NASA 2015 Budget: Europa Mission, Orion Big Winners As Space Agency Receives An Extra $500M

originally posted by: Metallicus
This is wonderful news. Finally the Government is spending money on something of which we can all be proud.

Those were my first thoughts. All the civil & political news was about to make my brain exploded.

originally posted by: gorsestar

It's the combined bipartisan effort nobody saw coming; to support space exploration and scientific research which is mutually beneficial. The funding will go to some major projects including: Europa , Orion, SLS (Space launch system). Keep in mind that all these projects have very near dates within a few years. So that means we'll be exploring the oceans of Jupiter's moon Europa, privatizing manned space flight, and propelling large masses up out of Earths orbit before 2020. I also should add the categorization of exoplanets.

Your Thread title and opening paragraph are very misleading.

First of all, NASA did not get a $1 trillion budget. That budget is for the entire United States -- not just NASA. NASA's part of that is "only" $18 Billion.

And to say "nobody saw this coming" is also misleading, considering NASA got basically what they asked for -- albeit the did get a little more than they asked for (they got an extra $500 Million), which is a nice a surprise, but it's not exactly enough money to "do everything they ever wanted to do".

To put it into perspective, that extra $500 Million would not even be enough to have paid for a mission such as the Curiosity Rover (which cost a total of $2.5 Billion, but with a cost spread over several years). That extra $500 million would have been enough to cover that test flight of Orion a couple of weeks ago (which cost $375 million), but with only a little to spare.


Plus, even the $18 Billion is NOT "unprecedented"; NASA has had much larger budgets in the past. $18 Billion is not even half of the budget NASA was given during the heydays of the Apollo project in the 1960s. Adjusting for inflation (i.e., in terms of today's dollars), the budget for NASA in the mid 1960s was about $40 Billion. Don't get me wrong -- it's great that NASA got the $18 Billion it was looking for (plus even a little extra), but it's not like the U.S. congress has suddenly decided to give NASA a blank check to do whatever they please.

a reply to: IShotMyLastMuse

Funny, my first thought was something along the lines of , "I wonder what top secret thing they discovered recently."

Maybe aliens DO exist.

originally posted by: JohnFisher
a reply to: IShotMyLastMuse

Funny, my first thought was something along the lines of , "I wonder what top secret thing they discovered recently."

Maybe aliens DO exist.

But the OP's headline is not correct. NASA has not been given a $1 Trillion budget. Their new budget is $18 Billion, which is about the same as it has been for a few years now.

The $1 trillion is for the entire U.S. government, not just NASA.

Wouldn't it be better if they built a moon base?? From there it could be have launch site for mars and future missions. Also it would save alot of money since the moon has 1\4th the gravity compared to on earth.The ridiculous cost of shootin one of them big ol' firecrackers in space. Just my opinion from the little knowledge i think i have..ha

a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

It was late at night and I even asked myself "aren't we $12 trillion in debt?". Mental lapse but I should have proof read.

Let me put into perspective the effects of an extra 1/2 billion bucks.

1. "We're always appreciative of whatever dollars the appropriators appropriate to us," Kathy Nado, a manager at NASA headquarters, said at the American Astronautical Society meeting in Houston. "Whatever dollars they give us we will be able to effectively spend."

2 summers ago NASA had one planned successor to Hubble, the only deep space telescope. It was pushed back 2 additional years due to budget constraints. Additionally, a pension program was almost terminated because of money. Even the space shuttle program scuttled costing us $50 million per person to rely on the Russians to take us to the space station, inevitably costing more money.

Besides the obvious there are sub surface ripples that touch the families of the space program.

They want to spend that kind of money to find water on Europa (365 million miles away), but we can't spend 1 billion to clean up the continent of plastic in our ocean 1000 miles away.

I can't believe that some people here thought that any increase in spending for NASA is proof of a "conspiracy", even some who wanted to cut ALL funding for them. NASA is a govt organization...yes, but without them you all wouldn't be complaining about them over your internet connection.