[X] My Assistant

[Phil Stooke]

LPSC is coming up in mid-March. I just submitted my abstract - and I'm a coauthor on another one which should go in shortly.

Is anyone else from UMSF going ?

Phil

[nprev]

Got this off of the BBC via Google News (with LOTS of concurrent articles). Dr. Griffin basically stated that US UMSF Mars exploration will flatten out over the next decade, and NASA's emphasis will shift to outer-system missions:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7298608.stm

[Stu]

Got this off of the BBC via Google News (with LOTS of concurrent articles). Dr. Griffin basically stated that US UMSF Mars exploration will flatten out over the next decade, and NASA's emphasis will shift to outer-system missions:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7298608.stm

I had mixed feelings when I read this. My instant, gut reaction as a lifelong "Mars nut" was "NOOOOOOO!!!" ... but then the more reasonable part of me took over and I began to think "Hmmm, ok... fair enough," because - and I never thought I'd find myself thinking this thought or typing these words - maybe it is time to not focus quite so much on Mars, and strike out a bit for the Farworlds.

It actually makes a lot of sense. MSL will - hopefully - trundle around Mars for several years at the least, so there's no urgent need to send more rovers after it for a while. And with a fleet of orbiters circling Mars - among them the MRO "martian spy-sat", which as we all know here can pick out individual boulders with HiRISE - there's no pressing need for a flagship new orbiter either. Phoenix will "do" the polar environment; MRO wil let us map the surface in amazing detail; who knows how much longer Spirit and Oppy will keep doing their Duracel bunny act... There's actually plenty going on on Mars to keep us, and martian scientists, busy for the forseeable future. If ExoMars makes it to Mars that will further surface studies. As far as NASA is concerned, the next logical Mars mission is a sample return, right? And there's obviously no money for that at the moment... so, amazingly, I find myself agreeing that perhaps it is time to turn our minds towards other bodies and destinations.

I've actually been feeling this way for a while, if I'm honest. Everyone here knows how passinate I am about Mars (just noticed, I joined this Forum <before it even WAS 'this forum'!> four years ago yesterday, so thanks for 4 fantastic years Doug!) but recently I've been feeling a kind of... well, no, not boredom, I wouldn't go that far, but I have definitely been feeling a kind of restlesness, a wanderlust almost. I think, in fact I know, a lot of that is to do with the work of people here - the fantastic images of Io produced by Jason, Ted's stunning portraits of the oft-neglected moons of the outer planets, Juramike's intense studies of Titan's surface, pictures produced by so many other people here during the recent Mercury and Iapetus and Enceladus encounters, and more besides. They've made me feel fascinated by these places all over again, helped wash the martian dust out of my eyes and allowed me to see that there are other wonders Out There worthy of exploration.

So, while part of me, again if I'm honest, feels a pang of guilt for even thinking this, I have to agree that the time is right to not turn our back on Mars, but definitely to sweep our eyes across the bigger picture and embrace the Farworlds. The fractured ice plains of Europa calls to us (not you Jason, I know!) as does the sulphurous landscape of Io and the bizarre, alien-yet-familiar surface of Titan. The moons of Uranus and Neptune deserve further study, and Pluto is now just years away from being seen as a real world for the first time.

Bring it on, I say!