Mars Rovers Survive NASA's Budget Crunch

By Marc Kaufman Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, March 26, 2008; Page A17

For four years, the Mars robot rovers Spirit and Opportunity have braved deep cold and burning heat, week-long dust storms and steep crater walls -- continuing to send back invaluable data well past the three months they were expected to survive.

Last week, the rover mission's principal investigator experienced what appeared to be the gravest threat of all: Budget cuts that would have sent one of the solar-powered rovers into hibernation, and the other into part-time operation.

As part of broad cost-cutting in many NASA programs, mission investigator Steven Squyres of Cornell University was told that NASA headquarters had sent a letter to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory making it clear that $4 million would be cut from his program. Squyres and his team concluded that they would have to strictly curtail operations.

That was before NASA Administrator Michael Griffin learned of the plan. NASA spokesman Dwayne Brown said yesterday that Griffin was surprised to learn that the rover mission had been targeted for drastic cutback, and that he opposed the idea.

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