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March 7, 2006

House of Representatives Science Committee

House Appropriations Science Committee
Washington, DC 20515

Dear committee members,

I am writing to ask you to help prevent NASA from further decimating its most innovative and efficient science missions. In the last few NASA budgets, many of these low-cost missions have been cancelled or deferred, in favor of much larger and more costly manned and unmanned projects. I urge NASA to follow a more balanced approach between its large and small missions.

On Thursday, March 2, 2006, I watched the House Science Committee hearing on NASA’s proposed FY2007 budget. Though a Shakespeare scholar by training, I have been fascinated by developments in astronomy since I was a child; it’s now my good luck to be married to an engineer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, allowing me a special view of the important work of JPL and NASA. Because my husband is currently managing an Explorer project, I was particularly intrigued by last Thursday’s discussion of NASA’s small missions, including the Explorers.

Each of the scientists on the House panel expressed strong support for these missions: all four recommended reducing the budgets of the high-cost “flagship” projects (such as JWST) to preserve the smaller, more nimble missions, like the Explorers. With cutting-edge science objectives, these missions are selected after rigorous competition, with many young scientists engaged in the productive process of designing and refining the various Explorer proposals. Once a project is chosen, it is developed over a period of just a few years, leading to confirmation by NASA and subsequent launch.

Unfortunately, this process has been interrupted, for a moratorium has been placed on new competitions—from now until perhaps 2010—to provide funds for other NASA priorities, including the much more expensive proposed human missions to the Moon and Mars, the maintenance of Hubble and the Space Station, as well as the great “flagship” missions. While all of these projects are worthwhile and important, it is dangerous to delay or cancel the smaller missions, rather than adjusting the huge budgets of the largest projects to make room for the smaller ones. Eliminating opportunities for new competed projects for several years is especially short-sighted, a serious squandering of our country’s intellectual potential. As the scientists on last week’s House panel emphasized, such a gap in new science missions would seriously impact the number of new PhDs entering space and Earth science, damaging NASA in the long run and losing a generation of potential scientists.

My husband’s current project, WISE, the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, is one example of what is happening to NASA’s Explorer missions now in development. After launch, WISE will map the sky in exquisite detail, using powerful sensors that will detect previously unseen objects, from earth-threatening asteroids to distant galaxies. For FY2005, WISE’s budget was cut by $15 million, roughly 40% of that year’s budget. After changes to accommodate this new budget, the NASA Headquarters Management Committee unanimously recommended confirmation for WISE in November 2005. But for the first time in the history of the Explorers, confirmation was withheld in spite of the enthusiastic recommendation of the NASA committee. Just last week, WISE’s budget was cut over 50% for FY2006 and confirmation delayed until as late as next October.

Other small missions have not been so lucky: the Explorer NuStar, selected in 2003, has recently been cancelled, even though, like WISE, NuStar was on schedule and on budget. Still other small projects have also been cancelled or postponed, causing some scientists to question NASA’s ability to follow through on its commitments.

In a perfect world, we would have funds for all projects, large and small, manned and robotic. But I know from watching my grandson that it doesn’t take the most expensive missions to engage the public’s interest: in his second-grade class in Portland, Oregon, students are discussing the amazing Mars Rovers, still sending home valuable science well past their planned lifetimes. The students know about the comet dust recently returned by the small mission Stardust, and the recent launch of the small probe to Pluto. Though we’d all love to see humans walk on Mars, the more cost-effective, innovative, and science-rich smaller missions capture our imaginations as well, while consuming much less of our treasure.

I urge you to do whatever you can to follow the recommendations of the House science panel to support small competed science missions like the Explorers, helping to ensure our ability to invent new technologies as we explore our universe, continue our leadership as an innovative global power, and preserve the future of America’s space program for our grandchildren’s generation.

Sincerely,

Kathleen Irace, Ph.D.

Very well written letter. Unfortunately, it appears to be falling of deaf ears. This news item today proves it:

Pentagon Requests Increased Funding For Space Weaponry
In other news, the Boston Globe is reporting the Pentagon has asked Congress for hundreds of millions of dollars to test weapons in space. The Globe calls the request the biggest step toward creating a space battlefield since President Reagan’s so-called “Star Wars” program. The budget request would fund a variety of tests on several weapons. Military specialists believe the Pentagon is operating several other space weapons programs not disclosed in its budget request. Philip Coyle, who served as the Pentagon's top weapons tester from 1994 to 2001, criticized the new emphasis on space weaponry at a time when: ''there is no threat in space to justify a new arms race in space."
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I guess they really have different priorities now. Perhaps some other country will pick up where we seem to have left off.

I wish I had better news, but I can't see anything on the horizon except more problems for education and exploration in space.

Posted by: Joe on March 15, 2006 11:12 AM