NASA Dawn Asteroid Mission Told to "Stand Back Up", Reinstated! Options

[dvandorn]

Just 'cause I said I would...

Hopefully, though, this whole episode has made its point -- NASA isn't afraid to tell overbudget missions to stand down.

I just *really* wish we could get the magnetometer back on the beastie, though...

-the other Doug

[gpurcell]

The other thing is when you do overrun - if there is an overrun - we don't print money in the basement of Headquarters. The reason we have cost caps is so that we can plan our budgets. If there is an overrun that money will come from somewhere else. It will probably come from the next mission in that line - Scout, Discovery, New Frontiers - whatever. So ... not like any one ever intends to overrun - but I did at least want to clarify that and give everyone an opportunity to ask questions since I know that this is something of a new issue."

Well, that's really what we figured, isn't it? Goodbye Mission of Opportunity, maybe a year schedule slip for the Discovery competition....

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

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Not necessarily. Dantzler told the November COMPLEX meeting that the cancellation of any full-mission selection for the disastrous Discovery 11 AO had left him with a considerable amount of spare money, which he was determined (at the time) to use to select TWO full Discovery missions next time, although one of them might be minimum-cost. Even if Dawn's overruns have cut further into his kitty, I imagine this still leaves him enough to select one full mission this time, PLUS enough left over to fund not only Dawn's cost overrun but also one, or maybe even two, Missions of Opportunity (with reuse of Stardust and Deep Impact, I presume, being strong candidates for those).