For long, we have remained moon-struck only by seeing the lunar beauty from the earth. It will not be long when we can travel to this wonderful satellite of earth and even own an apartment there. This is no figment of lunacy but if NASA is able to achieve its target of returning to the moon in 2020 and unravel its program to build towns on the moon then you can own an apartment in the lunar city.
After Neil Armstrong’s giant leap on the lunar soil in 1969, the last manned mission went to the moon in December 1972 carrying Gene Cernan, Ron Evans and Jack Schmitt. NASA is facing financial crunch in the way of realization of its ambitious project that is expected to make rapid strides in space exploration. A manned outpost powered by solar energy is expected to be built on the south pole of the moon. With successful completion of its lunar project that includes constructing a town on the satellite, NASA hopes to sent a manned mission to Mars.
The financial impediments could be removed only if the US Congress passed the budget approving NASA’s lunar mission. After President John F Kennedy, later US Presidents seemed to be more interested in building global political hegemony and less interested in moving ahead with space research. China has emerged a likely contender to US’s lunar mission. It can only be hoped that fear of China’s space control programs will stimulate the US administration to increase its space research funding.
