www.nasa.gov down

[Kerbin Dallas Multipass]

Political discussions are against forum rules, but perhaps we can talk about the consequences of the fiscal shutdown for NASA and Spaceflight in general.

[Comrade Jenkens]

I'll be following the Russian space agency if NASA can no longer continue.

Their Soyuz rockets are some of the best manned spacecraft ever built and the future OPSEK station looks very interesting.

Though it is a great shame if they are shutting down, they simply havn't had the funding to contribute to spaceflight much recently.

[Tiberion]

LOL, NASA isn't shutting down, just the website.

Just ignore it, the politicians will get bored in a few days and one side will blink, and nothing will have been achieved in either direction.

[Kryten]

Current missions are still being funded, particularly the ISS, but unlaunched missions are now in limbo, including the MAVEN mars mission. If this continues long enough, it's going to end up sitting in a warehouse for 18 months waiting for the nex window.

EDIT:

Just ignore it, the politicians will get bored in a few days and one side will blink, and nothing will have been achieved in either direction.

Last time it took almost a month, and they're even less inclined to negotiate now than they were then. Add in the actual 2014 budget that'll need to be sorted (this one is a ~six-eight week interim measure), and the debt ceiling hit in the near future, and it's not looking good.

Edited October 1, 2013 by Kryten

[Guest]

Any discussion regarding a NASA shutdown also involves politics and U.S. financial affairs. Spaceflight in the U.S. is nothing more than a political football at this point. No real serious scientific exploration is being considered. A manned mission to Mars? Please. I have enough trouble just getting to Duna. If they were really serious about scientific exploration, they would be discussing sending probes to Europa and/or Titan, where there are real discoveries awaiting.

[Mr Shifty]

Though it is a great shame if they are shutting down, they simply havn't had the funding to contribute to spaceflight much recently.

NASA's budget, in inflation adjusted dollars, has been higher in recent years than has been typical in the post-Apollo years. NASA is currently running two flagship missions: MSL (Curiosity rover) and Cassini (Saturn probe) and many other exploration missions: LADEE, MAVEN, New Horizons, Dawn, Juno, LRO, MESSENGER, etc. In addition, it's spending $3 billion per year to support operations at the International Space Station, another $3 billion per year developing SLS and MPCV, $600-800 million per year to get the James Web Space Telescope operational, $500 million per year on developing commercial space transport partners and a bunch of other programs supporting astrophysics, heliophysics and earth science. NASA contributes and has contributed more to space exploration than any other agency. It's silly to suppose otherwise.

NASA will be back after the shutdown, which will hopefully be very temporary. They've said that mission control centers for the various NASA missions (particularly the ISS) are still operational during the shutdown.

[Mr Shifty]

If they were really serious about scientific exploration, they would be discussing sending probes to Europa and/or Titan, where there are real discoveries awaiting.

Huygens landed on Titan in 2005. Cassini has done about 70 fly-bys of it in the last 9 years, and will do 30-40 more in the next 5.

[Guest]

Thanks for the info, Mr. shifty. It's easy to get frustrated when all you hear about is sending a manned mission to Mars. You can see where that sounds ridiculous at this point, right?

[hugix]

Wonder if Karen has a few days of...

[rodion]

The way I see it, NASA has been in a fiscal shutdown for about the past four decades, am I right? [sound of crickets and disgruntled silence]

I'll be following the Russian space agency if NASA can no longer continue.

I don't see NASA really "shutting down", now or in the future, any more than I can see the US Air Force or Navy shutting down. They may be on the back end of nowhere on budget priority lists, but they are an enduring symbol of national and indeed, international pride for a whole lot of people, and killing it would be about as acceptable as killing bald eagles to a lot of folks. Not to mention, there's no shortage of major political rivals and "ex-" rivals who are running their own fully formed space programs at this time. It's just not a good look to can it just as the gauntlet is being thrown down again. It's just a pause.

I won't make any comments on which political institutions and bodies might be saying what about this and that, but I think shutdowns like this are a self-solving problem in a way. A massive public failure like this is a huge loss of face for the, uh, Kovernment of the...Ignited Stages...when ordinary people notice that their country just made stools in the bed because some old guys from Yale couldn't come to an intelligent decision on [a certain disputed proposal] and just heaps on the pressure to hack it out and resolve the bullheaded gridlock as soon as possible. Maybe deep inside I'm too optimistic though, because I just want to see NASA up and running again as soon as possible.

[ZedNova]

Nothing is shutting down, Everyone is just on vacation until congress decides it's time to give money to the government again.

[shadowsutekh]

It is unfortunate that current events make NASA's site inaccessible right now, but please refrain from political discussion over the how and why it's inaccessible. Political discussion is prohibited by the forum rules.

Edited October 1, 2013 by shadowsutekh

[Brotoro]

It is unfortunate that current events make NASA's site inaccessible right now, but please refrain from political discussion over the how and why it's inaccessible. Political discussion is prohibited by the forum rules.

Well, then, don't talk about politics.

But the NASA Web site suddenly going down just seems to be a case of somebody being a dick. There's no reason the computer couldn't keep running and serving the site. It runs all the time without constant intervention needed unless the content changes. Do they think the power company is suddenly going to switch off the electricity to their machine? Get real.

[ecat]

Well, then, don't talk about politics.

But the NASA Web site suddenly going down just seems to be a case of somebody being a dick. There's no reason the computer couldn't keep running and serving the site. It runs all the time without constant intervention needed unless the content changes. Do they think the power company is suddenly going to switch off the electricity to their machine? Get real.

...and if someone decides to take advantage of the situation and hack the site?

[Mr Shifty]

But the NASA Web site suddenly going down just seems to be a case of somebody being a dick. There's no reason the computer couldn't keep running and serving the site. It runs all the time without constant intervention needed unless the content changes. Do they think the power company is suddenly going to switch off the electricity to their machine? Get real.

I think you'd be surprised how much effort is needed to maintain a large website like NASA's (many billions of hits per year.) Ask the administrators of this forum if they just sit around all the time. Web servers are shut down as a consequence of the Antideficiency Act. The OMB sent out a memo to federal agencies a couple weeks ago with guidelines. Refer to page 13:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/memoranda/2013/m-13-22.pdf

[czokletmuss]

I find this the most outraging thing about the whole issue:

A government shutdown could affect the launch schedule for MAVEN, NASA's next mission to Mars.

Dwane Brown, Senior Public Affairs Officer at NASA, confirmed that "a shutdown could delay the pre-launch processing currently under way with a possible impact to the scheduled Nov. 18 launch date."

(...)

But it's really hard to know what the impact to MAVEN's schedule will be. It's an understandably fluid situation, and the full impact of a shutdown – if it even happens at all – won't be known until after the government resumes its business. Even Lockheed-Martin, the prime contractor building MAVEN, doesn't know what will happen yet.

The worse-case scenario is that MAVEN misses its launch opportunity to Mars. These only come around every 26 months and remain open for only a short time. MAVEN's has only 20 days between November 18th and December 7th. If MAVEN cannot launch in time, it will have to wait for the next opportunity in early 2016, a delay that would cost NASA's Planetary Science Division tens of millions of dollars it cannot afford

http://www.planetary.org/blogs/casey-dreier/2013/20130930-a-government-shutdown-could-delay-maven.html

Missing the transfer window to Mars because of the shutdown? I just hope it won't happen.

[Justy]

I was about to post that a contractor had posted to Reddit he was pretty sure work on MAVEN was one of the few projects still continuing, but the Planetary Society is a whole lot more trustworthy (if less hopeful), and the official @MAVEN2Mars twitter feed makes it pretty clear: "#MAVEN is shut down right now. Work at gov't facilities is undergoing orderly shutdown. Hardware will be put into known, stable, safe state." Damn. I guess we can be happy it's not RTG-powered; safely stowed, its solar panels should be just as good two years down the road as they are now.

I can think of a bigger tragedy than delaying MAVEN, though. In a week, Juno does a slingshot past Earth, its closest approach just 559 km above surface. If the shutdown should mess up that maneuver...

[czokletmuss]

In a week, Juno does a slingshot past Earth, its closest approach just 559 km above surface. If the shutdown should mess up that maneuver...

That would be truly disastrous. But aren't the people responsbile for Juno considered vital (or whatever this is called)?

[goldenpeach]

I find this the most outraging thing about the whole issue:

http://www.planetary.org/blogs/casey-dreier/2013/20130930-a-government-shutdown-could-delay-maven.html

Missing the transfer window to Mars because of the shutdown? I just hope it won't happen.

Let's hope that,now that the entire US government(and more important, the NASA(don't take this sentence seriously,I'm just kidding))is under shutdown,the congress and the president will try to fix the problem fast.

[Justy]

But aren't the people responsbile for Juno considered vital (or whatever this is called)?

Man, I sure hope so. Hard to get info.

I'm pretty sure the ham radio project is off the table though. During the flyby, NASA was organizing a coordinated effort of ham radio operators to send a very slow speed morse code "HI" message (four dits, pause, two dits... where each dit is 30 seconds long!) to see if Juno's radio detector would pick it up. I might try broadcasting anyhow.

[hugix]

It kinda does have a USSR feel to it. A country in debt yet having a huge space program... Luckily the ISS is shared with other agencies.

[Camacha]

It is unfortunate that current events make NASA's site inaccessible right now, but please refrain from political discussion over the how and why it's inaccessible. Political discussion is prohibited by the forum rules.

Well, the forum rules are not enforced fully anyway, since roleplaying in the form of pretend companies is common and a lot of conversation about (wanting to go to) space is ideologically inclined.

[Kerbin Dallas Multipass]

Well, the forum rules are not enforced fully anyway, since roleplaying in the form of pretend companies is common and a lot of conversation about (wanting to go to) space is ideologically inclined.

I have seen two posts about the subject being locked for violation of forum rules, so all posters please keep it as unpolitical as possible.

I do hope the forum mods understand that this is political headline news but is also affecting NASA, spaceflight and science, hence on-topic.

[OdinYggd]

I have seen two posts about the subject being locked for violation of forum rules, so all posters please keep it as unpolitical as possible.

I do hope the forum mods understand that this is political headline news but is also affecting NASA, spaceflight and science, hence on-topic.

That is understood at the moderation level, thus the notice earlier regarding it. As long as we stay more towards the effects of the shutdown on NASA's missions and projects and don't get hung up on the politics of its funding, this thread can continue.

Interestingly enough, it looks like the JPL website is still online: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/hijuno/

[Guest]

It looks like that website is run by Caltech. They must still have some money left.