NASA will
push ahead with its plan for an October 2009 launch of the already over-budget
Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) despite ongoing technical and schedule
difficulties all but certain to push the cost of the mission past $2 billion.
Officials
in charge of NASA's Mars program made the announcement Friday following a
meeting with NASA Administrator Mike Griffin to discuss what to do about the
mission in light of continued cost
growth. MSL's price tag has risen $300 million since mid-2006 topping $1.9
billion in NASA's latest public estimate.
Doug
McCuistion, the director of NASA's Mars Exploration Program, said MSL will need
more than $1.9 billion whether it launches
as planned in October 2009 or is delayed two years until the next optimal
launch window opens
in 2011. McCuistion said NASA was not at liberty to say how much additional
money MSL would need until it has a chance to square its budget needs with the
White House and Congress.
NASA Mars
officials are due to meet with Griffin about MSL again in January. By that
time, McCuistion said, MSL officials expect to show that some key
hardware and software deliveries holding up the project have been made and
that testing has continued to go well.
While NASA
could still decide to cancel MSL, NASA's associate administrator for science,
Ed Weiler, described that as an unlikely scenario.
"It's easy
to say, 'let's just cancel it and move on' but we've poured over a
billion-and-half dollars into this," Weiler said. "The science is critical.
It's a flagship mission in the
Mars program and as long as we think we have a good technical chance to
make it we are going to do what we have to do."
Weiler said
he would look for additional money for MSL in the Mars budget before putting
the pinch on the rest of NASA's planetary science portfolio.
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