Some disturbing info from an articlehttp://www.space.com/31890-nasa-mars-insight-lander-fate.htmlThey basically are talking cancellation for money reasons?
Quote from: Prober on 02/10/2016 02:05 pmSome disturbing info from an articlehttp://www.space.com/31890-nasa-mars-insight-lander-fate.htmlThey basically are talking cancellation for money reasons?Is that basically much different from what the situation was when they announced it wouldn't be flying this year? Doesn't seem to indicate any decision has been made one way or the other yet.
Quote from: Prober on 02/10/2016 02:05 pmSome disturbing info from an articlehttp://www.space.com/31890-nasa-mars-insight-lander-fate.htmlThey basically are talking cancellation for money reasons?I believe they are playing a dangerous game here. The President will present a Budget where InSight is cut, hoping that then the California Reps will find the extra money and appropriate it so they don't cancel it since it's basically ready. Magic extra budget. At least that's my wild speculation.
What do they do if the delay puts them over the cost cap? Rewrite the Discovery program rules? Kick it out of Discovery but reinstate it as an ESMD mission or something?
There's a lot of angst and disappointment in this thread. Remember that even if the mission is cancelled, the spacecraft will be mothballed and may be reinvented as something else in in the future much like the Phoenix mission was.
Newton_V is there a tail number for the LV yet for this mission?
While in the landed configuration for the last time before arriving on Mars, NASA's InSight lander was commanded to deploy its solar arrays to test and verify the exact process that it will use on the surface of the Red Planet. During the test on Jan. 23, 2018, from the Lockheed Martin clean room in Littleton, Colorado, engineers and technicians evaluated that the solar arrays fully deployed and conducted an illumination test to confirm that the solar cells were collecting power. The fan-like solar panels are specially designed for Mars' weak sunlight, caused by the planet's distance from the Sun and its dusty, thin atmosphere. The panels will power InSight for at least one Martian year (two Earth years) for the first mission dedicated to studying Mars' deep interior.InSight, short for Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport, is a Mars lander designed to give the Red Planet its first thorough checkup since it formed 4.5 billion years ago. It is the first outer space robotic explorer to study in-depth the "inner space" of Mars: its crust, mantle and core. Studying Mars' interior structure may answer key questions about the early formation of rocky planets in our inner solar system - Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars - more than 4 billion years ago, as well as rocky exoplanets. InSight also will measure tectonic activity and meteorite impacts on Mars today.InSight is scheduled to launch in May 2018 from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket.
Just got back from VAFB. Insight’s Atlas is in flow and looking good. the final Delta II has arived for IceSat. Busy year on the West Coast.