Voyager program budget to be cut

[Rogue 9]

Slashdot

darylb writes "NASA is proposing ending the 28-year old Voyager program, which costs a paltry $4mil per year to operate. One of the two Voyager probes is approaching the edge of what can be thought of as the sun's atmosphere (where the solar wind bumps up against interstellar wind), a place where no probe has gone before. Canceling this project means saving almost nothing compared to the hundreds of millions of dollars spent so far. The craft will be out of juice by 2015 in any case, so the marginal cost for the extra, invaluable, data would be minimal." From the article: "NASA officials said the possibility of cutting Voyager and several other long-running missions in the Earth-Sun Exploration Division arose in February, when the Bush administration proposed slashing the division's 2006 budget by nearly one-third -- from $75 million to $53 million."

[Shinova]

I would agree with killing the Voyager budget and saving the money for a properly nuclear-powered deep space probe that could go the same route the Voyager probes went, but be able to take so much more readings and pictures with all the amount of power it could now have, but slashing the NASA budget as a whole, I don't agree with. Bad Bush!

[Nick Lancaster]

We're going to Mars (so we can drill for oil).

We're going to cut funding for Hubble, so we don't have to see all this deep-space bullshit that gets in the way of believing in Jesus Christ as Personal Savior, or contradicting YECs, or other silliness.

Same for Voyager. Space is really, really far away. It's black and it's cold and it's full of stars. That's all Creationists need to know. Oh, and God Made It.

Stupid. It's all the rage. Be the first on your block to be stupid.

[SirNitram]

I would agree with killing the Voyager budget and saving the money for a properly nuclear-powered deep space probe that could go the same route the Voyager probes went, but be able to take so much more readings and pictures with all the amount of power it could now have, but slashing the NASA budget as a whole, I don't agree with. Bad Bush!

Are you aware both Voyager probes are being pushed off course by something that our current models of physics and/or the solar system doesn't account for?

That reason alone means we should milk them for every fucking byte of data they'll cough up before those reactors turn off. Something is going on out there. Be it some new wrinkle in physics over large distances or an unseen massive object, we should know about it.

[Molyneux]

I would agree with killing the Voyager budget and saving the money for a properly nuclear-powered deep space probe that could go the same route the Voyager probes went, but be able to take so much more readings and pictures with all the amount of power it could now have, but slashing the NASA budget as a whole, I don't agree with. Bad Bush!

Are you aware both Voyager probes are being pushed off course by something that our current models of physics and/or the solar system doesn't account for?

That reason alone means we should milk them for every fucking byte of data they'll cough up before those reactors turn off. Something is going on out there. Be it some new wrinkle in physics over large distances or an unseen massive object, we should know about it.

Amen to that!
Bush is a freakin' hypocrite...go to Mars, slash the budget. Jerk.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Didn't Bush just proposed massive spending increases for exploration?

[Wicked Pilot]

There is no substitute for Voyager. It will be decades before we get another oppertunity to see what they're seeing right now.

[SirNitram]

Didn't Bush just proposed massive spending increases for exploration?

No, see. He approved a vision for exploration. Then his administration told Nasa to make do with alot less. But the vision is intact!

[Firefox]

Are you aware both Voyager probes are being pushed off course by something that our current models of physics and/or the solar system doesn't account for?

I thought the anomaly wasn't attributed to the Voyager probes?

[tumbletom]

Arghh...I like this probe--tits probably a very valuable asset, information wise at least..

They should cut other useless crap, like the iss and shuttle....

Arghh at Bush and NASA...

[Sea Skimmer]

I blame NASA its self for continuing to insist that the Space Shuttle is viable. Until a replacement craft is ready for production, we can use normal rocket boosters and fuck the ISS in the meanwhile, all the money being spent on the shuttle go could to protects like this and new probes.

[Ra]

The ISS was the worst mistake of NASA history. I mean, they expected an international effort, but since it is basically a NASA effort, the other countries freeload off of NASA. After all, we pay for the Russian components of that station as well as our own, and the proposed ESA and Japanese modules haven't even been built. I say let this rattletrap fall out of orbit. We don't need it, and it isn't making any contributions to science. All it does is suck up funds and *gasp* provide housing for two or three men. This money could better be used in not only keeping Voyager and Hubble around, but also in building a more capable Hubble replacement. Hubble can see near the edge of the known universe, who knows what a better replacement could see?
Coming up with these bold new "visions" and slashing the budget are signs of a real problem: this is just more of the same. NASA said it would be sending Humans to Mars back in the early '90's, IIRC. Have we gotten any closer to Mars? No. The chances of a Mars mission before 2050 are close to nil, especially with Dubya unwilling to provide the money to even sustain current programs, let alone begin new ones.
If I had any say, I'd begin construction of a series of new "super-probes", ones that are much larger and more capable than any previously. Ion drives were pioneered on earlier NASA probes, why not build a large ion-drive probe to follow up on the Pioneer X? This is the one that is encountering the strange anomalies in deep space. With the ion drive, this new probe could get there faster than the rocket-driven Pioneers could.
This anomaly is very strange, and the potential for scientific discovery is immense. Problem is, Dubya disagrees.
Manned space technology has stagnated for the last forty years, give it up for awhile. The data and experience gained by these large ion-drive probes could be a prelude to construction of manned probes again, say in 2050. Ion drive, and the theoretical plasma drives, have great potential. Again, if I had any say, the ISS and shuttle would lose funding, not the vital deep-space exploration missions.

[Il Saggiatore]

Are you aware both Voyager probes are being pushed off course by something that our current models of physics and/or the solar system doesn't account for?

I thought the anomaly wasn't attributed to the Voyager probes?

Study of the anomalous acceleration of Pioneer 10 and 11 (Anderson et al., Phys. Rev. D 65, 082004 (2002)).

Our previous analyses of radio Doppler and ranging data from distant spacecraft in the solar system indicated that an apparent anomalous acceleration is acting on Pioneer 10 and 11, with a magnitude a_P~8×10–8 cm/s^2, directed towards the Sun. Much effort has been expended looking for possible systematic origins of the residuals, but none has been found. A detailed investigation of effects both external to and internal to the spacecraft, as well as those due to modeling and computational techniques, is provided. We also discuss the methods, theoretical models, and experimental techniques used to detect and study small forces acting on interplanetary spacecraft. These include the methods of radio Doppler data collection, data editing, and data reduction. There is now further data for the Pioneer 10 orbit determination. The extended Pioneer 10 data set spans 3 January 1987 to 22 July 1998. (For Pioneer 11 the shorter span goes from 5 January 1987 to the time of loss of coherent data on 1 October 1990.) With these data sets and more detailed studies of all the systematics, we now give a result of a_P = (8.74±1.33)×10–8 cm/s^2. (Annual-diurnal variations on top of a_P, that leave a_P unchanged, are also reported and discussed.)

[SyntaxVorlon]

To play the devil's advocate, or jesus freak's advocate more like, the article makes it seem like the Earth-Sun research division's budget is being cut, not NASA. I would be highly surprised if NASA could run on $73 million dollars.

[Ra]

That's a good point, as a single shuttle launch costs over US$100 million, IIRC. The total NASA budget (I have no sources, just a guestimate) is probably in the billions.
Even so, we still don't need to be cutting the Voyager program while the wasteful ISS program continues to such in funds like an orbiting maelstrom.

[Firefox]

[quote="Il Saggiatore"][/quote]

The excerpt makes no mention of the Voyager probes.

[Darth Servo]

but slashing the NASA budget as a whole, I don't agree with. Bad Bush!

What do you expect. He needs the money to pay for all his second term wars.

[tharkûn]

1. Bush has actually increased NASA's budget - to the tune of 6%.
2. There already is a a replacement for Hubble in the works: The James Webb Space telescope. It will have a friggen 6.5 m mirror.

Voyager, meh I could take it or leave it. Frankly at those distances all you are sensing is the transition from one type of almost complete vacuum to another type of almost complete vacuum. I'm sure any compotent astronomer can come up with enough 4 million dollar projects to eat up the NASA budget, so at some point choices have to be made. It is far more important to me to open up space exploration be advancing new technologies than to look at small bits of the cosmos. Depending on what the real oppurtunity cost of funding this I might well support canning it; certainly if that money has to come out of something developing nuclear spacecraft or reducing lift costs it is jettisoned in heartbeat.

[Il Saggiatore]

The excerpt makes no mention of the Voyager probes.

That's why I quoted you, Firefox: the anomaly is observed in the Pioneer probes, not in the Voyager probes.
Though there seem to be anomalies in other probes in the Outer Solar System (but I do not have any information handy).

[Chmee]

Didn't Bush just proposed massive spending increases for exploration?

No, see. He approved a vision for exploration. Then his administration told Nasa to make do with alot less. But the vision is intact!

On the money, this is the whole neocon agenda for every branch of the government except defense .... propose 'reforms' that will drive the agency into the ground, because they don't believe government should be involved in the first place. Social Security, NASA, health care ..... the whole agenda is to bankrupt government and destroy the 'socialist' functions they hate, all the while spinning it as 'reform'.

Business as usual at the government that's all about bending over for big business whenever possible.

[Lord Zentei]

Didn't Bush just proposed massive spending increases for exploration?

No, see. He approved a vision for exploration. Then his administration told Nasa to make do with alot less. But the vision is intact!

On the money, this is the whole neocon agenda for every branch of the government except defense .... propose 'reforms' that will drive the agency into the ground, because they don't believe government should be involved in the first place. Social Security, NASA, health care ..... the whole agenda is to bankrupt government and destroy the 'socialist' functions they hate, all the while spinning it as 'reform'.

Business as usual at the government that's all about bending over for big business whenever possible.

This is an oversimplification. Moreover, the claim that the right beleives that government should not be involved in NASA is blatantly false, as the Administration has stated it's intent of returning to the moon and sending a mission to Mars.

It's not that I approve of spending cuts for NASA projects (particularly ones with such high cost-benefit profiles as Voyager), but do try to paint with a less broad brush.

Incidentally, it was the Clinton administration that toned down the ISS project down from levels where it might have been useful and failed to initiate a viable research programme to replace the shuttle; the Venture Star project was overly ambitious and when it failed, there were no replacements.

We're going to Mars (so we can drill for oil).

We're going to cut funding for Hubble, so we don't have to see all this deep-space bullshit that gets in the way of believing in Jesus Christ as Personal Savior, or contradicting YECs, or other silliness.

Same for Voyager. Space is really, really far away. It's black and it's cold and it's full of stars. That's all Creationists need to know. Oh, and God Made It.

Stupid. It's all the rage. Be the first on your block to be stupid.

Far be it from me to play the Bush apologist, but I submit that blank bullets and strawmen are not really constructive. Dubuya makes enough mistakes that we dont really need them anyway, right?

[VT-16]

We´ll most likely see privately sponsored, manned ventures to other planets with this rate. They can increase the stakes for every new competition. Only problem is accepting the fact that some people COULD die during these testflights and that it will take alot of money, risks and gambles. That didn´t stop the development of the aircraft, it shouldn´t be allowed to halt the development of spacecraft, either.

[Firefox]

That's why I quoted you, Firefox: the anomaly is observed in the Pioneer probes, not in the Voyager probes.
Though there seem to be anomalies in other probes in the Outer Solar System (but I do not have any information handy).

Ahah. You gave the impression that you were trying to contradict my assumption that the Voyager probes were not affected, as Nitram had claimed otherwise.

[Il Saggiatore]

That's why I quoted you, Firefox: the anomaly is observed in the Pioneer probes, not in the Voyager probes.
Though there seem to be anomalies in other probes in the Outer Solar System (but I do not have any information handy).

Ahah. You gave the impression that you were trying to contradict my assumption that the Voyager probes were not affected, as Nitram had claimed otherwise.

I should have added an "Indeed" before quoting the paper.

[Ma Deuce]

That's a good point, as a single shuttle launch costs over US$100 million

$600 million actually: Easily 2½-3 times the launch costs of an expendable launcher of similar payload capacity, like the Delta IV Heavy...