NASA’s Mars sample return mission is facing some intense scrutiny.
The Senate Appropriations Committee has already made its recommendations for a spending bill for fiscal 2024, and it hasn’t delivered everything NASA had hoped for. The Commerce, Justice, and Science Spending Act (CJS), which allocates money to NASA and several other government agencies, was revised by the committee in a 28-to-1 vote on July 13. The bill secured funding for NASA’s ongoing Artemis program to the moon and other exploration initiatives, but cut the space agency’s planetary science budget by more than half a billion dollars.
in the opening commentSenator Patty Murray stated that the bill was “written under very difficult constraints,” adding her position that “these constraints limit our ability to invest in our country’s future.”
First on the commission’s cutting block appears to be NASA’s ambitious Mars Sample Return (MSR) mission, a plan to retrieve Martian geological samples collected by the Perseverance rover. The report raises concerns about mission schedules that are always delayed and rising costs. The latest Ars technology report The details increased the internal cost projections for MSR at NASA, nearly doubling the mission’s overall estimate to between $8 and $9 billion.
Related: What awaits us in returning samples from Mars?
The Senate committee report noted their concern that MSR was prioritized over other NASA critical path missions, stating, “The committee has significant concerns about the technical challenges facing MSR and the potential additional impact on confirmed missions, even before MSR has completed its initial design review. .” ”
The report gives NASA 180 days after the law is passed to provide an annual budget breakdown for MSR that complies with the $5.3 billion lifecycle cost blueprint included in the bill. Decadal Survey of Planetary Science 2022. If the space agency misses a deadline, or fails to cut costs to fit within the proposed budget, the mission may be aborted. It also allows the committee to suggest programs where funds could be reallocated, should the withdrawal occur. They include the Artemis campaign, the Dragonfly mission, and the Prime Orbiter and Probe missions to Uranus.
The Decadal Survey, which guides NASA’s exploration priorities for the next 10 years, put MSR at the top of the list, but according to the Senate report, “the committee is concerned despite Congress’s full request for this mission in previous years. […] Projected launch schedules continued to miss and increased financial and human resources allocated to MSR caused NASA to postpone other high priority missions across the Science Mission Directorate.”
In the “Three Forks” sample shed in Jezero Crater, 10 sample tubes are visible in this composite image captured by NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover’s WATSON camera at the end of a robotic mechanical arm. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS)
The goal of the MSR mission builds on its name – to collect samples from the surface of Mars and return them for study on Earth. Throughout the history of spaceflight, only a handful of missions to return robotic samples to the Moon have been successful. Trying to collect material from Mars and return it is an ambitious endeavor that has not yet been attempted.
The mission is a collaboration between NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA), which will require an automated lander, and a pair of helicopter-like drones such as Ingenuity Helicopter hovering around the surface of Mars alongside the lander. Perseverance also contributes to MSR’s duties. The rover is equipped with 38 sample containers that are filled and stored as it moves on the Martian surface, which will eventually be collected by the MSR rover.
Once collected, the ascent vehicle will launch the samples into Red Planet orbit, and rendezvous with the Earth Return Orbiter, which will launch itself from Mars orbit to an Earth trajectory, where the return capsule will take the long flight samples. End with a gentle parachute landing in the Utah desert.
If successful, the Martian material found could provide invaluable data for researchers. Theories about the geological evolution of Mars, the history of the planet, and even signs of ancient biological life can be derived from a distance. However, to Senate committees, a successful MSR did not appear to be worth sacrificing other NASA-critical missions.
The Nodal Survey agrees, to some extent. It recommends completing the MSR “as soon as possible,” but emphasizes that the cost of the mission “should not be allowed to upset the long-term program balance of the planetary portfolio.” Rather than suggesting that the mission be delayed if MSR goes over budget, the survey recommended that NASA work with lawmakers to “secure a budget increase” to help ensure its success.
Apart from MSR, CJS Production Bill NASA’s portfolio for its exploration program increased from this year onwards by around $270 million, but that’s still $230 million short of the space agency’s 2024 budget request.
Overall, the bill has reduced NASA’s money by $384 million compared to the 2023 fiscal year. This is partly because Financial Responsibility Actpassed by the Senate last month, capping non-defense spending for the coming year and only allowing a 1% increase through 2025.
2023-07-18 18:45:23
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