why did we not return to the moon in 36 years?

Question

it has been 36 years since Neil Armstrong landed on the moon, why haven't they gone back? Does anyone have any ideas or know of web sites that can explain this? Please help me if you can. Thanks.

Answer 1

because it's been done and there's nothing to prove by doing it again. unless there is technology to either mine for resources or to test habitating on the moon for an extended time, going to the moon is quite useless.

when armstrong went the first time, it was because the russians were pushing for the same & America just had to beat the russians to the moon first.

Or, if you subscribe to the hoax theory, then why would we need to go? CGI animation can make that happen anytime.

Answer 2

The simple answer: money. It is incredibly expensive to send people to the Moon. There were fourteen planned manned missions. Four were tests (7, 8, 9, 10), six actually landed (11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17) and one aborted (13). The last three missions were cancelled because they were starting to become routine, so the public, and consequently Congress, lost interest. The NASA budget was cut back, so emphasis switched to Earth orbit missons like Skylab and diplomatic gestures, such as the Apollo-Soyuz mission. We had rocks and other data to keep scientists busy for years and the other potential missions looked pretty much the same to a layman.

Apollo would not have happened if not for JFK's speech. There were political points to be made and a national spirit to kindle, in the midst of more immediate problems. As it was, it's miraculous that there weren't more disasters. The hull of the LEM was .003" thick, like heavy tinfoil. The onboard computer was a glorified calculator. The astronauts navigated by comparing landmarks to marks on the LEM windows. We wouldn't dream of doing things so casually now.

One thing's for sure, when we go back this time, it'll cost a lot MORE money.

Answer 3

Going to the moon was strictly a political maneuver. The US had to be first on the moon and beat the Russians. When the US had won that race there was really no point to go further. The Vietnam war was draining alot of funds and it got all the attention. Also, with the race to the moon lost, the Russians started focusing on building space stations. And so NASAs priorities went to low earth orbit expeditions. The Apollo mission to the moon were scrubbed and were instead used to launch Skylab. This to counter the soviet Soyuz program. Ironically this also resulted in the Apollo-Soyuz test program in 1975 where a US Apollo vehicle docked with a Soyuz vehicle. This was the last flight of Apollo. NASA now needed a reusable vehicle for low earth orbit missions as the Saturn V was no longer needed and far too expensive to keep in use. The next manned US mission was with the space shuttle in 1981.

Answer 4

The reason was right after the 2ND lunar mission NASA and the air force wanted to build a reusable space craft . Rockwell had a design and the military wanted to procure that design. At that moment in time the Vietnam war was using a huge part of the Military and general budget funding. In negotiations Rockwell was to build a fleet of 6 shuttles for NASA, and an undisclosed amount for the air force. Rockwell knew they couldn't build the shuttles for the price they gave the government, so they as a prime contractor of the rocket used to launch our moon missions. told the military that to build these shuttles they would stop production of the Saturn 5 rocket, our only heavy lift rocket. President Nixon was told of this request and OKs the deal. The moon missions went forward , NASA cut back and finally ended the program because we were going to have to build more Saturn 5's. When the shuttles were being built Rockwell advised NASA that the costs to build these shuttles was probably 4 times more than estimated cost. The Government could not now stop this program as the Saturn 5 was no longer in production, and in the aggreement with Nixon the blue prints and all technical data to build them had been destroyed. along with missles that were not finished and the tooling used to build them. Nasa was in a panic, they could not afford the 6 shuttles to be built for them and the air force was taking a second look at the viability of plans to keep men in orbit at all times. There was a belief at Nasa that without a moon program they would lose favor with Congress and the American people, so they lied and told Congress that the shuttle could be used for lunar missions. They kept this lie going untill the engineering staff at Rockwell was asked by a congressional comity that the shuttle would not be capable of reaching the moon and was advised that the shuttle was a low earth orbiting craft only. when that information was digested by congress they wanted to know about the Saturn 5 and the lift capability to still do lunar missions. When told of the inability to produce them any more and the decission had been made to not build them , we were stuck with the shuttle. The cost over runs were epic the delays excruciatingly long. Then the air force decided that they would not continue with their program. Rockwell was told to build 5 shuttles , The first shuttle Enterprise would not be used in actual flights. This saved money and gave them a usable ship for flight testing in the atmosphere. the snowball effect was the air force had to re engineer existing missles to launch spy satellites. We lost 25 years of space exploration, our largest Missle and two shuttle crews.

Answer 5

It is completely wrong to say there is no point going back. Geologists were devastated by the cancellation of Apollo 18 and 19. They had only just scratched the surface, geologically.

The last Apollo (17) was the first on which they sent a geologist.

Apollo was cancelled for financial and political reasons (Vietnam was on everyone's mind).

It was NOT cancelled because there was no need.

After the giant Saturn V was mothballed, there was no vehicle capable of taking humans beyond Earth's orbit.

Answer 6

Because Neil Armstrong and Co were warned off by the other people on there.

That's the common belief among many of us, the skeptics say america's been there, done that. but does it explain anything?
What happened to all the plans america had about building a base on the moon, to me that'd be good science because we'd find out if we could live outside earth and possibly other planets.

And I can say with certainty that the next mission to mars will be put off for other difficultys because we're being cautioned off by the others lol I guess they dont want another hiroshima happening

Answer 7

There is Helium-3 on the moon which is extremely valuable. It is mined by the aliens who warned us off. The astronauts are talking about it now, before they die. All you have to do is look and read.

Answer 8

Cost! Basically, the fledgling shuttle program (at the time) was simply more cost effective. So the Apollo program was ended in favor of the space shuttle .

Answer 9

Because there isn't any oil, gold, silver, diamonds or any thing of value on the moon. Only dust and moon rocks, and that isn't worth returning for.

Answer 10

they have sent unmanned probes there, and people may be going back and using the moon as a base or something to help put a man on mars