SpaceX to Send Privately Crewed Dragon Spacecraft Beyond the Moon Next Year
Wow. This sends so many thoughts cascading through my head that I'm dizzy.Some things to consider, China has been working up to getting a space capability to send people to the Moon with the full backing of the government funding, by 2035[1]. They started in 2003. SpaceX was founded in 2002 and they are saying they will fly someone around the moon next year? Dragon has the deltaV to land on the moon (not sure if it has enough to get off again though) and SpaceX certainly has the expertise in building spacecraft that land.The next person to take a picture of the Earth from moon may not be on a government funded mission. That one really blows my mind. For so long it was only countries that could do something like that, now it is nearly within reach of individuals.The UN has treaties about claiming (or not) the moon by a nation state, but there isn't anything about a privately funded and established outpost that wants to declare independence. All this time I imagined that some country would establish a base there, and grudgingly offer up some space for non-state use, and now there is this possibility of a private facility that states have to ask permission to visit? That is priceless.[1] http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2016/04/29/man-on-the-moo...