground - is the fact that everybody we sent to the moon, think about this, everybody we sent to the moon a generation ago, 35 years since I made those final steps, everybody, including the crew of Apollo 13, came home.
'That's a testimonial to what we can do if we put our minds to doing something.
'So we did it with something called Apollo, and if Constellation looks like Apollo, but it's got a little bit more capability, we don't need to re-invent the wheel. We just need to get there.
'The trip is mandatory, but if I had my way I'd wave a magic wand and we'd just forget the trip and just be there - because that's the reason we're going, just to be there.'
Captain Cernan also emphasized the rationale for spending billions of American taxpayer's money on going back to the moon and on to Mars, claiming it is the basis of a human's existence to explore.
'Why do I need to go to the moon, why do I need to go to Mars? I've got my sewing machine, I've got my washing machine, my computer and my cell phone (is what I sometimes hear).
'Thank God someone didn't say that over history - or you and I wouldn't be here to talk about how we did something - and I use the term 'we' - we did something - in this country.
'When I hear people asking about why we need to (explore), I say that curiosity is the basis of our human existence. Seeking knowledge and understanding about who we are, how long were going to be here, what's out there. Did Mars look like Earth eons ago, or does Mars look like the Earth will many years into the future?
'I don't have the answers to those questions, but when I stood on the surface of the moon, took those final steps, and crawled up the ladder, I tried to realize what those last few days meant to me, the significance of it all, and I came to the conclusion that science and technology didn't give the answer to what I was thinking and what I was feeling.
'So when we go further out, we're going to have more feelings and we're going to have more answers - and that's what it's all about. This is our destiny!
'People who say we could use the money to feed the poor are eating our seed corn, they are taking the investment in the future right out of the hands of the young people of today.'
And it was Captain Cernan's passion for the education of today's youth that is one of the key points that the benefits of the space program can provide America's children.
'I keep getting this question 'why spend so much money on the space program? We should spend that money on education!' Well let me say this, money doesn't educate kids, it gives them opportunities to learn. But you've got to stimulate their minds, you've got to inspire them, you've got to give them an opportunity to dream.
'The space program's legacy is the inspiration and dreams they provided to all of us. When I went, today, and tomorrow - all of us went to do what other people couldn't do, or what other people were afraid to do. That's education.
'When you take money away from aviation and space, you take away that inspiration and you put a hole in the opportunity for kids to have a desire to learn. So put the money in the space program and stimulate kids to learn. That's education.'
While Captain Cernan believes the decisions made by the Constellation program have been the correct ones, he's been disappointed at the pace of the vehicle's development, citing the political will that is not showing any signs of improving via the comments made so far by the presidential candidates over recent months.
'I think so far they've done what they could have done right with the funding they've had available (the Constellation program). But when president Bush announced (the VSE), the president looked and pointed at me and quoted my words 'we leave as we now came, and God willing as shall will return with peace and hope for all mankind'.
'He pointed to me (in the audience) and said 'and Captain Cernan, America will not let you down' or something to that effect. Well, things have slowed down obviously and I'm a little disappointed, because no one talks about the space program these days.
'The question I get today is 'why did we quit, why didn't we go on, and when are we going back?' And you haven't heard one word in any primary about space (from the presidential candidates). Now you may hear words about education, but the people talking about education don't know that you have to stimulate kids to learn.
'You don't hear about space being a contributor to education. You don't hear about space in the existing political situation.
'There's a lot of support in Congress from both sides of the aisle. The one thing I'll give Congress credit for - not much - is at least there's a majority of consensus that we need to spend money on technology and space.'
A specific political target for Captain Cernan was Obama's current policy of installing a five year hiatus in the Constellation program, to allow the diversion of funds into a proposed education program, which - in Cernan's opinion - is one of a number of reasons he is not a supporter of the Illinois Senator.
'Depending on how the election goes, Obama's already said he's going to slow down the space program - and I think it'll go further than that, I think it'll be slowed down for a decade or so and I don't believe anything will happen - and he'll use the money for education. I just told you how I feel about that.
'So I'm not too excited about him, for a number of reasons quiet frankly - lots of reasons actually, politically and on ideology and on the space program - I'm just not too excited about the potential of him being the president of the United States.
Cernan, a retired United States Navy Captain, was assigned to Attack Squadrons 26 and 112 at the Miramar Naval Air Station. He has logged more than 5000 hours flying time with more than 4800 hours in jet aircraft and over 200 jet aircraft carrier landings.
His career in the US forces has led to a certain amount of respect for John McCain - the Republican presidential candidate, adding that both candidates need to understand the power behind the decisions made by former president John F. Kennedy - mainly due to the current situation with the space program and the American political climate.
'John McCain, as a kid, had the same dreams as I did. He wanted to fly planes off aircraft carriers, so somewhere down in John McCain's heart was a dream about wanting to fly, and I think he's got a better appreciation for the significance of technology in the free world and the continuation (of the US) to be the leader in the free world.
'(For example) let me take you back to 1961. Sputnik had flown a couple of years earlier. Yuri Gagarin had flow a couple of orbits of the Earth in the April of 1961 - and the rest of the free world was looking at the US saying 'what are you going to do about it?'
'We were a country torn apart by civil unrest and campus strikes, at the beginning of a very unpopular war, and in May - the next month after Gagarin - Alan Sheppard, the first American in space, went up and down.
'He would have 16 minutes of space flight experience, didn't even get into orbit, and three weeks later the president of the United States, JFK - God bless him, I don't know if he was a visionary, a dreamer or politically astute, he was probably all three, we'll never know - said 'ok folks, we're going to go to the moon'.
'Now think of the power in that statement, from sixteen minutes of space flight experience and before even the Gemini program, and not only that, we're going to do it before the end of the decade, and that we were going to do it before the other guy does it, even though he never said it, but we knew it.
'That was the stimulus of getting us to the moon and that was the legacy of Apollo. Don't tell me we can't do it, cause that's how we're going to make it happen. Dream the impossible and go out and make it a habit. That's what Apollo was all about and we've got to get back on that track.
'The presidential candidates of today have got to realize what that did to the American people, at a time we were down on ourselves, when we had nothing to be proud of.
'I know a lot of POWs (Prisoners of War), I don't know John McCain very well, but you can ask a lot of POWs, and God bless their souls as they gave six or seven years of their life for this country, and felt they were doing the right thing, as they were doing what they had been asked to do.
'(You can ask them about the) stories coming back about these POWs about getting a little package of sugar with a picture of an astronaut with an American flag on the moon. They didn't know who, they didn't know when, but they knew it had been done, and they knew we had done it.
'I've got friends who were over there who've told me 'Gene, that gave me inspiration to live and endure for as long as it took to get out of here.
'So was the Apollo program worth it in dollars? Look what it did to this country when we needed something to be proud of, and quite frankly I'm not sure if we're not in the same place today as we were then.
'That's another reason I'm so passionate about us being the technological leader of the world. Going to the moon and on to Mars is going to be an international program, but we need to be the guy out front.
'If the presidential candidates don't know that, then it's going to be a long hard summer.'
I find it amazing that India can see that the reality of the Chinese space program is purely militaristic, but the man currently most likely to be the next President doesn’t understand why we need an aggressive space program.
I’m spreading it around everywhere I can.
This myth that we don’t spend enough on education still exists, unfortunately. So Obama wants to divert funds from an already puny NASA budget to education. Brilliant idea. How about letting states and municipalities run schools, as they are suppose d to do!
Obama can’t be doing himself any good in the great state of FL with this stance either. They could lose thousands of jobs once the shuttle program ends. The Houston area Democrat lawmakers won’t be happy with him either, if NASA is cut more.
Me too!
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