NASA chief excited about prospects for exploiting water on the moon

[Judi Lynn]

AUGUST 21, 2018 / 8:54 PM / UPDATED AN HOUR AGO

Steve Gorman, Mana Rabiee

(Reuters) - NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine has a vision for renewed and “sustainable” human exploration of the moon, and he cites the existence of water on the lunar surface as a key to chances for success.

“We know that there’s hundreds of billions of tons of water ice on the surface of the moon,” Bridenstine said in a Reuters TV interview in Washington on Tuesday, a day after NASA unveiled its analysis of data collected from lunar orbit by a spacecraft from India.

. . .

The discovery holds tantalizing implications for efforts to return humans to the moon for the first time in half a century. The presence of water offers a potentially valuable resource not only for drinking but for producing more rocket fuel and oxygen to breathe.

Bridenstine, a former U.S. Navy fighter pilot and Oklahoma congressman tapped by President Donald Trump in April as NASA chief, spoke about “hundreds of billions of tons” of water ice that he said were now known to be available on the lunar surface.

More:
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nasa-bridenstine/nasa-chief-excited-about-prospects-for-exploiting-water-on-the-moon-idUSKCN1L7062?rpc=401&

[brush]

1. This was just discovered? By India? WTF? Haven't we been to the moon...

multiple times and never found this out?

[DavidDvorkin]

2. We never landed at or even near the poles

That's where the water is.

[brush]

3. What is it that Homer Simpson says..."DOH"! We spent all that money and did bother...

to look at the poles.