Ami Silberman wrote:



How do four astronauts on the Moon make it a "better" mission than
three astronauts on the Moon? It sounds like a lot of ballast (both in
body mass and support materiel) to land and re-launch.



First, you should compare four with two. Second, the primary reason why it
is a better mission is that there will be a longer stay. Secondly, IIRC, the
new proposal calls for two rovers. I would imagine that a single one of the
new missions would cover as much ground as all the Apollo missions. (IIRC,
Apollo 15 alone covered more than all three of the successful non-LRV
missions).



Longer stay means more EVAs on the Lunar surface, and that means we need
beefed-up spacesuits to deal with the abrasive Lunar dust...have they
started working on those yet?

Pat