President Donald Trump's surprise backing of a US return to the moon "and other destinations" has been welcomed by space scientists. The announcement on Friday that Mr Trump would be visiting NASA headquarters in Washington DC next week was made during his speech at the National Space Council meeting in Colorado Springs. Meanwhile, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who distanced himself from Trump over climate change, said it was "high time that humanity went beyond Earth". And Robert Zubrin, president of the Mars Society, points out that when John F. Kennedy announced his dream of putting a human on the Moon, he did so in a speech before a joint session of Congress, not in a lightly attended press conference. But others were not so certain of the US president's vow to follow through on the promise, with Mars Society President Robert Zubrin saying: "There's no evidence whatsoever of serious commitment".
President Donald Trump's surprise backing of a US return to the moon "and other destinations" has been welcomed by space scientists. The announcement on Friday that Mr Trump would be visiting NASA headquarters in Washington DC next week was made during his speech at the National Space Council meeting in Colorado Springs. Meanwhile, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who distanced himself from Trump over climate change, said it was "high time that humanity went beyond Earth". But others were not so certain of the US president's vow to follow through on the promise, with Mars Society President Robert Zubrin saying: "There's no evidence whatsoever of serious commitment".