国产热热热精品,亚洲视频久久】日韩,三级婷婷在线久久,99人妻精品视频,精品九热人人肉肉在线,AV东京热一区二区,91po在线视频观看,久久激情宗合,青青草黄色手机视频

WORLD> America
NASA delays Mars mission to 2011
(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-12-05 10:30

Washington -- NASA is delaying a mission to Mars that already had been over budget and will get even more costly.


This NASA artist's concept shows the Mars Science Laboratory, a mobile robot for investigating Mars' past or present ability to sustain microbial life. [Agencies] 

The launch of the massive roving robot with a rock-zapping laser was pushed back Thursday from next year until 2011, adding $400 million to the price tag. More than 10 different problems, all solvable with time, forced the postponement, Mars exploration chief Doug McCuistion said.

The six-wheeled Mars Science Laboratory is designed as the most powerful spacecraft to explore the Martian surface. About the size of a small sport utility vehicle, it will probe the red planet's climate and geology in finer detail than previous missions.

The project has been dogged by cost increases and technical challenges. Just two years ago the lab was supposed to cost $1.6 billion; the launch delay inflates the total price to nearly $2.3 billion.

The biggest major technical problem involves motors and gear boxes that will help the rover drive around and bend its robotic arm to reach out to test soil. One of the most vexing problems: the brake sticks in the on position in cold weather, McCuistion said. Other problems involved cracks in a key pipe, computer glitches and easy-to-fix failures with solar power cells, he said.

The problems couldn't be fixed and tested in time to launch next year, NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said at a news conference.

"Despite the delay, work on the mission really is progressing well with the exception of the motor problem," he said.

Mars and Earth only pass close enough to launch probes every 26 months. The next opportunity is September and October next year; it will be the first time since 1994 that NASA will miss a chance to launch toward Mars.

Sean Solomon of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, who heads a NASA Mercury mission, thinks the space agency made the right choice to slip the Mars launch, but he warned it could hurt other projects.

"That's quite a high price to pay for this delay. We're not in a good place on this mission," said Solomon who chairs the planetary subcommittee of NASA's Advisory Council.

It is the second time in two years that NASA has postponed a Mars mission. Last year, it delayed a planned 2011 launch of a $485 million Mars atmospheric probe by two years because of an unspecified conflict of interest in the selection process.

佛冈县| 仲巴县| 石阡县| 武功县| 稻城县| 临澧县| 双峰县| 淮安市| 汾阳市| 哈巴河县| 安龙县| 江门市| 宣城市| 南投市| 清新县| 孝义市| 永胜县| 桃江县| 灵丘县| 仁怀市| 闵行区| 拉孜县| 黑河市| 洱源县| 乌兰察布市| 朝阳县| 比如县| 锡林浩特市| 渝中区| 壶关县| 横峰县| 扶风县| 保德县| 湘乡市| 临沧市| 苏尼特右旗| 博爱县| 绿春县| 马边| 泗阳县| 民权县|