2009 Mars Lander May Slip To Fund Higher Priorities

TIGHTENING FOCUS

NASA will tap its research and new-technology development accounts--delaying missions or eliminating them outright--to finance near-term priorities, such as closing the gap between the space shuttle and the follow-on Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV).

The agency's latest operating plan for Fiscal 2005 reflects an effort to accommodate congressional concerns over the length of the gap in U.S. human access to space after the shuttle is retired in 2010 and an earlier decision to let the Hubble Space Telescope die. Among the fund-raising possibilities under review is a two-year slip in the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), now planned for 2009.

"One of the few areas of freedom that I have as the administrator is the--I hesitate to call it the pot--but the pot of research and technology money that can be, if you will, bought by the yard," NASA Administrator Michael D. Griffin told the Senate Commerce science and space subcommittee last week. "That is one of the few areas where I have any flexibility at all. And if I am to accelerate the development of the CEV, a good chunk of that money must be used to do so."

THE LATEST OPERATING plan trims $125.9 million from robotic Mars exploration accounts, including $71.7 million from the MSL, pending the outcome of an overall review of the agency's strategy for exploring the Red Planet.