WASHINGTON - NASA is bracing itself for the release Tuesday, March 28 of an in-depth review of the space agency's troubled Mars exploration program. The report, according to NASA insiders as well as industry officials, paints a bleak picture of program mismanagement, lack of proper technical oversight of government and industry teams and inadequate testing of spacecraft hardware that led to last year's failure of multiple Mars probes.

NASA is expected to announce a significant overhaul of Mars planning groups, both here at NASA Headquarters and at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California -- the center that manages the Mars exploration effort.

NASA's Mars Czar? Scott Hubbard

James Garvin, now a member of the Mars Global Surveyor science team at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, has accepted a position as Mars exploration program scientist.

The creation of these two posts at NASA headquarters would centralize leadership, program management, and the needed oversight powers to reshape the Mars exploration program. Tuesday's report calls attention to a lack of program oversight at the NASA headquarters' level -- a management flaw that contributed to the Mars spacecraft failures.

According to NASA sources, the "Mars mess" the agency now finds itself in is due in large measure to a cross-cutting and consistent theme: The set of Mars spacecraft failed because of inadequate finances, driven by NASA's bullishness to create a cheaper, better and faster approach to space exploration. Moreover, Mars spacecraft managers were "intimidated" to plod ahead, rather than blow-the-whistle as difficulties began to chip away at program success.

Although details of the forthcoming review of Mars program woes are being tightly held, those now engaged in reshaping exploration of the Red Planet suggest:

• The Mars return sample program has proven far too daunting, both in engineering and financial terms. The project is nowhere near off the ground, but has already rocketed to an over $1 billion price tag. Also, there is disagreement over whether France should continue as a "critical path" partner. They are building a Mars orbiter that would haul back to Earth the goods -- martian rock and soil samples -- as well as provide Ariane 5-booster rides for Mars spacecraft.
• There is a split decision as to what Mars mission will fly in 2003 -- be it an orbiter or a lander. There is growing support to fly only an orbiter in this time period. However, a small landing device -- tagged a "Scout" mission may be flown in 2003, although these craft are ill defined at the moment.
• The prevailing view for loss of the Mars Polar Lander last December centers on software. It is believed that the craft's landing legs on extension also compressed a set of micro-switches that in turn shut down the lander's engines far too high above Mars' surface. Inadequate software did not "poll" a second time whether or not micro-switches were just momentarily closed or permanently closed. This software glitch was found by 2001 lander project personnel. But this possibility does not explain loss of two small microprobes that were to be ejected earlier in the descent, before landing-leg deployment.