Jun 30 1998
From The Space Library
NASA announced that experts from the ESA and Matra Marconi Space, the prime contractor for the SOHO spacecraft, had met at GSFC in Greenbelt, Maryland, to assess the situation of the noncommunicating spacecraft and to analyze the satellite's status in the event that ground controllers reestablished contact with it. Participants at the meeting named as cochairs of a joint inquiry board to investigate the incident, Professor Massimo Trella, the ESA's Inspector General, and Michael A. Greenfield, Deputy Associate Administrator for the Office of Safety and Mission Assurance at NASA Headquarters.
The European Science Foundation and the U.S. National Research Council published a joint study analyzing 13 projects in astrophysics, planetary science, space physics, earth science, and microgravity research. The report advised the United States and its international partners to "set aside a specific part of their annual space budgets to plan for future critical joint exploration projects," highlighting factors hampering cooperation within the projects analyzed. Hampering factors included cultural differences, poorly defined objectives, and "lukewarm support from the scientific community for projects undertaken more for political than research reasons." The report set forth recommendations for successfully pursuing cooperative space projects within tight budget constraints.
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