Bush to announce new missions to moon

Bush to announce new missions to moon

Posted 1/8/2004 8:43 PM

PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. (AP) — President Bush will announce plans
next week to send Americans to Mars and back to the moon and to
establish a long-term human presence on the moon, senior
administration officials said Thursday night.
Bush doesn't plan to send Americans to Mars anytime soon; rather, he
envisions preparing for the mission more than a decade from now, one
official said.

The president also wants to build a permanent space station on the
moon.

The initiatives are part of a broad, new commitment to manned space
flight, three officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

They said Bush wants to aggressively reinvigorate the space program,
which has been demoralized by a series of setbacks, including the
space shuttle disaster last February that killed seven astronauts.

The officials said Bush's announcement would come in the middle of
next week.

Bush has been expected to announce a major space initiative, and some
thought he do so at the 100th-anniversary celebration of the Wright
brother's first flight last month in North Carolina.

Instead, he only pledged the United States would continue to lead the
world in aviation.

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, has called for an expansion
of the U.S. space program, including a return to the moon.

McClellan spoke with reporters accompanying Bush on a trip to
Tennessee and Florida.


http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/...ush-moon_x.htm