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Meeting	ACGS Committee Meeting 105 - Lake Tahoe - March 2010
Agenda Location	8 SUBCOMMITTEE B -- MISSILES AND SPACE 8.2 Placing People on the Moon: A Look at the Technical and Political Contexts
Title	Placing People on the Moon: A Look at the Technical and Political Contexts
Presenter	Phil Hattis
Affiliation	Draper Laboratory
Available Downloads*	presentation
	Downloads are available to members who are logged in and either Active* or attended this meeting.
Abstract	Given that the future of human exploration of space is an issue now in front of national policy makers, it is important to understand some of the history of past and present human exploration initiatives, as well as the political and technical factors that contributed to both the successes and failures of resulting programs. This paper reviews the political and technical contexts, beginning with the Apollo program and going up to newly proposed human spaceflight paradigm shifts. The political and technical approaches that made Apollo successful are reviewed, as are the causes of the subsequent confinement of human spaceflight to low Earth orbit. The impact of the 2003 Columbia accident had on national thinking regarding space missions that justify risking human lives is assessed. Also, the new political and technical directions now proposed for human space exploration are reviewed, and observations are provided regarding how to establish the right context and target destinations for successful long-term human space exploration programs.