That would be tragic, short-sighted and entirely in line with modern government priorities.
Is there anyway these can be taken more international.
Quote from: Ben the Space Brit on 11/15/2012 04:51 pmThat would be tragic, short-sighted and entirely in line with modern government priorities.I agree. This would be tragic, moreso for Cassini (then again, I am more emotionally attached to it).Quote from: Pheogh on 11/15/2012 04:57 pmIs there anyway these can be taken more international.Cassini already is an international project and that fact actually saved it from cancellation once. Not sure how it would help this time as probably the majority of the operations money is provided by NASA.
what are we talking about here $$$ what kind of money.
If Santa Claus were to offer ESA a healthy space probe around Saturn right now, am I to understand they couldn't come up with the money to use it?
what are we talking about here $$$ what kind of money. If Santa Claus were to offer ESA a healthy space probe around Saturn right now, am I to understand they couldn't come up with the money to use it?
There's a rumor going around that the initial OMB budget proposal (which goes to NASA, then back to OMB to become the final administration budget) calls for shutting down both Cassini and MESSENGER to save money.No more details than that. But we may be seeing a repeat of what happened with the Apollo seismic instruments when budget cuts are ending ongoing data collection.
How much would it cost, if spread out over a single full-time lead and some grad-students (work for practically minimum wage) and a small amount of DSN (or, heck, ESTRACK) bandwidth?
Quote from: Robotbeat on 11/15/2012 06:52 pm How much would it cost, if spread out over a single full-time lead and some grad-students (work for practically minimum wage) and a small amount of DSN (or, heck, ESTRACK) bandwidth?1. This is not a rover. Grad students don't have the experience to manage flight operations or understand the vehicle systems.2. Why bother if there isn't going be bandwith to downlink the data.
1) Granted. But how much needs to be understood?
I know operating it can't be that simple, but seriously... How much would it cost, if spread out over a single full-time lead and some grad-students (work for practically minimum wage) and a small amount of DSN (or, heck, ESTRACK) bandwidth?
Maybe OMB knows something about the Planetary Sciences Senior Review that (the existential) we do not.Have they ever put the results of that out?