Leonard David's INSIDE OUTER SPACE

Image credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

Moon boots and Mars boots. Anyway you look at it there are a lot of NASA shoes still to drop.

One of those in perpetual déjà vu status is flinging off Mars select specimens from that distant orb, an endeavor viewed as a U.S. high priority.

However, there’s also been a recurrent whirlwind of fall out about the Mars Sample Return (MSR) endeavor. Is it too costly, too far in the future, too debatable?

Image credit: NASA

In a nutshell, here’s the extraterrestrial angst.

“The Chinese may well beat the U.S. with a grab sample,” explains one Mars expert.

For details, go to my new Space.com story – “Winning the Red Planet race: Returning Mars samples before China should be a top US priority, experts say” – at:

https://www.space.com/astronomy/mars/winning-the-red-planet-race-returning-mars-samples-before-china-should-be-a-top-us-priority-experts-say