Page 13 - Constellation Program News Today

President kacalderone and first lady. shell sit down with business leaders and then heading to san diego for a childhood obesity event. >> thank you. lets talk about what the presidents doing today. >> reporter: yeah. >> whats the president doing today? >> reporter: well, yeah, hes going -- im like. i thought you were -- that was a really short question. im not used to that. hes going down to cape canaveral. as you know, back stateside theres a bit of a controversy over the space program and the...

We had no way to get into earth. we have to hitch a ride on russians who are charging us extraordinary rates and are only going to increase that. >> bret: we should point out that astronaut buzz aldrin is supportive of president obamas plan. here is what neil armstrong said, juan, in the letter. "it appears we will have wasted the current $10 billion plus in constellation and equally lost the many years required to recreate the equivalent of what we will have discarded." say tag the constellatio...

Program. i believe $9 billion. although critics say that was not enough money, it was always unfunded, not properly funded, not feasible, its still, in a sense to some, throwing away those billions in the constellation program, and they object to that, what do you say to that argument? >> well, heres the deal with constellation. constellation was a program that harkened back to the "apollo" days and it perhaps was never funded correctly. were at the point now where we can do more. so lets not re...

International space station construction is complete. so we need a different vehicle to allow us to take this -- these heavier materials up that are going to build the spacecraft that take us out to the asteroids or take us on to mars. >> the other specific in here, the constellation program, it was behind schedule, it was overbudget. was it right to essentially abonden it and does it mean were going to give up hope for, say, the millennium, for returning to the moon? >> i dont think so at all. ...

This question has been around for decades since apollo 17 and all of the way back to 1972. i love looking at this video. i love it. >> yeah. >> so many people wondering when the united states will ultimately put people back on the moon and then in more recent years, youve had another question on top of that. how long, how far in the future before we can get people all of the way out to mars and as we know, the nation that leads the way in space can be the critical piece of the future, but it is,...

So youre looking at nearly 40 dwrae years. as we know it was before that that the united states had the first touchdown and that was when neil armstrong was the first human being to set foot on the moon. it was absolutely amazing to have historic pictures right here on the website behind me. nasa has tons of them and everyone remembers what a powerful moment it was. and right now what were seeing whats happening as you know is president obama is talking about his vision for how to handle space e...

Nitrogen tapg. problem is not putting the astronauts in dame, but if it isnt fixed in the next few days, nasa could be forced to turn off some of the stations electronics. jon: the first man to walk on the moon slamming the obama administrations plans for the future of nasa just one day before the president visits florida to deliver a space policy speech. neil armstrong and fellow astronauts signing an open letter criticizing the decision to scrap nasas program that would have sent americans bac...

Megyn: those words from the day america changed the world. now the first man to walk on the moon is blasting the obama administrations plan for nasas future. neil armstrong, along with two other heros of the apollo program, co-signing the following letter to the president which reads in part: megyn: former astronaut is also in charge of the constellation program thats been canceled by the president. allall right, doc, so youre a rocket scientist, astronaut, smart guy, and youre in charge of the ...

Workers and the engineers, now thats what the astronauts are so concerned about. losing this skilled team. once they lose it, they will never be able to get these workers back. if the plan goes forward as the presidents proposed for 2011, then you would not only lose shuttle and constellation and other associated, you would lose in this area alone, in this community, 20,000 jobs, 8,000 directly on the kennedy space center itself and in houston at the mission control center you would lose another...

Jobs compared to 8% nationally. so theyre highly trained and educated but its a little unclear still because this vision is vague, at least to those of us who are here. so we dont know if they can transfer. >> the idea of greatly redefining or canceling the constellation program as it is currently laid out, do you fundamentally disagree with that idea or that notion from the president? well, im not a space person. im a physician. i think that it was very unfortunate that that happened because, y...