Echo: "We No Longer Have a Viable Mars Program"

The journal Science's blog has posted a summary of the key issues raised at the last meeting of the Planetary Sciences Subcommittee, an advisory body of planetary scientists. The report confirms what was posted in other blogs and summarized in previous posts of my blog. The head of NASA's science program, Ed Weiler, had three key messages: NASA's planetary exploration budget has shrunk from $3B to $1.5B and as a result NASA no longer had a coherent Mars program nor could afford to build the Jupiter Europa Orbiter (penciled for launch in 2020). The galloping cost increases of the Mars Science Laboratory (originally proposed as a $600M technology development mission, then a $1.6B Flagship-class science mission that will eventually cost more than $2.2B with cost overruns).

From Future Planetary Exploration.

:((