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Lift-off for new NASA rocket
AFP - 2 hours 23 minutes ago
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CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (AFP) - – NASA took a major step forward Wednesday in its plans to return astronauts to the Moon by 2020 with the successful launch of a next generation space rocket.
After several delays, the Ares I-X, the tallest rocket ever built, blasted off at 11:30 am (1530 GMT) from Cape Canaveral in Florida, carrying with it the US space agency's lofty ambitions for human space flight.
The rocket is the prototype of the Ares I, designed to carry a new capsule-shaped crew module called the Orion into low-orbit so it can embark on future missions to the International Space Station, the Moon, and beyond.
"The flight test lasted about six minutes from its launch from the newly modified Launch Pad 39B until splashdown of the rocket's booster stage nearly 150 miles (240 kilometers) downrange," said a NASA statement.
The main part of the 327-foot (100-meter) rocket separated off from a simulated upper stage and Orion crew module before splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean to applause in a relieved and excited NASA control room.
"It's the most beautiful rocket launch I have ever seen," said NASA program director Jeff Hanley. "I get tears in my eyes. It was very special."
More than 700 sensors should provide engineers with important data for fine-tuning the design of the rocket that with Orion is intended to replace NASA's aging fleet of space shuttles, which is due to be retired in 2010.
"This is a huge step forward for NASA's exploration goals," said associate administrator Doug Cooke at NASA headquarters in Washington.
"Ares I-X provides NASA with an enormous amount of data that will be used to improve the design and safety of the next generation of American spaceflight vehicles -- vehicles that could again take humans beyond low Earth orbit."
Ares and Orion are part of Constellation, NASA's grand program to send astronauts back to the Moon by 2020, and then perhaps to Mars and other destinations in the solar system.
The shuttle will be retired next year, but the Ares I will not enter into service until 2015 at the earliest. In the interim, NASA will have to rely on Russia to put US astronauts into space, at a hefty price too.
The Orion is initially being designed to take a crew of up to six astronauts on flights to the International Space Station, or four on lunar missions of up to 210 days.
Instead of landing back like a plane, as the shuttle does, it will return to Earth with the use of parachutes, more like the Apollo modules that took Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Buzz Aldrin to the Moon more than 40 years ago.
Sitting atop the Ares rocket, NASA has included a launch abort system in the design to enable the capsule to jettison out of harm's way should something go wrong.
The test flight comes at a crucial time as the White House is considering a report ordered by President Barack Obama's administration that raises concerns about the whole Constellation project.
The commission, chaired by Norman Augustine, a former executive at aerospace giant Lockheed Martin, concluded that the program "appears to be on an unsustainable trajectory" and was seeking goals not matched by its resources.
The Ares rocket has suffered major development problems and its price tag has fueled criticism of NASA, an agency notorious for its cost overruns.
The initial budget for the Constellation program was set at 28 billion dollars, but has swollen to at least 44 billion.
NASA's annual budget is about 18 billion dollars, 10 billion of which is being plowed into the human space flight program, chiefly in developing the Ares and the Orion.
The Augustine Commission said an additional three billion dollars a year was needed for NASA to meet Constellation program goals or take human space flight the next step beyond the existing International Space Station.
The commission proposed several alternatives, including sidestepping the rocket and going straight to the Ares V family of launch vehicles, which would take astronauts back to the Moon and eventually on to Mars.
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