– NASA’s Mars Sample Return mission is facing significant cost overruns, with an independent review finding it could cost up to $11 billion, $4-5 billion more than originally expected.
– The mission is also facing schedule delays, and would not return samples to Earth until 2040 under the current architecture, which NASA Administrator Bill Nelson called unacceptable.
– As a result, Nelson has asked NASA to seek alternatives from the private sector and NASA teams to return samples more quickly and cheaply, aiming to stay within the original $6 billion budget estimated in a decadal survey.
– One option suggested could be using SpaceX’s Starship rocket, which Elon Musk said on Twitter could return significant tonnage from Mars within 5 years.
– The sample return mission involves the Perseverance rover collecting samples on Mars’ surface, a NASA retrieval mission to collect them and put them in orbit, and an ESA orbiter returning them to Earth. But technical issues have led to cost overruns and schedule delays.
– NASA wants a new plan by this fall to assess alternative mission designs that can meet the original budget and schedule timelines to return samples in the 2030s, not the 2040s, given rising costs threaten to balloon the mission to as much as $11 billion.
Source: CBS News
