Japan Sets Its Sights on the Moon

He gives rare interview ... to Australian accountants

(NEWSER) - Fans of the space program are in for a treat: The normally reticent Neil Armstrong sat down for an hourlong interview about that moon landing of his with, of all outlets, the Certified Practicing Accountants of Australia. Some highlights:

• 50-50: "I thought we had a 90% chance of getting back safely to Earth on that flight but only a 50-50 chance of making a landing on that first attempt. There were so many unknowns ..."
• Close call: When Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin descended to the moon's surface in the Eagle, the on-board computer was guiding them toward a rocky, steep area. "Not a good place to land at all," says Armstrong. "I took over manually and flew it like a helicopter out to the west direction, got into a smoother area without so many rocks and found a level area and was able to get it down there safely before we ran out of fuel." There was "something like 20 seconds of fuel left."

Mammoth device would carry passengers more than 22K miles into the sky

(NEWSER) - Obayashi Corp. likes building tall towers—it's days from completing a 2,080-foot skyscraper in Tokyo— and now it's working on the granddaddy of them all: A "space elevator" that could carry people 22,370 miles into the air. On Monday, the company announced that it was working on a plan for the lift, which it believes it can produce by 2050, the Yomiuri Shimbun reports. "Humans have long adored high towers," the project's lead says. "Rather than building it from Earth, we will construct it from space." More»

Takes tiny creatures along for the ride

(NEWSER) - A Russian spacecraft will depart for a Martian moon as soon as tomorrow. Its mission: to land on Phobos and collect soil to bring home to Earth, Scientific American reports. Researchers aim to learn about the moon’s development and composition. And should they discover ice or hydrated rocks, the 17-mile-long moon could be ultimately take on a new role: astronaut "base camp," writes Philip Boffey in the New York Times . The craft, called Phobos-Grunt, has some other objectives, too: It’s hauling a Chinese satellite—the country’s first Mars craft—which will orbit the planet. More»

... But it's an unmanned mission to explore the lunar gravity field

(NEWSER) - NASA's not done with the moon yet. It launched two unmanned spacecraft today (Grail A and Grail B) to study the lunar gravitational field and interior, reports Space.com . The $496 million mission has an interesting twist, notes the PopSci blog: a MoonKAM that will allow students to log in, scan the moon's surface, and request particular images for study. The two probes, which lifted off aboard a Delta 2 rocket shortly after 9am EDT, aren't expected to be in place until the end of the year. (If you like your moon missions with astronauts, click here for newly released images of the Apollo era.) More»

... though opening date is a little fuzzy

(NEWSER) - It’s tough to get a decent pizza in space—so tough that astronauts at the International Space Station once received a delivery from an earthbound Pizza Hut. Now, Domino’s Japanese operation is going a step further in the publicity wars: The chain swears it plans to open a store on the moon. Someday. A construction company has estimated that the endeavor would cost $21.4 billion, and costs would be minimized through the use of local moon minerals in the restaurant’s concrete, the Telegraph reports. More»