[X] My Assistant

[belleraphon1]

All...

have no idea why.... ?????

http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/08032...rn-resigns.html

Craig

[dvandorn]

At the STS-123 post-landing press conference, Mike Griffin was asked about the MER situation and about Stern's resignation. I won't even try to paraphrase from memory what Griffin said, but the gist of it was that, first, he had tried to talk Stern into staying. "I didn't see any reason why he had to leave," is what I believe Griffin said about it. But he said that Stern disagreed, and so Griffin accepted it and allowed Stern to resign.

He then said that the letter to JPL announcing the MER and Odyssey budget cuts had not been run past him, had not been reviewed by him, and had not been approved by him. He said that if he had been consulted, there would never have been any kind of dust-up because the letter never would have gone out. Griffin said rather strongly that he doesn't approve of shutting down working spacecraft that are still returning good data.

-the other Doug