50 years ago, President John F. Kennedy told the United States
that man would go to the moon. Soon, another American president
may announce that the same celestial body will serve as a
waypoint for manned space exploration. The Verge has learned
that NASA intends to deploy a robotic lunar rover on the Moon in
2017 to search for water and other resources necessary for space
travel, and that NASA may have secured support from the White
House for an actual manned outpost — a space station — floating
above the far side of the moon. We spoke to Logsdon as well, and
he said that the administration is planning a shift in policy
that could make the Moon and its surrounding space a more
important part of the equation. And our source tells us that
part of that plan is deploying RESOLVE on the lunar surface in
2017. It’s a payload designed to be mounted on a robotic rover
and driven across the moon to find water and other useful
materials for space travel, “Cheaper than lifting water off the
Earth” such that spaceships