Shecoda
04-20-2005, 08:12 PM
Executioner's Song: Deciding Which Space Missions Live or Die
By Leonard David
Senior Space Writer
posted: 20 April 2005
3:15 pm ET
UPDATE: Story first posted 7:15 a.m.
There has been a scientific and public backlash at the thought of shutting down spacecraft, like the vintage Voyager missions, all for the want of a few millions dollars.
But Voyager is likely to be an early signal from a growing dilemma of finding cash to keep NASA spacecraft functioning beyond their initial work period.
There are plenty of examples, like the still-going strong Mars Exploration Rovers. Also count on keeping the Hubble Space Telescope alive. Toss in an extended Cassini mission at Saturn too. Also, there’s early talk about the Deep Impact flyby spacecraft possibly using its telescopic gear to scout about after it completes its main choir of hurling an impactor at comet Tempel 1 and monitoring the upshot this coming July.
But now there is growing talk of setting up something analogous to a "hit squad" at NASA that impartially agrees what projects should be ended, when, and under what rules.
Reportedly, a number of space probes could be on the chopping block, from the Ulysses mission to the Sun to several Earth-oriented space physics satellites busily sleuthing about.
Upsetting to many scientists is shutting down the long-distance Voyager -- seemingly a fit of heliospheric heresy. The valiant twin Voyager spacecraft were launched in 1977 and can define the end of the heliosphere -- the entire region of space affected by the Sun -- and the start of interstellar space.
The mission currently employs the equivalent of about 10 full-time people at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, significantly less than the approximately 300 during the height of its legendary "Grand Tour" of the planets through 1989.
Scientific novelty
New NASA Administrator, Mike Griffin, will likely revisit a number of "pulling the plug" decisions, suggested Stamatios Krimigis, Head Emeritus of the Space Department at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland.
"It’s clear that in a limited resource environment, decisions and choices have to be made…none would argue with that," Krimigis said. "The key issue is the criteria used to arrive at such decisions."
Speaking at the press conference Monday following his appointment, Griffin said NASA was months away deciding which missions get terminated, and that it “would not be done without a full and careful review.”
But, he added, that is not “to say that all missions are of the same importance. Voyager may well outrank others whose time to be turned off really has come. So I'm not making a blanket offer that we're going to reach a particular answer on any one mission or that we will treat them all as a block. But we are going to consider it carefully before we turn anything off."
Principal among the criteria would be the scientific productivity of a particular mission, Krimigis said.
"This is the area where the Voyager decision is totally indefensible. Why? Because Voyager has been at the fringes of the solar ‘cocoon’ that separates us from interstellar space for nearly three years now," Krimigis explained. Voyager has generated impressive science for so many years, and the excitement hasn’t stopped, he observed.
As a principal investigator on Voyagers 1 and 2, Krimigis also serves in that role on the Cassini mission now orbiting Saturn.
The scientific novelty of this region of space is clearly intriguing not only for scientists but the public at large, Krimigis argued.
Exploration at its finest
Voyager is "exploration at its finest," Krimigis said. "NASA has no present plans for an Interstellar Probe, and even if they approved such a mission tomorrow it couldn’t launch until 2014 and wouldn’t catch up with Voyager for at least 15 years after that," Krimigis noted. Voyager is likely to run low on power by about 2020, he said, but could possibly continue in some reduced capacity for several years after that, doing so through power sharing and other procedures.
"It’s a legacy mission that this generation can preserve for our children and even grandchildren," Krimigis stated. NASA pondering a pull-the-plug dictum on Voyager, he continued, is a decision without thought about the mission’s current scientific productivity or appeal of the science to the public.
"After all, $4 million is $4 million…and to accountants all funds are the same. No wonder the scientific community has so little confidence in the decision-making at [NASA] Headquarters," Krimigis said.
Of course, not all extended missions hold the excitement of the Voyagers, but all of the ones scheduled for termination next year are scientifically productive, Krimigis said.
"I believe the return on investment for all is very high," he said, and there is no way NASA could reconstitute these assets in the next 20 years. They are the equivalent of a "Great Observatory" and must be recognized as such, Krimigis concluded
This is a long article for more:
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/050420_last_missions.html
By Leonard David
Senior Space Writer
posted: 20 April 2005
3:15 pm ET
UPDATE: Story first posted 7:15 a.m.
There has been a scientific and public backlash at the thought of shutting down spacecraft, like the vintage Voyager missions, all for the want of a few millions dollars.
But Voyager is likely to be an early signal from a growing dilemma of finding cash to keep NASA spacecraft functioning beyond their initial work period.
There are plenty of examples, like the still-going strong Mars Exploration Rovers. Also count on keeping the Hubble Space Telescope alive. Toss in an extended Cassini mission at Saturn too. Also, there’s early talk about the Deep Impact flyby spacecraft possibly using its telescopic gear to scout about after it completes its main choir of hurling an impactor at comet Tempel 1 and monitoring the upshot this coming July.
But now there is growing talk of setting up something analogous to a "hit squad" at NASA that impartially agrees what projects should be ended, when, and under what rules.
Reportedly, a number of space probes could be on the chopping block, from the Ulysses mission to the Sun to several Earth-oriented space physics satellites busily sleuthing about.
Upsetting to many scientists is shutting down the long-distance Voyager -- seemingly a fit of heliospheric heresy. The valiant twin Voyager spacecraft were launched in 1977 and can define the end of the heliosphere -- the entire region of space affected by the Sun -- and the start of interstellar space.
The mission currently employs the equivalent of about 10 full-time people at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, significantly less than the approximately 300 during the height of its legendary "Grand Tour" of the planets through 1989.
Scientific novelty
New NASA Administrator, Mike Griffin, will likely revisit a number of "pulling the plug" decisions, suggested Stamatios Krimigis, Head Emeritus of the Space Department at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland.
"It’s clear that in a limited resource environment, decisions and choices have to be made…none would argue with that," Krimigis said. "The key issue is the criteria used to arrive at such decisions."
Speaking at the press conference Monday following his appointment, Griffin said NASA was months away deciding which missions get terminated, and that it “would not be done without a full and careful review.”
But, he added, that is not “to say that all missions are of the same importance. Voyager may well outrank others whose time to be turned off really has come. So I'm not making a blanket offer that we're going to reach a particular answer on any one mission or that we will treat them all as a block. But we are going to consider it carefully before we turn anything off."
Principal among the criteria would be the scientific productivity of a particular mission, Krimigis said.
"This is the area where the Voyager decision is totally indefensible. Why? Because Voyager has been at the fringes of the solar ‘cocoon’ that separates us from interstellar space for nearly three years now," Krimigis explained. Voyager has generated impressive science for so many years, and the excitement hasn’t stopped, he observed.
As a principal investigator on Voyagers 1 and 2, Krimigis also serves in that role on the Cassini mission now orbiting Saturn.
The scientific novelty of this region of space is clearly intriguing not only for scientists but the public at large, Krimigis argued.
Exploration at its finest
Voyager is "exploration at its finest," Krimigis said. "NASA has no present plans for an Interstellar Probe, and even if they approved such a mission tomorrow it couldn’t launch until 2014 and wouldn’t catch up with Voyager for at least 15 years after that," Krimigis noted. Voyager is likely to run low on power by about 2020, he said, but could possibly continue in some reduced capacity for several years after that, doing so through power sharing and other procedures.
"It’s a legacy mission that this generation can preserve for our children and even grandchildren," Krimigis stated. NASA pondering a pull-the-plug dictum on Voyager, he continued, is a decision without thought about the mission’s current scientific productivity or appeal of the science to the public.
"After all, $4 million is $4 million…and to accountants all funds are the same. No wonder the scientific community has so little confidence in the decision-making at [NASA] Headquarters," Krimigis said.
Of course, not all extended missions hold the excitement of the Voyagers, but all of the ones scheduled for termination next year are scientifically productive, Krimigis said.
"I believe the return on investment for all is very high," he said, and there is no way NASA could reconstitute these assets in the next 20 years. They are the equivalent of a "Great Observatory" and must be recognized as such, Krimigis concluded
This is a long article for more:
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/050420_last_missions.html