Trump's 2018 Budget Request Axes 5 NASA Earth-Science Missions

[Judi Lynn]

By Mike Wall, Space.com Senior Writer | May 24, 2017 02:00pm ET


Five NASA Earth-science missions are now on the chopping block.

Four we already knew about; they were zeroed out in the White House's preliminary, or "skinny," 2018 budget request, which was unveiled in March. The fifth, called the Radiation Budget Instrument (RBI), was revealed yesterday (May 23) with the release of the Trump administration's fleshed-out 2018 request.

RBI had been part of Joint Polar Satellite System 2, a NASA and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration mission scheduled to launch to Earth orbit in late 2021. The instrument would have measured the effect of clouds on Earth's energy budget, said Andrew Hunter, NASA's acting chief financial officer. [Watch: NASA's Future Plans in 2018 Budget Request]

But it wasn't to be.

"We were experiencing schedule and technical difficulties on RBI," he told reporters during a budget-explaining teleconference yesterday. "It’s always tough to terminate a mission, but it becomes a matter of priorities, and it was a budget-related decision."

More:
http://www.space.com/36989-nasa-budget-cancels-five-earth-science-missions.html?utm_source=notification

[progressoid]

1. Well of course it does.