[meteorite-list] OT: Asteroidal and Lunar Materials

From: Darren Garrison <cynapse_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sun May 22 19:03:15 2005
Message-ID: <5c4291ht2o7a87u5hmckganr1fnqppq62j_at_4ax.com>

On Sun, 22 May 2005 17:55:15 -0500, "Sterling K. Webb" <kelly_at_bhil.com> wrote:

>Hi, Marc, and The List
>
>
> Yes, it needs decades of work!
>
> That post was the Visionary Me talking.
>
> This post is the Practical Me talking:
>
>a. We need a major, manned metallurgical research facility in orbit about ten times the size of
>the ISS with a staff of 30-50.

I don't concider this to be the practical you talking, concidering:

http://skyandtelescope.com/news/article_1516_1.asp

May 20, 2005 | Astronomers are riding an emotional roller coaster. Last month they were elated when
NASA's new administrator, Michael D. Griffin, restarted work on a possible shuttle mission to extend
the life of the Hubble Space Telescope. This month they're in despair over news that future
space-astronomy missions may be downsized, delayed, or cancelled because of a financial crisis
within the agency.
In a recent letter to Congress, Griffin noted that NASA's budget for the current year falls about $2
billion short of what's needed to keep all current programs on track. Reasons for the imbalance
include cost overruns in the shuttle return-to-flight effort and in several space-science missions,
congressionally mandated expenditures ("earmarks," otherwise known as "pork"), and the resumption of
preparations for servicing Hubble. Testifying before a Senate subcommittee on May 12th, Griffin
admitted that "identifying offsets needed to fund these items has created some difficult choices."

Among the projects whose timelines will be stretched out are the Space Interferometry Mission and
Terrestrial Planet Finder, advanced space telescopes designed to explore planets around other stars
beginning in 2011 (SIM) and sometime between 2012 and 2015 (TPF). Griffin says he doesn't yet know
the extent of these delays. NASA's Mars Science Lab, a long-duration rover now slated for launch in
2009, may slip to 2011.

By far the worst problem for astronomers concerns the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), a 6.5-meter
(256-inch) infrared observatory sometimes called Hubble's successor. It's a joint project of NASA,
the European Space Agency, and the Canadian Space Agency. Various hurdles seem destined to delay its
launch by at least a year, to no earlier than 2012, and threaten to increase the mission's cost by
as much as $1 billion, to more than $3 billion. In response, NASA has asked the project to consider
whether a 4-meter telescope with fewer scientific instruments could be flown instead. According to
one astronomer on the Webb team, who asked to remain anonymous, "such an observatory would not be
worth continuing with" because it wouldn't be able to compete scientifically with the next
generation of giant ground-based telescopes except in a narrow range of infrared wavelengths. "None
of us believe it'd save the required amount of money anyway."

At this point it's anybody's guess what will happen to Webb. If NASA can't scrounge enough extra
money to continue the project in its current form, perhaps by taking it from another mission,
outright cancellation is a very real possibility. "I don't know the technical and budget path we'll
find," says senior project scientist John Mather (NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center), "but the JWST
project management and science team are extremely determined to find a solution in working with our
international partners and NASA Headquarters."
Received on Sun 22 May 2005 07:12:24 PM PDT