Moon walk or Death Star? China’s lunar plans a mystery

An artist's conception of China's Chang'e 3 robot on the moon.ESA

A Chinese satellite has entered lunar orbit and should drop a robotic probe on the moon as early as Friday -- the first such moon landing in nearly four decades. But China's ultimate plans are unclear, whether simply scientific or the first steps toward a military base on the moon.

The Chang’e 3 satellite was launched from southwest China on Dec. 2 and entered orbit around the moon on Dec. 6. It will deposit a robotic rover on the moon as early as Dec. 14. China’s long range goals are murky, according to Thomas Reiter, director for human spaceflight and operations with the European Space Agency (ESA). Yet militarizing the moon would be a shame, he said.

“I could not imagine that human exploration is getting … pushed by military consideration,” Reiter told FoxNews.com. “It would really be a pity.”

'It could indicate interest in the next decade in bringing humans to the lunar surface.'

- Thomas Reiter, director of human spaceflight and operations at the ESA

The ESA is helping China to the moon, a landing that will be the first controlled descent since Russia’s Luna-24 landed in 1976. The space agency’s worldwide network of satellites are tracking the science mission while expert teams on the ground are lending technical assistance. But not even the ESA knows exactly what China has planned.

“The strategic long-term goals of China in human exploration … are not very clear yet,” Reiter said. China’s goals could include landing men on the moon, a feat only the United States has managed to do, the last time 41 years ago, he said.

“I believe they are taking a clear path with some first steps, and I could imagine yes, this could be interest in the next decade in bringing humans to the lunar surface.”

Russia also has shown interest in the moon, Reiter said. Yet the ESA, like NASA, has no concrete plans to do more than help when it comes to lunar exploration.

“NASA is not going to the moon with a human as a primary project probably in my lifetime,” NASA administrator Charles Bolden said at an April panel in Washington. NASA spokesman David Weaver echoed that sentiment, telling FoxNews.com that it is working with international partners to plan missions to the moon and elsewhere.

“We are deeply involved in lunar science, with two satellites currently orbiting the moon,” he said. “The global community is committed to working together on a unified deep-space exploration strategic plan, with robotic and human missions to destinations that include near-Earth asteroids, the moon and Mars. 

Reiter also put the moon on a short list, including low-Earth orbit and Mars. But due to budgetary restrictions, the ESA has no plans of its own to visit the moon.

“For the moment, we do not have a dedicated lunar exploration program,” he told FoxNews.com. At a recent conference in Naples, the space agency proposed a program for a European lunar landing mission to the south pole.

“Due to the overall economic situation of the member states, this could not be approved,” Reiter said. “We are looking into a cooperative mission with the Russian partners.”

Yet Reiter said the agency remains focused on the moon, despite a decades-long dry spell in lunar landings.

“I believe the moon is still a very important destination,” he said. “If we really intend to take a human mission to Mars … in two decades or maybe a little more, this way leads by the moon.”

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How to Preserve the Apollo Lunar Landing Sites (ContributorNetwork)

Recently, NASA released some Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter images of some of the Apollo moon landing sites. While this would seem to be the final nail in the coffin of the "we never went to the moon" conspiracy theory, they raise another question.

NASA is expressing interest in protecting the Apollo landing sites from contamination from future lunar landers. The motive is as much scientific as it is cultural and historical. According to an article by Chris Bergen at NASA Space Flight, there is concern that future lunar landers, such as are being developed for the Google Lunar X Prize will damage not only the footprints and treads left on the lunar surface by the Apollo astronauts, but the hardware.

Nevertheless there is some interest in revisiting some of the Apollo sites to ascertain how four decades of micrometeorite bombardment and exposure to lunar weathering have affected the descent stages and other hardware left behind. How to do this and not damage the landing sites is a vexing question.

Protocols will no doubt be developed to allow for the traversing of lunar rovers on or at least near the landing sites. However there is a longer view question that has to be answered, especially as humans sooner or later begin to return to the moon.

The Apollo landing sites are historical and cultural areas, where history was literally imprinted on the soil by the footsteps of astronaut explorers and the tread tracks of lunar rovers. When people start living and working on the moon, same care has to be made to keep from contaminating the sites while at the same time eventually facilitating the desire of people on the moon to visit them.

The desire to preserve the sites down to the very footprints make preserving them a more daunting task than the equivalent, say a famous battlefield, on Earth. The disturbance caused by future lunar explorers, kicking up dust, might damage the sites irreversibly.

One idea might be to set up barriers around the landing sites, beyond which future lunar visitors will not be able to traverse. No doubt with careful mapping and the deployment of walkways that avoid the footprints and tread marks, future lunar tourists will be able to enter the sites, to a certain extent, and stand near where the first explorers of the moon stood so many decades before.

That's not an immediate problem, of course. The United States is still wrestling over what sort of space exploration program it should have or whether it should have one at all. But China, India, and perhaps other countries are interested in eventually sending their astronauts to the moon. The question thus arises, if the personnel of other countries are on the moon and Americans are not, will the United States have any say in how the Apollo landing sites are treated?

Mark R. Whittington is the author of Children of Apollo and The Last Moonwalker . He has written on space subjects for a variety of periodicals, including The Houston Chronicle, The Washington Post, USA Today, the L.A. Times, and The Weekly Standard.

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Haunting Moon Photo: Shadows Loom Over Huge Lunar Crater (SPACE.com)

A new photo of the moon's huge Tycho crater taken at sunrise shows haunting dark shadows spreading out across the lunar surface.

The pitch-black patches loom behind the Tycho crater's central peak complex, which is about 9.3 miles (15 km) wide from southeast to northwest.

The photo was taken on June 10 by NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter in orbit around the moon. By angling its orbit 65 degrees to the west, the spacecraft was able to capture this dramatic sunrise view. [See the photo of moon's Tycho crater]

NASA launched the LRO mission in June 2009 to photograph the moon in unprecendented detail, mapping its surface for scientific study, as well as to scout potential landing sites for future manned missions.

Tycho crater is named after the 16th century Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe (1546-1601). One of the most prominent features on the near side of the moon, the impact basin is a favorite observing target for amateur astronomers.

The crater stretches about 51 miles (82 km) in diameter, with the summit of its central peak 1.24 miles (2 km) above the crater floor. The rim of the crater is about 2.92 miles (4.7 km) above its floor.

Follow SPACE.com for the latest in space science and exploration news on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.

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Government sues Apollo 14 astronaut over lunar camera (Reuters)

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The U.S. government has sued a former NASA astronaut to recover a camera used to explore the moon's surface during the 1971 Apollo 14 mission after seeing it slated for sale in a New York auction.

The lawsuit, filed in Miami federal court on Wednesday, accuses Edgar Mitchell of illegally possessing the camera and attempting to sell it for profit.

In March, NASA learned that the British auction house Bonhams was planning to sell the camera at an upcoming Space History Sale, according to the suit.

The item was labeled "Movie Camera from the Lunar Surface" and billed as one of two cameras from the Apollo 14's lunar module Antares. The lot description said the item came "directly from the collection" of pilot Edgar Mitchell and had a pre-sale estimate of $60,000 to $80,000, the suit said.

Mitchell was a lunar module pilot on Apollo 14, which launched its nine-day mission in 1971 under the command of Alan Shepard. The sixth person to walk on the moon, Mitchell is now retired and runs a website selling his autographed picture.

He has made headlines in the past for his stated belief in the existence of extraterrestrial life.

"All equipment and property used during NASA operations remains the property of NASA unless explicitly released or transferred to another party," the government suit said, adding NASA had no record of the camera being given to Mitchell.

The suit said the government had made repeated requests to Mitchell and his lawyer to return the camera but received no response.

Mitchell's lawyer, Donald Jacobson, said NASA management was aware of and approved Mitchell's ownership of the camera 40 years ago.

"Objects from the lunar trips to the moon were ultimately mounted and then presented to the astronauts as a gift after they had helped NASA on a mission," Jacobson said.

Bonhams said in an emailed statement that the camera had been slated to be auctioned off in May when it learned about the ownership dispute from NASA. The auction house withdrew the camera from sale "pending further discussion between NASA and the consignor," a Bonhams spokesperson said.

The government is asking the court to stop Mitchell from selling the camera to anyone, to order its return and to declare that the United States has "good, clean and exclusive title" to the camera.

(Reporting by Terry Baynes; Editing by Cynthia Johnston)

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Government sues Apollo 14 astronaut over lunar camera

Astronaut Edgar Mitchell on the surface of the moon during the 1971 Apollo 14 mission.

Credit: Reuters/NASA

NEW YORK | Fri Jul 1, 2011 11:57am EDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. government has sued a former NASA astronaut to recover a camera used to explore the moon's surface during the 1971 Apollo 14 mission after seeing it slated for sale in a New York auction.

The lawsuit, filed in Miami federal court on Wednesday, accuses Edgar Mitchell of illegally possessing the camera and attempting to sell it for profit.

In March, NASA learned that the British auction house Bonhams was planning to sell the camera at an upcoming Space History Sale, according to the suit.

The item was labeled "Movie Camera from the Lunar Surface" and billed as one of two cameras from the Apollo 14's lunar module Antares. The lot description said the item came "directly from the collection" of pilot Edgar Mitchell and had a pre-sale estimate of $60,000 to $80,000, the suit said.

Mitchell was a lunar module pilot on Apollo 14, which launched its nine-day mission in 1971 under the command of Alan Shepard. The sixth person to walk on the moon, Mitchell is now retired and runs a website selling his autographed picture.

He has made headlines in the past for his stated belief in the existence of extraterrestrial life.

"All equipment and property used during NASA operations remains the property of NASA unless explicitly released or transferred to another party," the government suit said, adding NASA had no record of the camera being given to Mitchell.

The suit said the government had made repeated requests to Mitchell and his lawyer to return the camera but received no response.

Mitchell's lawyer, Donald Jacobson, said NASA management was aware of and approved Mitchell's ownership of the camera 40 years ago.

"Objects from the lunar trips to the moon were ultimately mounted and then presented to the astronauts as a gift after they had helped NASA on a mission," Jacobson said.

Bonhams said in an emailed statement that the camera had been slated to be auctioned off in May when it learned about the ownership dispute from NASA. The auction house withdrew the camera from sale "pending further discussion between NASA and the consignor," a Bonhams spokesperson said.

The government is asking the court to stop Mitchell from selling the camera to anyone, to order its return and to declare that the United States has "good, clean and exclusive title" to the camera.

(Reporting by Terry Baynes; Editing by Cynthia Johnston)

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Bigelow Plans First Private Space Station by 2016, Warns of Chinese Lunar Land Grab (ContributorNetwork)

The Next Big Future recently checked in on Bigelow Aerospace, which plans to deploy a private space station in low Earth orbit by 2016. Robert Bigelow, the company's CEO, also had some blunt things to say about the Chinese.

More than the heavily government subsidized rocket companies such as SpaceX, real hopes for a vibrant commercial space sector resides in corporations like Bigelow. So far the government is at once the prime investor and the sole customer of the commercial launch companies it is funding under President Barack Obama's space policy.

Bigelow represents a much more pure manifestation of commercial space. Instead of chasing government subsidies, Bigelow envisions its space facility as hosting private researchers and astronauts, charging initially $28.75 million for a two-week stay, expensive to be sure, but still very competitive compared to what is charged by Space Adventures for a stay on the International Space Station.

Bigelow will benefit from the Obama commercial space plan at least indirectly. Bigelow has signed an agreement with Boeing to use the BA330 capsule, which the giant aerospace firm is developing using commercial space subsidies from NASA. The BA330 is in direct competition with SpaceX's Dragon space ship.

Bigelow would also not be averse to having guests paid by the U.S. government, say researchers who want to run experiments on board its facility. Plans are not quite firm for that kind of arrangement, so Bigelow is relying mainly on commercial customers for now. Of course, the US government is not the only government keen on getting in on space research. Bigelow's prices are low enough that any number of countries could use its space station to do research.

Moving beyond low Earth orbit, Robert Bigelow was quite blunt in his belief that as soon as practicable China would withdraw from the Outer Space Treaty which, among other things, forbids nation states from claiming extra terrestrial territory. China would hence start claiming large sections of the moon, especially the poles where water exists in relative abundance.

Bigelow's assertion may seem far-fetched, but it does mesh with China's aggressive behavior on Earth in its drive to supplant the United States as sole super power. And Bigelow does envision his company as being part of an American response, building inflatable lunar bases to counter Chinese territorial claims.

One of the refreshing aspects of Bigelow's prediction of a Chinese lunar land grab is the implied criticism of Obama's current space plan that bypasses the Moon, which in many ways is strategic territory, in favor of chasing asteroids. If one legitimately fears Chinese empire building on the Moon, then the recourse is to deploy American personal and infrastructure on the lunar surface to preempt that move. And, if Bigelow makes a little more money in the process, one suspects that Mr. Bigelow will not mind getting richer by being a patriot.

Mark R. Whittington is the author of Children of Apollo and The Last Moonwalker. He has written on space subjects for a variety of periodicals, including The Houston Chronicle, The Washington Post, USA Today, the L.A. Times, and The Weekly Standard.

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