Main Engine Cut OffStark Contrast Between NASA Directorates Put On Display
Thomas Zurbuchen, on Europa Clipper’s ICEMAG instrument:
This latest cost estimate is $8.3M above the cost trigger set in January 2019 and $16M above the original cost trigger set in February 2017. Altogether this represents a cost approximately three times the cost estimate presented in the original ICEMAG proposal.
The level of cost growth on ICEMAG is not acceptable, and NASA considers the investigation to possess significant potential for additional cost growth. As a result, I decided to terminate the ICEMAG investigation.
Jeff Foust, for SpaceNews, on an exchange between Jody Singer, director of NASA Marshall, and Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama:
“As chairman of the appropriations committee, I have more than a passing interest in what NASA does. And I have a little parochial interest, too, in what they do in Huntsville, Alabama,” where Marshall is based, he said. “Jody, you keep doing what you’re doing. We’ll keep funding you.”