Abandoning development of a shuttle-derived astronaut-launching rocket in favor of existing U.S. Air Force vehicles would not save as much money as advocates suggest and would substantially diminish what could be accomplished during missions to the Moon, NASA Administrator Mike Griffin said. Griffin ended 2008 the same way he started it: defending his chosen architecture for replacing the space shuttle and setting NASA on course to return astronauts to the Moon by 2020 in preparation for eventual missions to Mars. But with U.S. President-elect Barack Obama's NASA transition team looking into the possibility of abandoning the current approach in favor of one that relies on Air Force Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) rockets, Griffin is finding the critics harder to dismiss and his job in jeopardy.
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