Of course, reasonable people may disagree with your absolutist position. From what I gather, there were very good reasons to kill Dawn, not the least of which was the trend in science descopes, and today's news might contain more than a little CYA spin. And don't underestimate the effect of Elachi's/JPL's lobbying, either.

No doubt today's decision is good news for the Dawn team but it may be bad news for the Discovery Program in the long run.

The launch date extends to at least October 2OO7, but a new date has not yet been set. time and personnel were lost due to the pointless standdown

Rex Geveden said during the conference that the independent assessment team identified August 2007 as realistic; and that the project said that a June-July date is possble, two estimates which he said were in "essential agreement." Colleen Hartman said that a launch date then would not delay the originally planned arrival dates in 2011 and 2014 for Vesta and Ceres.

--Emily

my position is not absolutist and should not be interpreted that way. there were simply no good technical reasons to stop the DAWN mission. An independent review board decalared there were no technical issues preventing launch and that is the source of my comment.

I completely agree with you that science descopes are terrible and missions should fly based on merit, not unattainable promises.

Cleave and Dantzler read the same IAT report and, apparently, came to the opposite conclusion. So, either the report was worthless or Cleave and Dantzler are incompetent.

Thanks Emily,

Yes, its precisely due to the use of ion propulsion that there is a wide launch window and no delay in arrival. thats one on the great advantages of ion propulsion vs. chemical rockets. In fact this mission cannot be accomplished except by using ion propulsion.

ken

Looks like NASA blinked.

I think there will be a 2006 mission selected...but I would not be surprised, at all, to see the Missions of Opportunity zeroed out this time arounds to support the overrun (e.g., goodbye Deep Impact or Stardust extended missions).

This is what I meant by affecting the Discovery Program in the long run.

One might also consider today's decision as NASA's sop to the planetary sciences community in the wake of the recent dissents and protests. In fact, NASA might plausibly be able to say, "Look, we reversed the Dawn cancellation, so stop whining about Europa Orbiter."

Everybody happy now?

I've never understood the problem, actually. I visited Ceres a couple of months ago - it's a tiny village near Cupar, in Fife, (Nickety, nackety, noo noo noo!). I drove round it in about two minutes, so what's the big deal?

Seriously, though, a mission in the hand is worth two promised by Bush!

Bob Shaw

I may be forced to recant all my liberal european beliefs if you keep this up.

Not for me, but if you are going to spend any time in Folsom it might be necessary (and the offer still stands for a couple of rounds at my favorite pub down the road in Elk Grove.)

I am slightly glum over the reversal myself. I look forward to science from those asteroids, but I wonder about what we'll be losing. I worked for NASA. It was always clear that people made their moves, small and large, according to the past behavior of the capricious funding beast.

What is going to stop the next Discovery selection from being an "arms race" between teams trying to be the one to most egregiously underestimate future costs (and to draw up a plan that encourages reviewers to do the same)? The goalpost has shifted from accomplishing a mission under the cap to initially convincing the review that you will be under the cap -- when you blow it, the money will come through anyway. Suppose then the Dawn go-ahead kills another year's selection, and the next selection has an overrun that kills another mission -- that's not good for the program in the long run.

Well, one answer is to DQ proposals during the 2006 AO that are really stretching the envelope. Pick a good, solid, modest mission. Maybe refly CONTOUR, for example. A Deep Impact visit to an asteroid. See where the gaps are in Venus Express (particularly with the lopss of the PFS instrument) and have an orbiter that fills those gaps. Or (and I'm sure I'll have Bruce chasing me around with a pitchfork for this), use the 2006 Discovery slot for a modest, focused Mars mission in the 2011 launch window (e.g., methane detection or Netlander Mk. II).

Hmm... I guess I shouldn't have thrown away my "Submit your name to the Asteroid Belt" certificate after all