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NASA Extends Juno Jupiter Mission By Three Years (gizmodo.com)
The Juno spacecraft currently orbiting Jupiter was supposed to end its mission by crashing into the gas giant next month. Not anymore! From a report: It turns out the scientific mission will be extended through at least 2021 so it can meet its goals, as Business Insider first reported yesterday. This will delay the probe's dramatic demise for at least a few years. "NASA has approved Juno to continue through 2022 to finish all of our originally planned science," Scott Bolton, Juno's principle investigator from the Southwest Research Institute, told Gizmodo in an email. "The orbits are longer than planned, and that is why Juno needs more time to gather our planned scientific measurements." Juno departed Earth for Jupiter in 2011 and arrived at the gas giant on July 4, 2016. Since then, it's sent back a host of valuable data that has revealed new insights into Jupiter, like the depth of the red spot, three-dimensional views of the gas below its surface, and how its auroras work.
For science
No reason to waste a perfectly good spacecraft.
Maybe there will be another comet collision to observe. A probe in orbit would come in handy.
The expensive part of the mission is already behind it. Since the science return so far has been excellent, why not monitor it for another three years to get bonus data?
Juno was originally budgeted for $700M in 2003 and the full cost is now estimated to be $1.1B. That is not much of an overrun when you correct for inflation, and for added capabilities that were not part of the original budget.
Overall, the cost is about $3 per citizen. I am happy to pay my share, even if it means I have to skip a Starbuck's latte and brew a cup of tea in the microwave at work instead (Earl Grey, hot).
Early in the mission, the engines failed fire to reduce the orbit size. Subsequent engine tests would interfere with and overlap with the optimum observation time point of the orbit so they had to choose between debugging the engine glitch OR observing Jupiter.
They decided to observe rather than tinker with the engine, in part because if the engine were bad, it could muck up the orbit further. Thus, the left the orbit larger than planned, and that's why they want more time to get the same number of close-passes as originally planned.
Table-ized A.I.
If NASA is like other government agencies, they will have to go without paperclips, copy paper, toner, pencils, and other basic supplies in order to afford this. DoD excepted, of course. When satan is your president, you gotta build bombs above all else.
LOL@vword: nations
Agreed, this is one of the things I'm really happy my tax money is paying for. I'll never understand those people who get upset and call exploring space a waste of time and money, exploration is one of the must human things you can do.
You know, however, that Earl Grey is not the best tea for your health?
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
You know, however, that Earl Grey is not the best tea for your health?
Only if you consume in excess, or combine with certain pharmaceutical drugs. Even then, it is no worse than grapefruit juice.
Propellant is usually the reason these missions are forced to end. If they're not out, or dangerously close to it (they need some reserved to send it into the planet), then by all means, keep the lights on as long as possible! It's not like there's another one on the way.
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
For anyone wanting more info:
Juno and The New Jupiter: What Have We Learned So Far?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6Joupv6f-M
As it happens, I viewed the Europa Report last night.
I'm not sure whether they revised Europa to have more atmosphere (by a factor of about 7 billion) or they revised water to have an entirely different triple point (with Jupiter so close, who knows?)
I guess the main theme of the movie is just how quickly all that intensive drilling wears off during a long, monotonous space flight with inadequate radiation shields (the audience can only presume the crew went through some kind of training regime, even in the quick & dirty, bottom line corporate context).
You also have to question their psychological preparation. Their first response to any difficult task is to immediately lose all track of time/safety (unless someone is constantly nattering at them through their helmet radio, if these ever work).
Hiding from Jupiterâ(TM)s Radiation — January 2009
The Europe Report in real (ish) life: we came, we saw, ventured ten feet out the door, discovered that our helmet radios were a steaming POS, immediately cancelled the EV, packed up our things, and returned home again, as we were comprehensively trained to do.
Better luck next time.
With humans on board, every milestone is preceded by ten prudent abortions.
I can't recall a time when I wasn't firmly in Dyson's astrochicken camp.
Ever space movie tries to divert attention to the heroic, and every time they only manage to make the human crew look like an even bigger liability than I thought before.
The other option is one-way tickets. Which is actually way more believable than this cowboy crap.
Within fifty years, The Valhalla Implant could lie within easy reach. Plus, having redirected all that sexual energy (with a pink protein extracted from spawning salmon) it would also resolve the extra long voyage skoodlypooping-prohibition group sulk.
Nerdfighter CAPTCHA dictionary
I don't believe they know the exact cause such that assigning blame is premature. As I mentioned, further testing would have risked data collection.
Couple of typo corrections of mine:
the engines failed to fire to reduce the orbit size...
Thus, they left the orbit larger...
Table-ized A.I.
I know who you are. Expect a memo.