NASA - MAVEN - updates and discussion

[Kaputnik]

Supposing MAVEN is dead, could that free up enough of NASA's budget to continue operating JUNO??

(I expect that mathematically this might work, but practically and politically it wouldn't)

[StraumliBlight]

Supposing MAVEN is dead, could that free up enough of NASA's budget to continue operating JUNO??

(I expect that mathematically this might work, but practically and politically it wouldn't)

FY 2026 BUDGET TECHNICAL SUPPLEMENT.

NASA reduced peer-reviewed science in Mars Research and Analysis and has eliminated funding for several missions operating well past the end of prime mission including Mars Odyssey and Mars Express, Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN).

[Kaputnik]

Supposing MAVEN is dead, could that free up enough of NASA's budget to continue operating JUNO??

(I expect that mathematically this might work, but practically and politically it wouldn't)

FY 2026 BUDGET TECHNICAL SUPPLEMENT.

NASA reduced peer-reviewed science in Mars Research and Analysis and has eliminated funding for several missions operating well past the end of prime mission including Mars Odyssey and Mars Express, Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN).

So the funding was already going to be cut 😥

[vjkane]

So the funding was already going to be cut 😥

Normally the president's budget proposal is a political statement, and this certainly was.  Congress establishes the budget, and generally ignores the president's budget proposal and works off of prior budgets.

I believe that both the FY26 House and Senate budget proposals would continue funding for MAVEN. The current acting administrator instructed NASA's managers to spend based on the House proposal (smaller science budget) until a final budget is passed.

Right now, the federal government is operating on a continuing resolution that extends FY25 spending levels that included funding for MAVEN operations.

That said, this administration has cancelled Congressionally funded programs on it's own accord.

In other words, it's extremely unclear what the status of funding for anything is or will be.

[zubenelgenubi]

Would be Twilight Zone-ish if MAVEN operations recovery funding was sued for in federal court.

MAVEN funding is included in the current continuing resolution, as stated above, through January 30.

What federal court district has jurisdiction?

(If this generates a lot of policy discussion, then we can splinter said discussion to Space Policy.)

[Blackstar]

I believe that when a science mission dies, normal procedure is to continue some of the funding to perform archiving and continued data analysis for awhile. There's datasets that you want to be available for future researchers.

I also believe that part of an ongoing mission's budget is allocated to paying for their use of the DSN. That money can probably be shifted to other programs.

When the BBB spun up a Mars telecom orbiter rather unexpectedly this summer, they missed an opportunity to be more strategic. I asked a couple of people where that mission earmark came from and other than "beats the heck out of me," they speculated that the right contractor spoke to Senator Cruz when he was in a good mood. But a more logical approach than simply building a telecom relay would be to put a few science instruments on there as well. MRO is on borrowed time, for instance, as is MAVEN, and so science data continuity makes sense. But the whole process for selecting missions is broken right now.

[vjkane]

But the whole process for selecting missions is broken right now.

That may be the understatement of the day.

[Blackstar]

But the whole process for selecting missions is broken right now.

That may be the understatement of the day.

I work in this business and even I don't know what is going on. I suspect that something we're going to find out is that a lot of that 20% of NASA employees who took the retirements were key people who kept things running, and with them gone, stuff is not going to run. Just the other day I was talking to a guy from NASA who told me that at the beginning of the year his office had 19 people in it. It now has 7. The other 12 took the "retirement" option--many of them under 40 years old. They did that because they expected to all be fired. So even though some of these programs the administration wants canceled may still survive, the agency may not be able to effectively run them. Then again, that was probably the point.

[vjkane]

So even though some of these programs the administration wants canceled may still survive, the agency may not be able to effectively run them. Then again, that was probably the point.

Sadly, I believe that you are correct.

[Blackstar]

Something that is not measurable for any of this is morale. It's really bad throughout much of NASA and related organizations. That affects performance. People don't do their jobs as well as they previously did. They forget to do things, they come in late and leave early. They don't double-check their work to make sure it is correct. If you think you might get fired at any time for reasons beyond your control, you don't work harder, because what's the point? There's no longer any kind of performance/reward system. Also, raises have been canceled, so when you see people at a rally holding up signs saying "bigger paychecks" and "lower prices," well, you know that your paycheck is not any bigger. It's demoralizing.

What we're seeing now is the beginning phase of a "hollow NASA" where the exterior may exist, but the core is withered and emptied out. The United States spent three decades and billions of dollars building up expertise on Mars, both missions and science. That's fading away. The particulars of the MAVEN failure may not be a direct result of that, but it's all part of the whole. Mars Odyssey will fail soon (it should have failed already), and then we'll lose MRO.

[KWC]

Hold on, let me get this straight: you're blaming President Trump for the failure of MAVEN?

I'm sorry, let me stop laughing before I finish this post.

Actually, I won't finish. It would come off as disrespectful.

Regardless, several of the above posts are not "updates" and are instead unfounded opinions...

[eeergo]

Hold on, let me get this straight: you're blaming President Trump for the failure of MAVEN?

I'm sorry, let me stop laughing before I finish this post.

Actually, I won't finish. It would come off as disrespectful.

Regardless, several of the above posts are not "updates" and are instead unfounded opinions...

Hurt your feelings?

What you're reading are (very reasonable and realistic) first-hand accounts of what's happening under the current Administration in NASA, including the documented, black-on-white beancounting push to cancel MAVEN, with the (coincidence or not) that it appears to have failed. If you read that as "blaming President Trump for the failure of MAVEN", well, that's squarely on the eye of the beholder, in this case your own rage-ready bias, isn't it?

[Athelstane]

The particulars of the MAVEN failure may not be a direct result of that,

If we're being perfectly honest with ourselves -- whatever we think of the present administration's policy regarding NASA -- the odds are pretty heavy that it *isn't* a direct result of that. MAVEN has been in Mars orbit for 12 years, and that's plenty of time in a harsh environment for something to break down.

[ChrisC]

(If this generates a lot of policy discussion, then we can splinter said discussion to Space Policy.)

FYI that section is here: https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?board=44.0

[ccdengr]

MAVEN has been in Mars orbit for 12 years, and that's plenty of time in a harsh environment for something to break down.

The last orbiter to be lost at Mars (MGS back in 2008) was lost because of human error caused by thin staffing and bad documentation.  Without details it's impossible to be sure, but the MAVEN failure looks more like that to me than a single hardware failure.

https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/report-reveals-likely-causes-of-mars-spacecraft-loss/

[mn]

MAVEN has been in Mars orbit for 12 years, and that's plenty of time in a harsh environment for something to break down.

The last orbiter to be lost at Mars (MGS back in 2008) was lost because of human error caused by thin staffing and bad documentation.  Without details it's impossible to be sure, but the MAVEN failure looks more like that to me than a single hardware failure.

https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/report-reveals-likely-causes-of-mars-spacecraft-loss/

I read the linked report and I don't see anything about 'thin staffing and bad documentation' (the words 'staff' or 'documentation' do not even appear in the linked page).

[LouScheffer]

Hold on, let me get this straight: you're blaming President Trump for the failure of MAVEN?

I'm sorry, let me stop laughing before I finish this post.

You shouldn't laugh yet.

Of course it's possible that hardware failure -> dead mission.  No blame to current administration.

But it's also possible that:

Budget cuts -> Lower staffing -> less validation -> bad command sent -> dead mission.  In which case the administration is responsible.  This is not a hypothetical situation.  Mars Climate Orbiter was lost (report here) and one of the main factors was inadequate staffing of the navigation team.  That in turn was caused by the "cheaper" part of Faster-Better-Cheaper.  So budget cuts can be a direct cause of mission failure.

Of course we don't know what happened yet.  It may have had nothing to do with budget cuts.  But the possibility can't be laughed off yet.

[catdlr]

(If this generates a lot of policy discussion, then we can splinter said discussion to Space Policy.)

FYI that section is here: https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?board=44.0

To everyone:
I'm watching this, I haven't decided to either make a Policy Thread "Did the New administration cause Mave to die", or rip this policy discussion into the "Rest In Turmoil" thread. So if I see another "Policy"- related comment, it's lawnmower time.

Tony

[StraumliBlight]

I read the linked report and I don't see anything about 'thin staffing and bad documentation' (the words 'staff' or 'documentation' do not even appear in the linked page).

Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Spacecraft Loss of Contact [Sep 3, 2007]

Lifetime Management Considerations.
MGS had entered its fourth extended mission phase just prior to the anomaly. As is common during extensions to already long-lived missions, the MGS budget and staff had been reduced to economize on mission ops. While no direct evidence attributes the anomaly to these reductions, the review board judged that such reductions can inherently increase risk. Periodic reviews should have been performed to assure that spacecraft control parameters were appropriate to the current state of the spacecraft, and the risks associated with normal personnel turnover over time should also have been assessed. While the training methodology for some operations positions was excellent, the board noted that it was not uniformly applied.

NTRS: Anomaly trends for Missions to Mars: Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Odyssey [Feb 6, 2022]

[ccdengr]

I read the linked report and I don't see anything about 'thin staffing and bad documentation' (the words 'staff' or 'documentation' do not even appear in the linked page).

This wasn't emphasized quite as bluntly in the report for obvious reasons but read between the lines and it's fairly obvious.  I worked on this project over its entire lifecycle but was not directly involved in s/c ops.

"The board also concluded that the Mars Global Surveyor team followed existing procedures, but that procedures were insufficient to catch the errors that occurred."