Report: Without funding boost, Obama's plans to send man to Mars will be a 'failure'

Report: Without funding boost, Obama&#039;s plans to send man to Mars will be a &#039;failure&#039;

(Image credit: Thinkstock)

last updated 8 January 2015

The National Research Council is shooting President Obama's space-high plans back down to earth. In a 300-page report released today, the NRC said NASA's ambitious human spaceflight program has an "unsustainable and unsafe strategy" that will prevent the United States from landing a man on Mars in the near future.

NASA is spending several billion dollars in hopes of getting an astronaut on Mars in the 2030s. But to continue to move toward this goal using the allocated budgets — which doesn't keep pace with inflation — "is to invite failure, disillusionment, and the loss of the longstanding international perception that human spaceflight is something the United States does best," the report said.

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

NASA spokesperson David Weaver didn't seem phased by the NRC's assessment. "NASA has made significant progress on many key elements that will be needed to reach Mars, and we continue on this path in collaboration with industry and other nations," he said.

Explore More

Jordan Valinsky is the lead writer for Speed Reads. Before joining The Week, he wrote for New York Observer's tech blog, Betabeat, and tracked the intersection between popular culture and the internet for The Daily Dot. He graduated with a degree in online journalism from Ohio University.