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[Previous entry: "Bloc Party's Silent Alarm remixed"] [Main Index] [Next entry: "RAW's Email to the Universe released."] 09/19/2005 Entry: "Not to be outdone by Malaysia, NASA unveils 13 year plan to go back on the moon." Not to be outdone by Malaysia, NASA unveils 13 year plan to go back on the moon. Using designs largerly based on the old Apollo missions. "Think of it as Apollo on steroids," says NASA administrator Michael Griffin. The Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) capsule will weigh about 50% more than the Apollo capsule. "But understand, we did not set out to make it look like Apollo," he adds, explaining that the design was simply the best option out of all those considered. The new Moon programme will have timetable of 13 years instead of Apollo's 8, and the crew of four astronauts is double the number that landed on the Moon first time around. The maximum time the first astronauts will spend on the Moon's surface will also increase to seven days from Apollo’s three. The "something-old-something-new project" will build heavily on space shuttle hardware. It will use revamped versions of the shuttle's solid rocket boosters, external tank and main engines, but will scrap the system's most familiar component, the winged orbiter. At 104 billion total, that's only 14.8 billion per day spent on the moon. Disneyland costs almost as much. I swear I left the Tang right here!