The FAA To Facilitate American Commercial Participation In the ESA Moon Village (examiner.com) 31
MarkWhittington writes: While NASA remains fixated on its Journey to Mars, quietly, the FAA is positioning itself as the lead United States Government agency for a return to the moon. According to a story in Space News, "FAA's Commercial Space Transportation Advisory Committee (COMSTAC) unanimously approved a recommendation that the FAA's Office of Commercial Space Transportation begin discussions with ESA on ways American companies could participate in what's known as 'Moon Village.'" The "Moon Village" is a European concept for an international moon base where various countries and private entities would collocate habitats for mutual support and benefit.
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Bureaucrats know no bounds (Score:1)
From your back yard to the moon the FAA wants to stick it's finger in the pie. Are they going to start regulating mining and deep sea exploration next?
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So deep sea exploration than?
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The Administrator for Space Transportation actually started in another agency, and was transferred to the FAA about a decade ago when members of Congress were trying to figure out what part of the government ought to be regulating commercial space transportation systems. To be honest, the whole debate over even creating this agency started when Burt Rutan built Space Ship One, and members of Congress were trying to figure out who could give approval for the flight.
This isn't all that new of a thing, other
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Precisely. The Administrator for Space Transportation (AST) works in the Office for Commercial Space Transportation.
Treating it as if this is a new thing or a recent power grab is just a play of ignorance.
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Is there some condition of the Moon that would be different than Earth?
A bunch of die-hard communists want to make everything in space "a common heritage for all mankind" and get rid of the concept of extra-terrestrial real estate ownership. I really think that idea is going to die as a miserable failure, but that won't happen until a bunch of people who aren't government employees show up at places like the Moon or Mars to pull out a gun to defend territory that they don't want others occupying.
These same people think the conditions on the Moon are somehow different in that
Hey I'm all for it (Score:1)
As long as they use comlocks, it's gonna be great!
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As long as they use comlocks, it's gonna be great!
I agree, also females should be required to dress in bawdy off white, tight fitting spandex bell-bottoms with their department denoted by the color of one arm of their shirt.
If we can't see nipples from across the room, they are doing it wrong!
Thanks Obama (Score:1)
This is all because Obama and his enforcer at NASA, Charles Bolden, have made any discussion of the moon verboten.
So now the FAA has to do what NASA should be doing. It's all because people seem to think we have to go to Mars or the Moon, but not both.
WE NEED TO COLONIZE BOTH THESE BODIES FOR THE WELFARE OF OUR RACE!
Thanks Obama!
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This is all because Obama and his enforcer at NASA, Charles Bolden, have made any discussion of the moon verboten.
Hardly. Obama simply cancelled the Constellation program and the billions of dollars that were projected (but never appropriated) to be spent on basically re-creating the Apollo "J" missions and perhaps even the "K" missions that might have happened with Apollo missions 18-21 had funding continued back then. Boldly redoing stuff from the past isn't really colonizing.
WE NEED TO COLONIZE BOTH THESE BODIES FOR THE WELFARE OF OUR RACE!
I agree with the notion, but there has yet to be any major presidential candidate besides Newt Gingrich to even suggest colonizing anything o
Competing government agencies? (Score:4, Insightful)
When you see government agencies competing with each other, you know, you have too many of them.
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The write-up (and, likely, TFA as well) clearly implies, travel to Moon is NASA's prerogative, which FAA took over. There is obviously competition — at least, in the perception of the two agencies' missions.
FAA? NASA? (Score:2)
Forget it. I'll build my own, with blackjack and hookers. [youtube.com]
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We can send all of Japan's whalers there!
The Moon Village is a *concept* (Score:3)
The Moon Village is simply name coined by newly minted ESA Director-General Johann-Dietrich Woerner. He has selected this as his stretch goal as something he has discussed prior to become the head of the agency. It is in the *concept* stage right now. As of yet, there are no partners, no money, no plan, etc. It also doesn't yet have the actual ESA as backer as he made this whole thing simply in a speech at the 31st Space Symposium in Colorado Springs in April.
The concept he was pitching was a manned base on the far side of the moon which should have opportunities for astronomy and planetary science, learning resource management.
Some of NASA administrator Charles Bolden' comments on this so called "Moon Village"...
“The US does not have to be the country that says, ‘We’re going, follow us,’” he said. “We’re all going back to the surface of the Moon. But, it’s just that the United States has no intention of leading that effort. We will support and be along with anybody that goes.”
“It will be critical for industry, both in the United States and elsewhere, but most importantly for our international partners to finally step up” and take the lead on lunar landing plans, he said. “Unfortunately, nobody’s stepped up yet.”
The FAA seem to be simply just trying to grab some turf in the commercial angle of this, but there's nothing really to grab yet.