On 4/15/2010 2:39 PM, Quadibloc wrote:

But I saw a news item later today that has Obama saying that in the
2030s we would have an *Apollo 10* mission to Mars. Orbit it, then
return safely to Earth. Yes, with real astronauts.

That would be Apollo 8.
If it was Apollo 10, we would drop a lander halfway to the surface then
return to orbit.
The orbit or flyby Mars with no landing concept goes back as far as the
Bush administration, so this is nothing Obama came up with on his own.


Gratuitous radiation exposure... and, of course, Apollo 10 was
somewhat wasteful;

Not if you wanted to see how the LM worked on a practice de-orbit and
re-orbit mission to check out both of its stages under actual lunar
conditions and see how easy it was to rendezvous and dock in lunar orbit
while dealing with things like MASCONs making odd shifts in the orbit of
both vehicles.

Pat