No cheap missions to Saturn

[ToSeek]

A billion dollars won't get you back to Enceladus or Titan (http://www.planetary.org/blog/article/00000977/)


The Outer Planets Assessment Group or OPAG met two weeks ago, and the presentations from the meeting were recently posted online (http://www.lpi.usra.edu/opag/may_07_meeting/agenda.html). One of the notable items from the meeting was the discussion of a feasibility study that was done to determine whether it's possible to follow up Cassini-Huygens (http://www.planetary.org/explore/topics/cassini_huygens/) (which cost more than three billion dollars) with a less expensive mission to Enceladus (http://www.planetary.org/explore/topics/saturn/enceladus.html) and/or Titan (http://www.planetary.org/explore/topics/saturn/titan.html), one that would cost an easier-to-swallow under-a-billion. The answer, unfortunately, is no.

[JustAFriend]

Any mission outside the inner solar system is going to be extremely costly. Nothing that anyone can do about that except maybe to invent a cheap reactionless drive or cheap fusion power.

[Ilya]

posted online (http://www.lpi.usra.edu/opag/may_07_meeting/agenda.html)

Why did OPAG have to put their papers online in this ridiculous 1/4 format -- what is obviously 4 pages squeezed onto single PDF page (http://www.lpi.usra.edu/opag/may_07_meeting/agenda.html)? They are almost unreadable both on screen and on paper, and increasing scale does not help because fine details were lost in transition.

I was very frustrated.

[ToSeek]

Why did OPAG have to put their papers online in this ridiculous 1/4 format -- what is obviously 4 pages squeezed onto single PDF page (http://www.lpi.usra.edu/opag/may_07_meeting/agenda.html)? They are almost unreadable both on screen and on paper, and increasing scale does not help because fine details were lost in transition.

I was very frustrated.

That's a standard PowerPoint output format that was obviously ported to PDF, but I agree that it's very annoying.

[Doodler]

For a Titan lander, have they considered a wind powered lander?

[3rdvogon]

For a Titan lander, have they considered a wind powered lander?

Otherwise known as a yacht (sorry a cheap joke I know but I could not resist it)

Mind you if you wanted to put a probe down on one of the lakes, then I guess that sailing it might work. I presume you are talking about a windmill to recharge the batteries. Seems to me that to develop a lot of power that way you might need a fairly large one that means a fair bit of "deadweight" to haul around
also along with camera masts and dish antenna etc would there not be a risk of adding too much topweight that might adversely effect its stability.

[djellison]

In terms of spending the mass - an RTG would offer better value.

[Romanus]

I'm most interested in the long-lived Titan lander. Seismology, meteorology, compositional changes; the possibilities are endless.

[Saluki]

IMO, both enceladus and Titan are worthy of "flagship" missions. Then again, so are Europa, Uranus and Neptune. Sigh, too many worthy targets and not enough money.