NASA budget released

WASHINGTON — NASA's $17.5 billion proposed budget for fiscal 2015 released Tuesday provides funding for NASA's top priorities. It includes $2.8 billion for the Space Launch System rocket and the Orion multi-purpose vehicle; $848 million for the Commercial Crew Program that helps fund private efforts to sent astronauts to the International Space Station; and $3.05 billion to run the ISS, including money for continued cargo shipments by SpaceX and Orbital Science. Stennis Space Center, Miss., and Michoud Assembly Facility, New Orleans, are involved in those programs. The budget also would ramp up funding to fly astronauts to an asteroid by 2025 as part of a steppingstone approach to Mars. The budget is some $190 million below the fiscal 2014 level. Fiscal 2015 begins Oct. 1 and ends Sept. 30, 2015. (Source: multiple, including USAToday, Space.com, 03/04/14)