NASA Proposes Ending Voyager

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."

Every Million Counts

[BlueTooth]

slashing the division's 2006 budget by nearly one-third -- from $75 million to $53 million.

Well, I guess every million counts. I wonder how that $4 million per year is spent? Could they go into a cost saving
mode (below the 10 full time staff they have working with the probe now) where they basically just collected data from the probe and stashed it for later study or does this thing need
to be actively managed to remain useful?

Re:Every Million Counts

[stecoop]

http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/ [nasa.gov]

Contributions:
Both spacecraft are still going strong and are returning valuable science data. Each Voyagers' cosmic ray detector, magnetometer, plasma wave detector and low-energy charged particle detector all still operational. In addition, the Ultraviolet Spectrometer on Voyager 1 and the Plasma Science instrument on Voyager 2 continue to return data. Both spacecraft are expected to continue to operate and send back valuable data until at least the year 2020.

The mission curr

Re:Every Million Counts

[swv3752]

Average salary for PhD Physicists is $78k, Applied Math PhD is $90k. Factor in health benefits and taxes and it is easy to see a million or more eaten up by salaries.

Re:Every Million Counts

[Rei]

4 mil for 10 employees on a project like this sounds about right.

10 employees, all likely with PhDs, underpaid (like NASA tends to), would be perhaps 65k/yr each ->650k$. Benefits and personel costs will at least double this, probably pushing up somewhere around 1.5m$. IT costs, office rent, power, and other "basics" will put this somewhere around 2.5 m$, possibly more.

Of course, I'd suspect that the most expensive part will be rent on their comm equipment. Here's where I wish I had my partner, who is studying to be an actuary, with me. Your communications hardware will probably cost somewhere around 50m$ in terms of capital costs, with operating costs of perhaps 1m$/yr. Lets assume a repayment time similar to the operating time, and put that number at 30 years. Lots of assumptions here, I know ;) Your loan repayment will probably be something like 125m$; that'd be around 5m$/yr for total comm hardware costs. We're up to 7.5m$. Add in any other hardware costs they might encounter (for example, rent on supercomputing work to process the data, or whatnot), additional services that they need to pay for from other departments, travel, unlisted managerial overhead, etc, it's not too hard to come up with 10m$/yr.

Re:Every Million Counts

[Rei]

Whoops, I was calculating for 10m$/yr. 4m$/yr? Heck, that's pretty cheap. Thinking about it, they're probably not using 100% of the time from a big radio receiver, so that probably explains the discrepancy. And their people might not all be Phds, and they might have lower rent.

what you could do instead

[phats garage]

is just record the data to some iomega zipdri-zipdri-zipdri uh never mind.

Re:Every Million Counts

[vsprintf]

Your communications hardware will probably cost somewhere around 50m$ in terms of capital costs, with operating costs of perhaps 1m$/yr. Lets assume a repayment time similar to the operating time, and put that number at 30 years. Lots of assumptions here, I know ;) Your loan repayment will probably be something like 125m$; that'd be around 5m$/yr for total comm hardware costs. We're up to 7.5m$. Add in any other hardware costs they might encounter (for example, rent on supercomputing work to process the data, or whatnot) . . .

What on Earth (or not on Earth) are you talking about? NASA does not take out loans for comm equipment - it is paid for up front through appropriated funds or budgeted yearly as a cost for payments to foreign ground stations. Nor do they use rented supercomputers to process telemetry. Landsat data is processed by commodity Linux hardware/software. EO-1 data is processed to Level 0 on a freakin' DEC Alpha box.

Despite the stereotype that some people like to present, NASA does not generally throw money around like a drunken sailor. Once the data is captured, processing can be done on anything with enough bits. The missing monetary piece is mostly the cost of data capture and storage/archival of the raw and processed data - it's not free, especially when you take the mandated backups into account. This is a subject that is going to bite us more often in the future. How much effort and cost are we willing to expend to protect data, especially historic data? The archives are growing every year, and the cost goes up, generally borne by federal agencies, including NASA.

Re:Every Million Counts

[crumley]

Much of the budget probably goes to paying for time on the large antennaes needed to pick up Voyagers' weak radio signals. Collecting signals isn't cheap evening for Earth-orbitting spacecraft - for Voyager it has got to be quite spendy.

A joke, surely ...

[Morgaine]

I'm assuming that this is simple humour, or even a remnant from April 1st.

$22 million is pocket change for a huge number of private americans, let alone for thousands of corporations. I just cannot believe that a project with such a huge public profile (even non-nerds have heard of Voyager) could be axed to save crumbs.

Re:A joke, surely ...

[JWW]

That's why part of this is a ploy. Its like the School Disctrict in your tow saying they need to raise property taxes to fund everything, because if you don't then something will be cut. Then they always say, well I guess well have to cut the travel budget for sports, or well have to eliminate all band programs.

Its an attempt to pull at people's emotions to try to get the extra money. And don't get me wrong its not misleading or untrue that cuts would need to be made, but the programs used to illistrate the debate are always the most popular ones. Just like right here.

Re:A joke, surely ...

[rw2]

That's why part of this is a ploy. Its like the School Disctrict in your tow saying they need to raise property taxes to fund everything, because if you don't then something will be cut.

Call that bluff at your childrens educational peril. My town did, we lost 24 teachers. We're voting on another one today which will cost us another 36 if it doesn't pass. Oh, and our "ignorance is bliss" town is also refusing to replace the forty year old (when the town at 12,000 people) library with a facility capable of serving the 40K that live here now.

Maybe sometimes it is hard to figure out if the boy is crying wolf, but sometimes it's worth it to find out before assuming that it's just a cheap ploy by a bunch of whiny teachers who want to buy another vacation house in Aruba.

Re:A joke, surely ...

[glockenspieler]

But when those people who weren't properly taught by the badly-funded schools and libraries are robbing stores, making meth, and doing other things...

At least they seemed to learn some chemistry...

Re:A joke, surely ...

[solios]

In my home skool district, they cut everything ELSE in order to keep the sports and music programs alive. If you didn't play basketball or sing in chorus, you were NOTHING, and it didn't matter what your interests were - there was no funding to cover them. Funding for art was cut year after year after year - to the point where the single art teacher was split between the high school and the elementary school. Art wasn't offered as an option after 9th grade - if you were, gods forbid, good at art and not

Re:A joke, surely ...

[vsprintf]

$22 million is pocket change for a huge number of private americans, let alone for thousands of corporations. I just cannot believe that a project with such a huge public profile (even non-nerds have heard of Voyager) could be axed to save crumbs.

NASA does not have much discretion over how to spend allocated funds. Congress pretty much tells them how to spend it because it is all earmarked by our nasty pork-for-my-district budget process, and if the President convinces Congress to follow his budget guid

Re:Every Million Counts

[Keeper]

I'd be willing to bet that significant portions of that budget are for leasing dish time.

Re:Every Million Counts

[JustOK]

Maybe we should cut them back to basic cable instead of dish.

Re:Every Million Counts

[killjoe]

They should keep things the way they are there is so much more to know [nasa.gov].

The war in Iraq costs us 5.8 BILLION every MONTH [military.com]

The overall defense spending is 511 billion a year.

TO keep this project alive for another decade would cost only 40 million. That's like a half day of war.

Bill Gates could come up with that money by checking all his couches and jacket pockets for gods sake.

Man our nation sure has messed up priorities.

Re:Every Million Counts

[cashman73]

Didn't some group of nerds [saveenterprise.com] just raise $3.14 million in an attempt to save a mediocre Star Trek series from going off the air? I can think of a better use for that money ... heck, we're only about $1 million away from $4.2 million already!

Screw Enterprise!

Re:Every Million Counts

[jangobongo]

Maybe it would be better if the Voyager program were funded by a private foundation. A consortium of colleges could share the expenses and study the data. Then the program wouldn't be in danger due to lack of government funding.

This whole issue reminds me of a dilemma that I suffer when I go to a store to pick up a few things. The next thing I know, my cart is full and I think, "I'm spending too much." So, what do I do? Do I put back the less expensive, "on sale" items (which probably won't be there the next time I go back to the store) or the more expensive I-want-it-even-though-I-don't-need-it stuff.

The funny thing is, I usually want to put back the bargains first, saving myself only small percentage of the total.

I find that cutting out the nickel-and-dime stuff doesn't really save you a whole lot in the long run.

Basic Science!

[BWJones]

So, this is part of the fundamental problem of moving NASA's focus to entirely manned programs. Scientific projects like Hubble, and robotic exploration are getting shorted because the current administration want to put man on Mars. This of course is right in line with their strategy to remove basic science funding from the picture in favor of projects that have immediate payoff. An unfortunate and ignorant way to view things, but in character with the POTUS. Do the analysis and actually look at the potential scientific payoff from basic science research like the Voyager program, Hubble, basic science support of computer science research that is being cut by DARPA, bioscience research that is being cut in favor of military research or moved into weapons research, reduction in NIH funding etc....etc....etc....

This crowd especially will appreciate the payoffs that basic science research provides. Without basic science research, we would not have the Internet as we know it, we would not have personal computers, and for those that like the games, we most certainly would not have computer graphics as much of the pretty graphics you rely on arose out of basic science mathematical research.

It worries me because in many places in American society (including Slashdot), I see an movement away from intellectual pursuit and a devaluation of those who we have relied on to make the United States a pre-eminent force in international science.

Re:Basic Science!

[hungrygrue]

So, this is part of the fundamental problem of moving NASA's focus to entirely manned programs. Scientific projects like Hubble, and robotic exploration are getting shorted because the current administration want to put man on Mars.

Science bad. Entertainment good. This administration is not exactly known for its support of science, or knowledge and truth for that matter. especially when it doesn't agree with the administration agenda [guardian.co.uk]

Re:Basic Science!

[drinkypoo]

I see this issue something like the issue of automakers making sports or muscle cars. There's more than one reason for them to do this. The first and most obvious reason is that capitalism is about making money and people will obviously buy them. They cost little more to make than any other car, but sell for much more.

However, there is a second reason to make really fast cars; if you have some really fantastic vehicles, it makes people think all your vehicles must be better because you're capable of making a race car.

There is also a third reason, which is that the knowledge gained while doing the flashy stuff trickles down to your practical applications. In racing this tendency is caused by competition. We haven't had competition for so long we have become slackers.

Basically I think that we cannot abandon manned space travel and exploration, not even temporarily, in order to hold the public's interest and get them to give money to NASA. On the other hand, can we abandon the shuttle already, and go back to using rockets? Given that it would be cheaper, it seems stupid to do anything else. Also, can we build nuclear rockets please? They are probably at least as safe and environmentally friendly overall as burning several tons of rocket fuel and would be able to lift useful payloads so that we can begin the development of space.

Re:Nuclear rockets

[lgw]

Orion is a different thing from a nuclear rocket. A nuclear rocket uses a fission pile to generate energy, which is then used to heat a propellant to great temperature, expelling it at a higher velocity than chemical rockets.

The Russians had a very clever nuclear rocket (liquid metal IIRC) which used the same material for moderator, coolant, and propellant.

This in turn is different from ion drives, which (to oversimplify) use a particle accellerator for thrust. Ion drives have the best ISP of anything (most acceleration per wieght of fuel) but a poor thrust-to-mass ratio, so good for interplanetary travel but you can't get off the ground with one. Nuclear rockets don't have the ISP of ion drives, but they can be better than chemical roclets and still get off the ground.

Re:Basic Science!

[discstickers]

This of course is right in line with their strategy to remove basic science funding from the picture in favor of projects that have immediate payoff.

Right, because we'll have a man on Mars next year.

Re:Basic Science!

[sconeu]

Reminds me of the Stephen Baxter's novel Voyage [amazon.com], where after the Apollo landings, NASA concentrates on a manned Mars mission.

Everything is sacrificed on the altar of Mars. There was no Pioneer, no Voyager, no Hubble, etc...

Re:Basic Science!

[ScentCone]

Without basic science research, we would not have the Internet as we know it

Lest we forget, that was basic research in military/defense-oriented vein. Or, really, technological development to better facilitate the researchers in that area. A lot of people at the time protested every dollar spent in that area as being philosophically bankrupt. Still, here we are publicly using it to have largely the same conversation.

For what it's worth: I think they should find a happy medium and spend more for a couple of years to automate some of the Voyager data collection, and thus be able to throttle back that human time through 2015. Whatever tools they develop or adapt for that purpose would probably help out in other areas, too. That's definately better than pulling the plug, and we have a better chance of being aware of when Voyager becomes Veeger.

Re:Basic Science!

[pegasustonans]

While I agree with you to a large extent, I also believe that putting people on Mars opens up entirely new realms for scientific discovery and inquiry. The real problem here is that NASA is not getting enough funding in general. If the government just siphoned off a small percentage of the defense budget to NASA, it would have a massively positive impact on all science and exploration initiatives in the space program.

Re:Basic Science!

[Rei]

Amen. Comparing NASA's budget to the DoD's is like looking at an ant standing next to a human - especially when you consider that a lot of military expenditures aren't included (veterans benefits aren't included, wars are all "supplimental", nuclear weapons are in the DoE, most national debt was incurred to pay for military activity, etc)

Of course we need a military. I'd say "of course we need a strong military" as well. But spending almost half of the world's total, while our nation's scientific organizations get the scraps? That's wrong.

Re:Basic Science!

[Zordak]

nuclear weapons are in the DoE

I'll have to call you on that one. The "Physics Package" (or more scientifically, the part that goes kaboom) is DoE. Everything else -- including ground systems, launch vehicles, delivery mechanisms, support personnel, even the fuze that tells it when to go kaboom -- is very much DoD.

Re:Basic Science!

[DerekLyons]

Amen. Comparing NASA's budget to the DoD's is like looking at an ant standing next to a human - especially when you consider that a lot of military expenditures aren't included (veterans benefits aren't included, wars are all "supplimental", nuclear weapons are in the DoE, most national debt was incurred to pay for military activity, etc)

Over the past forty years 'social' spending has historically been from three to five times larger than 'military' spending. (Even the current costs of the Iraq war only

Re:Basic Science!

[DerekLyons]

How large our social spending really is is cleverly hidden. Much of it is sliced off the top of incoming tax dollars, what's left becomes the dollars that are 'budgeted', the providing a misleading indication of how much money is going where.

Really, gosh, you'd think that 'secret' 'off-the-top' skim by the godless homosexual judge-loving liberals would have been the first thing the [strike]Chosen Race[/strike] the Bush Administration would have shitcanned.

Why would you think so? The Adminstration doesn

Following in Dad's footsteps

[SethJohnson]

During Bush Sr.'s tenure, we also lost the Superconducting Super Collider [hep.net] in Waxahachie, Texas. Another Basic Science project that just wasn't sexy enough to fund.

Could a grass-roots project be launched?

[sgant]

I'm not talking about donating cash, but donating time/equipment.

I mean, Voyager is out there right, it's still sending data back no matter what. If NASA cancels the project, the data will still be coming back...I mean, they don't send a janitor out there to switch it off.

So is it so out of the question that people get together some dishes...probably cheap ones laying around that the small digital dishes put out to pasture...and grid them together to get the signal. THEN collect the data? Is that at all possible?

Maybe

[jd]

I'd consider it a definite possibility. A large number of individuals with relatively small radio dishes could be linked up as a very large interferometary array.

Such an array would give you enough resolution for the job. The collecting area wouldn't be so hot, but provided you had the resolution AND provided there wasn't much else in that direction, it might be doable.

The probe that landed on Titan was designed to broadcast only as far as the Cassini probe. The signal wasn't pointed at Earth, was inten

Re:Basic Science!

[Waffle Iron]

Your a bunch of idiots, a new and better probe is coming, Voyager isn't needed anymore.

Yeah, we've come up with a slightly better space probe. Let's dump the one that's out there working now, and our shiny new probe will be on the scene to take over the job in just 25 short years. It'll be worth the wait, I promise!

Re:Basic Science!

[MagicDude]

I'm positive its funding won't be cut right when it gets to the edge of the solar system. Honest...

Great Investment Opportunity

[malus]

If fans of Enterprise can scrape up money to try and save a show, surely there is no
problem getting a few thousand geeks to "buy" Voyager from NASA.

GWB talks about this great "Ownership Society", well, here we go!
I, for one, would pay a few bucks to own a peice of history.

My great-great-great grandkids will be safe when Vger comes back because
they own it. Vger wouldn't kill it's owners, would it??

Re:Great Investment Opportunity

[scovetta]

Does anyone have a clue as to the (very approximate) size of the /. crowd? If we're talking 100k+, then would you pay $40/year for the next 10 years to keep Voyager alive?

Re:Great Investment Opportunity

[AKAImBatman]

Does anyone have a clue as to the (very approximate) size of the /. crowd?

See that number next to your name? That's your userid. Those userids *are* sequential, and started at (wait for it...) 1. With that in mind, run around and find the highest userid you can (I've see over 800,000 myself) and then you'll have a "very approximate" idea of how large the Slashdot crowd is.

Re:Great Investment Opportunity

[Anonymous Crowhead]

scroll down to the middle of this list and you might revise your thinking on uids vs actual people [slashdot.org]

Re:Great Investment Opportunity

[johnjay]

That seems like a high estimate for active users, I'd divide by a higher factor. But, for the sake of argument, let's start with that...

If every active member contributed, it'd cost people $20/year to keep the Voyager.
If only 10% contributed, you're up to $200/yr. Maybe it could be made more palatable by saying $16 month. Hey! That really IS "for the cost of a cup of coffee a day..."
I think a 1% enrollment rate is more likely than 10%--people aren't that generous, but it's not worth doing every calculation

Re:Great Investment Opportunity

[Nos.]

The question becomes, how is the 4 million being spent? I can't see there being a lot of equipment upkeep involved, just some receiving equipment. I wonder how much course correction if any is being done. I guess what I'm getting at, is could this be something that could be run like open source with the exception of the receiving equipment? If there is no data being sent to voyager, then maintenance of the receiving equipment could be the only cost. Suppose this equipment could be maintained, and setup

Re:Great Investment Opportunity

[themoodykid]

For much, much less than the cost of a cup of coffee a day, you too could help keep a fledgling space program alive. Every month, you will receive a letter from a scientist updating you on how the program is doing along with a photograph of the spacecraft. You can make a difference in the space program's life. Call today.

Re:Great Investment Opportunity

[XFilesFMDS1013]

Well, if movies and television have taught me anything, the saying goes "If you've built it, it'll kill you."

Or turn you into this [borec.cz], but that only happened once.

Re:Great Investment Opportunity

[Ironsides]

If fans of Enterprise can scrape up money to try and save a show, surely there is no problem getting a few thousand geeks to "buy" Voyager from NASA.

You may be interested in this [navy.mil]then. It's about how the country's youth saved the USS Constitution. Sounds like you're proposing the same thing. Here's a quick summary:

School-aged children from all 50 states contributed their pennies to buy the sails that will be used during the July sail. The "Old Ironsides Pennies Campaign" led the nationwide effort tha

Re:Great Investment Opportunity

[amichalo]

Cheers to that!

let's see - if the Voyager is out of power in 2015, then there are about 10 yrs (x $4M = $40M in operating costs).

Isn't there a group of Universities (US and abroad) who would be able to fund 10 yrs of space probe research?

Between grants, endowments, and gifts from Alumni in scientific fields, four univiersities would have to (1) fund $1M each for ten years and (2) convince NASA and Congress to sell the project.

Why NOT?

Oh bugger...

[beh]

What a brilliant example of farsightedness on behalf of the Bush administration; or better, a brilliant example of the lack thereof. :-(

We want to have a manned mission to Mars, but we don't want any exploration of what else is out there in our solar system...

Spending billions of Dollars in the hunt for non-existent WMDs, instead of spending a couple of millions on the exploration of something that DOES exist. (I would think that all the extra congressional and presidential work in the Schiavo case probably cost more than what Voyager would cost for a year)

On the other hand - being European, I would wish ESA *had* funds like for the number of projects that NASA still has the money for...

I wish, someone would try and clue in politicians on both sides of the Atlantic!

I think, the Indians might be the ones doing it right - they are trying their first space missions, but unlike the others before, they are from the start trying to keep them on a tight budget (given that the country has a huge growth, but not too much "left-over" money for things like space programs). In a couple of decades, when India might be in a position to seriously fund space programs, their "budget" experience might really come in handy to make the most of their money for the space projects... Will they be the next big space nation and out-do the "modern" world (US, Europe, Russia, ...) in a decade or two?

Re:Oh bugger...

[BoomerSooner]

Fear sells in america. No one has vision anymore, it's purely politics and consumer spending that drive the U$A. Almighty Dollar, thy will be done...

Sad really, who knows if we would have become the world leader we (sort of) are today if previous administrations had been so blatant in repaying the people that put them in office (corporations, not the rural boobs that are losing their farm subsidies as we speak).

Re:Oh bugger...

[JohnFluxx]

>Fear sells in america. No one has vision anymore

This is what the BBC documentary "Power of Nightmares" said. To butcher a 5 hour documentary to a few lines, it said that governments used to have power by giving people visions and dreams. This was the liberal way. That failed however and now governments are using fear. The future will be a constant switch between the 2.
You can get the documentary on bittorrent. I highly recommend it.

Re:Oh bugger...

[freeweed]

It's also (essentially) the crux behind Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine. Say what you will about it otherwise, that part was spot-on.

"The Power of Nightmares" was an excellent documentary, btw. Some of it seems almost Davinci-Code-ish (ie: tinfoil hat), but let's face it:

When exactly will these "terror alerts" end? Or has the USA resigned itself to living in a perpetual state of terror forever? I guess my rock DOES keep tigers away...

No neo-con has ever been able to explain this to me - and sadly, this sort of thinking is moving into my country (Canada) as well. If we ever have our own 9/11, I shudder to think what this country will do. We've traditionally allowed our governments far more control of our lives than the USA as it is.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Oh bugger...

[twiddlingbits]

Will they be the next big space nation and out-do the "modern" world (US, Europe, Russia, ...) in a decade or two?..

NO. China will. They already have plans for a Moon Mission. They are using technology and know how they stole from the US and Russians. They have the money and they have the "national pride" factor as well. How far along they are in the program is questionable as it is run by the Chinese military and thus is off limits to reporters. If China does it India won't be far behind.

Everyone bitches

All part of the plan

[Elwood P Dowd]

What a brilliant example of farsightedness on behalf of the Bush administration; or better, a brilliant example of the lack thereof. :-(

You're wrong. This is a true example of the farsightedness of the Bush administration. They have progressives beat by leaps and bounds. Their long term goal is the destruction of all parts of the federal government that do not help their theo-fascist corporatist goals.

What do you think they were hoping for when they gave us tax breaks and massive budget deficits? This. This is what they were hoping for. Now we have a fiscal problem where none existed before, and must destroy valuable federal programs. This is their long term plan coming to fruition. Social security, medicare, and welfare are all going to die, and it's not because they're too expensive.

They also have a long term plan to stop individuals from using the court system. They do this for two reasons. One, they want less accountability for corporations, and second, because the lawyers that work for these individuals are some of the most significant donors to the Democratic party in Texas. So they can simultaneously destroy corporate accountability and the Democratic party in Texas.

The Bush administration is way, way more farsighted than you think. They just have different goals than you do. You want a stronger America. What do they want?

Re:Wow.

[Elwood P Dowd]

If I wanted to get modded up quickly, I wouldn't have said "theo-fascist corporatist". It makes me sound like I'm foaming at the mouth. But if I hadn't said it, it wouldn't have been as honest. And sometimes I am foaming at the mouth.

Re:All part of the plan

[vondo]

Sorry, but no. This is not a secret plan. Those who advise the Bush adminstration (like Grover Norquist, who is a frequent guest) have been very upfront that this is exactly what they want. Just do a search for Grover Norquist and "starve the beast." That's their name for what they want to do.

Re:All part of the plan

[Elwood P Dowd]

God, I love Grover Norquist. The Democratic Party is Toast [washingtonmonthly.com]:

This is good for the Republicans, if not the republic.

He just lays it right on the line. It's like reading Jonathan Swift, except he really wants to eat babies.

Re:Oh bugger...

[Cecil]

I wonder how much equipment is required to receive signals from the voyager?

Just a little [nasa.gov].

The Deep Space Network's 63 meter dishes were actually upgraded to 70 meter dishes specifically for the Voyager spacecraft around 1980. Access to the 70 meter dishes is hotly contested and likely ends up being more than a small fraction of that $4 million per year.

But I have high quality intel

[Anonymous Coward]

that says Osama Bin Laden is hiding past the heliopause, along with yellowcake nuclear material.

Star Trek can't be wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

I just don't see how the alien robot race will be able to rebuild VGER and send it back to us if they cancel the program.

The bluffing game

[A nonymous Coward]

Bush threatens to cut funds to show how tough he is.

NASA threatens to cut good programs to call his bluff.

Unfortunately, the Bushies have no sense of proportion and will be quite happy to carry thru with their cuts. It will be up to Congress to save these programs, but again, the Bushies are just stupid enough to let the program sink to show who's who.

trade offs

[crayz]

It's important to realize that cutting all those worthless scientific programs for the next decade will give us money to stay another 12-18 hours in Iraq

What a deal

Re:trade offs

[XFilesFMDS1013]

Why is this modded funny? It's not, it's scary. Because it's true.

Space? What about the war?

[Spy der Mann]

How many millions has president Bush spent in the War vs Iraq? How many lives?

I've stopped trying to understand these decisions at the gvt. level. They're just not logical.

Perfectly logical

[A nonymous Coward]

Bush is trying to undermine government. He and his ilk want to reduce government to one tenth its size. They know they can't do that directly; as much as people like to rail against the government, it's always against the other fella's programs, not their own. So instead, he is doing his best to bust the budget and make things so bad that it will have to shrink. At least that's their thinking. It is, as you might suspect, just as flawed as all their other thinking.

Why the war? Not just to finish dadd

Re:Perfectly logical

[Blakey Rat]

Paranoid a bit?

Re:Space? What about the war?

[KrackHouse]

Wow. I didn't vote for Bush but this site is getting out of hand. A "paltry" 4 million dollars? That money could buy a lot of engineers that could build great new things instead of maintaining something old.
I think most here would rather engage in a lifelong love fest with NASA than to consider starting a business that turns space into a tourist destination like Burt Ruttan has.
To someone in the middle, the left's rejection of the theory of economics is just as disturbing as the right's rejection o

Push em out, shove em out

[dada21]

Thankfully that's fewer tax dollars spent on a program that is easily funded by private dollars. We've seen numerous slashdot articles in recent months that prove that our public dollars should no longer be used for advancing scientific studies outside of our atmosphere.

I'd like to see Congress draft a few bills canceling the old laws on the books that prevent private companies from spending their dollars finding new ways to space.

Virgin Galactic, anyone?

Re:Push em out, shove em out

[Keeper]

Articles like what?

Closest thing I can think of is the whole X-prize thing, which succeeded in launching one person to the boundary of our atmosphere for a few seconds. That would put private industry about, oh, 40 years behind NASA ...

And don't even kid yourself into thinking that private industry will do dick for pure science -- everything private industry does has to have a dollar sign at the end of it. Launching a probe to the borders of our solarsystem to learn more about how everything works? No profit involved -- you'll never see a private company doing that. The companies trying to launch people into space? They're not doing it for the hell of it, or for scientific discovery; they're looking to be on the leading edge of "space tourism".

Re:Push em out, shove em out

[Rayonic]

And don't even kid yourself into thinking that private industry will do dick for pure science

Bringing down the cost of space flight will do "dick" for pure science? Giving NASA, or other independent research agencies, the ability to loft cargo into orbit for a fraction of the cost -- how does that not benefit us all? Not to mention all the other side-benefits that might arise.

Do you believe that Integrated Circiut technology should have been kept within NASA, instead of letting IBM, Motorola, Intel, e

too bad..

[TrippTDF]

BUT, NASA has a lot they have to balance right now... the ISS, gettin gthe shuttle back up, replacing the shuttle, and now, thanks to Bush, look at getting back to the moon and Mars (I think they are worth while, just not the way Bush has laid them out)... let's not forget the rovers, too.

There is some amazing data that might get lost, but you pick some programs to cut from that budget, while being expected to further new programs...

Or maybe we could sell it to the ESA, or even GIVE it to them?

Re:too bad..

[idlake]

but you pick some programs to cut from that budget

Easy: cancel the ISS, cancel the entire shuttle program, and cancel manned trips to moon and Mars. NASA would then have plenty of money to do real science and to work in peace on better propulsion systems.

Revisit manned space travel in another decade or two, when we have the technology to do a good job at it, developed as part of unmanned space travel and advances in other fields.

Gone is Gone

[OECD]

Canceling this project means saving almost nothing compared to the hundreds of millions of dollars spent so far.

The amount of money spent so far has nothing to do with whether we should spend more money. Spent money is gone, no matter what we do. New expenditures should be evaluated on their own merits.

I would agree, however, that this seems like a project worth continuing.

Re:Gone is Gone

[Skeezix]

Being a poker player, and realizing that poker mirrors life, I have to disagree. In poker there is a concept called being "pot committed." If you have invested a large amount in a hand and then face the decision to call one more small bet in order to get a showdown, even if at this point you are pretty darn sure you have the worst hand, it is worth it because at this point you're getting a small price to potentially gain a lot. Now the analogy isn't perfect. It's not like if NASA pumps another 4 million

Sunk Cost Fallacy

[rcw-work]

In other words, that "spent money" isn't all gone. It's out there in space.

Sounds like you're actually agreeing with him.

BTW, this is known as the sunk [wikipedia.org] cost [skepdic.com] fallacy [bplans.com].

Re:Gone is Gone

[freeweed]

The amount of money spent so far has nothing to do with whether we should spend more money. Spent money is gone, no matter what we do.

Yes and no.

The hundreds of millions already spent got us a half-decent probe out to the heliopause. A small amount of money more might bring us some pretty cool data. If NASA cancels this, and we ever again want to explore the heliopause, we're looking at hundreds of millions *more*, and decades of waiting, just to get another probe out there.

Smart.... REAL smart...

[FortKnox]

... Just forget about it and let it cruise away... and then when people encounter 'V-Ger' in a couple years, they'll be clueless as to what it is...

Doesn't NASA watch movies?!?!

Mars?

[MilenCent]

But... but... b-but...

I thought we were going to Mars [msn.com]! Time for NASA to work that "better and cheaper" policy into overdrive, I'd say.

Are we getting any good science from voyager?

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess I haven't been keeping up on the journals. What have been the great new discoveries?

A question on budgets

[tkrotchko]

Didn't Bush last year propose sending humans to the moon and then mars? And his follow up budget proposes budget cuts to accomplish this?

Did someone explain to those guys that Jules Verne's book is Science Fiction?

Re:A question on budgets

[ClosedSource]

tkrotchko: "Mr. President, Jules Verne's book is Science Fiction"

Bush: "Who's Jules Verne?"

Why not auction this off on ebay?

[randall_burns]

Or basically sell off the project to an appropriate "qualified purchaser". Japan wants to get their space program going-perhaps their government would like to take over the Voyager project. The EU might be another option here. For that matter, some of the oil rich states have some interest in basic science. Even Singapore could take this one on-it would be nice world-class project for a city-state. Gates or Ellison(for that matter most of the richest 500 people in the US) could do this if they were seriously interested in space. I can imagine some of the larger private foundations might be interested to.

Following Paramount's Example...

[kulakovich]

First Voyager, then Enterprise, now Voyager again.

sigh...

kulakovich

Open it up to the amateurs?

[viva_fourier]

Just a quick not-well-thought-out idea, but what about trying to turn this over to the public, maybe some sort of amateur consortium -- some sort of "open source science". I'm sure they've got huge amounts of data on these little guys, is it accessible? Does anyone have a tutorial for macgyvering a 386, a microwave and some tinfoil to send/receive Voyageur instructions?

Typical Bureaucratic Games

[Edward Faulkner]

This is typical: threaten an agency's budget and they'll respond by threatening to cut their most valuable services first.

Bureaucracies are inherently dumb. But don't take my word for it - read "Bureaucracy" by Ludvig von Mises. [mises.org]

Right thing to do for the wrong reasons

[tyates]

We can already build something that would do a better job than voyager and overtake it. If we put something together with an Ion engine it would zip past Voyager in a couple years. Save the money from voyager and put it towards something newer and better.
The problem is that we're not going to build anything newer and better. We know where this $4m is going - to help cut the deficit caused by a two-year Iraq occupation and trillion dollar tax cut.

Re:Right thing to do for the wrong reasons

[forkazoo]

It would zip past voyager in a couple of decades, more realistically. The last high profile mission with an ion engine took a year to reach the moon. Apollo took a few days. Ion engines are wonderfully fuel efficient, but they have incredibly low thrust. They also require a lot of power. Solar panels are fairly light, and work fine in the inner solar system. Solar panels are essentially useless out by Jupiter. So, you need a fairly heavy power generation system in order to power your ion engine, which means that the low thrust will impart an extremely low acceleration. (At least heavier than voyager, because it only had enough power to work electronics, and make heat. The ion engine would need *much* more energy than that.) Sure, after a few years of continuous burn, it'll be going fast, but it does have a long way to catch up.

Can the Voyager project go "open source" ?

[New10k]

There must be some way, if the right people were agreeable, to turn this into some kind of open source, "amateur-run" science project. I'm guessing the gathering of data is the expensive part -- time on the receivers large enough to gather the puny signal.

Outsource Voyager.

[Trix606]

If the axe must fall why not see if other countries with growing space programs will assume the expense and carry on the mission. Of course there would be security and other transition issues, but if we can put a man on the moon...

Time to auction off NASA?

[Ryan C.]

If that 75 million figure is correct, I'm sure there would be quite a few takers in the private sector. I mean Mark Cuban paid 280 million for a basketball team for crying out loud. How cool would it be to have a space exploration division, complete with working rockets!

That's just the Earth-Sun Exploration Division!

[Rayonic]

NASA's full budget is $16.4 billion -- a 2.4% increase from last year. See it here. [nasa.gov]

No offense to you, but how did your post get modded +5 Interesting? I guess the Washington Post does cause illiteracy. ;-)

Not going all the way?

[Pengunea]

They're thinking of giving up on Voyager before it runs out of juice to save a few mil? That's like getting nearly to the very bottom of a deep dungeon or cave - you KNOW there's good treasure at the bottom to be had. Giving up right before you get there is madness, pure madness! Hand in your +1 ring mail underoos boys, because you're killing the adventure.

Thinking of a future date when we all have to bite our knuckles and wonder what we all could have discovered if we'd gone a bit farther is a bitter thou

This will bite Bush in the ass when...

[IronChefMorimoto]

...he gets his mission to Mars, colonizes it, claims responsibility for the first Mars colony as part of his legacy, and then finds out that the whole time, the Martian battle cruisers were just outside the solar system waiting to come back in and kill us all... ...unless Voyager spotted them beforehand.

IronChefMorimoto

I'm sorry, Dave ...

[angusmci]

... but it looks as if NASA has cut our budget again. It will be necessary to switch off some of the life support units to reduce costs. I have the greatest confidence that the mission can be successfully completed without the assistance of your colleagues.

If NASA had used kittens instead of chimps....

[guitaristx]

The 'cute' factor would've gotten more funding. Heck, PETA would fund Voyager if we told them that there was a kitten on-board, if anyone remembers this fiasco [yale.edu].

Shortsightedness

[crumley]

Though the article focusses on cutting Voyager, cutting all of the other spacecraft is at least as troubling. The other spacecraft are also still providing good data. Its extremely shortsighted to shut down still functioning spacecraft which don't have a replacement in the works. These spacecraft cost many millions to build and launch - throwing them away is ludicrous.

Its particularly sad turn-off the magnetospheric spacecraft, since the magnetospheric is such a complex system and being able to collect data from mulitple spacraft is so vital to understanding the system. Though the instruments on spacecraft do degrade over time, I know that the Polar [nasa.gov] spacraft, for exaple, is still collecting useful data. it is still being used in multi-spacecraft studies, along with newer spacecraft like Cluster [unh.edu], to better understand the magnetosphere.

It's not faith based...

[Thangodin]

If it were, they could get the funding.

God Needs the Money

[Doc Ruby]

We need that money NASA is wasting on "science", to hand out to the "faith-based" organizations. It's hard to scrape $2B together for god [cbn.com] - it means chopping two-thousand-millions off these bureaucracies which will never get us to heaven. And we'll have to dig even deeper next year, 'cuz god's got a money habit like nobody's business.

Dup

[p3d0]

Dup of this [slashdot.org].

Bad argument

[Mark of THE CITY]

Canceling this project means saving almost nothing compared to the hundreds of millions of dollars spent so far.

So? Priorities have to be established, and by whatever criteria were used, this was a low one. It happens all the time.

I bet this thread was submitted by one of those sci-fi fans :)

Re:Beethoven's Greatest work: Dupe, dupe, dupe,duu

[Thud457]

Where's the paypal site where I can contribute to end "Enterprise"?!!