NASA says next Mars mission delayed two years
By Michael W. Jones
NASA has announced that the next generation Mars mission, originally planned for 2009, has been delayed for at least two years. A series of technical problems and cost overruns will force a delay until the year 2011, and will result in at least $400 million in added costs, the space agency said at a briefing at NASA headquarters in Washington, D.C. The delay could possibly result in some layoffs at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).
The next generation mission, a package as large as an SUV, is one of the most difficult and challenging missions that NASA has ever attempted. Named Mars Science Laboratory, the instrument payload for the next generation mission is 10 times heavier that the Spirit and Rover packages, which landed on Mars in 2004. In the words of Charles Elachi, reported in the L.A. Times, director of JPL in La Canada Flintridge (the facility where the new rover is being constructed), “We ran out of time.”
The Mars Science Laboratory is planned as a mobile device, as were it’s predecessors Spirit and Rover. It is designed to have sufficient ground clearance to easily drive over many obstacles that were insurmountable for previous generations of Mars rovers. The improved instrumentation for the mission are designed to determine the habitability of the red planet both today and in its distant past. To this end, landing sites which have been discusses involve places on Mars where previous missions have seen signs of water. A final landing site has not yet been selected.
The set of problems that forced the delay involved the design and construction of of the mechanisms, mainly motors and gearboxes, that control the movement of the rover and the deployment of science equipment. Mission managers have finally decided that they will not have enough time to solve these problems before the 2009 launch date. Ed Weiler, associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, said, “We want to avoid a mad dash to launch. Failure is not an option on this mission.”
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