Astronauts could travel to an asteroid inside the Orion crew capsule that NASA is developing for moon missions, according to a previous NASA study (Illustration: NASA/JAXA)
A committee reviewing NASA's goals has outlined a scheme to send astronauts on progressively longer space trips – including dockings with asteroids and flybys of Venus – to prepare for an eventual landing on Mars.
The Moon by 2020
The White House set up the committee, chaired by former Lockheed Martin CEO Norman Augustine, to review NASA's plans for human spaceflight, which are currently focused on returning astronauts to the moon by 2020.
It is examining NASA's current plans and exploring alternative destinations and hardware that NASA could pursue.
The Flexible Path
Committee member Edward Crawley of MIT presented a short list of possible destinations for future human missions at a public meeting on Thursday in Cocoa Beach, Florida. He is the head of a subcommittee that is investigating options for exploration beyond low-Earth orbit.
One of the options the team proposed is called the "flexible path", which Crawley also described as a "deep space" or "in space" option.
It would see astronauts sent on a series of progressively longer missions beyond low-Earth orbit. The first would fly by the moon. Later missions would include rendezvousing with one or more of the many asteroids on orbits that take them close to Earth. Asteroid missions would take several months each.
Later, astronauts could fly by Mars and Venus, and touch down on Mars's 27-kilometre-wide moon Phobos. Each of these missions would take more than a year.
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There is true danger to be confronted in space. The most important mission for humans in space is understanding and ultimately controlling asteroids and comets; to avoid an unpleasant "extinction encounter". What better mission than "Protecting the planet"? "Flexible Path" seems a start in this direction.
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