[FPSPACE] Steve Squyres fears further cuts to Mars plans

[LARRY KLAES]

http://www.theithacajournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080314/NEWS01/803140355/-1/&source=nletter-news

Lawmakers criticize funding for NASA science programs

Cornell's Squyres fears further cuts to Mars plans

By Eun Kyung Kim

Gannett News Service

WASHINGTON — President Bush has failed to back up his broad vision to revive 
the nation's interest in space exploration with adequate funding or even 
public support, a leading scientist told lawmakers Thursday.

“The money that was promised to execute the mission has not been provided, 
and it's hard to say that the vision has generated much excitement, 
particularly among the young, who are expected to benefit the most,” said 
Lennard Fisk, chairman of the National Research Council Space Studies Board.

The 2004 vision outlined by Bush included plans to retire the aging space 
shuttle, return Americans to the moon and explore Mars through robotic and 
human missions.

“I encourage you to ask whether there was a flaw in the vision that we did 
not realize at the time,” Fisk told members of the House Science and 
Technology Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics.
“The vision is about the future, extending our civilization into space, but 
there is little of immediate concern to the taxpayer.”

The congressional hearing, which focused specifically on NASA's space and 
Earth science programs, was the latest held to examine the proposed 2009 
budget Bush has recommended for the agency.

Steven Squyres, an astronomy professor at Cornell University, expressed 
specific concern about the agency's Mars exploration program, which includes 
the scheduled launch of several spacecraft over the next decade.

“The budget doesn't appear to include enough funds to carry out the 
mission,” he said, an observation he based on a study he and more than a 
dozen engineers and scientists conducted recently.

“Most of the news in this budget is good for solar system exploration,” 
Squyres said. “If you can fix the one serious problem — the cuts to the Mars 
program — you can make it a space science program that the nation will be 
proud of.”

Committee chairman Mark Udall called NASA's science programs the “crown 
jewels” of the agency but expressed his longstanding concern over whether 
they have been adequately funded.

“NASA's challenging new science initiatives are to be built on a budget that 
increases by only one percent through 2011 — and that assumes only 
inflationary increases at best in the years beyond that,” said Udall, 
D-Colo. “There will be little new money. Instead, there will be a continuing 
need to transfer funds across the science accounts to support each new 
initiative — an approach some might call ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul.'”

Rep. Tom Feeney, the panel's top Republican, said both the president and 
Congress often are eager to assign NASA new missions yet avoid providing the 
money necessary to achieve them.

“The result of our actions is that NASA's resources are shrinking in real 
terms while the agency is charged with maintaining America's preeminence as 
a space faring nation,” said Feeney.