Persephone: A Pluto-System Orbiter & Kuiper Belt Explorer

[Flyaway]

From OPAG.

https://www.lpi.usra.edu/opag/meetings/opag2020fall/presentations/Howett_6005.pdf

 

[World B4]

Pleasantly surprised to find the thread already exists
https://science.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/PlutoPersephoneStudy.pdf

 

[World B4]

It sure looks cool, but the price of an SLS Block 2, plus the orbiter, all to take 27 YEARS to reach the target seems like the sort of idea I would be scared to pitch to a higher-up.

 

[publiusr]

27 years---worth the wait.

The Gold Standard
https://arc.aiaa.org/doi/abs/10.2514/1.A34658?journalCode=jsr
The key to any Pluto probe is to back EUS, by getting rid of Jared.

 

[timmymagic]

27 years---worth the wait.

I can never get over the fact that you could start on that programme now straight out of an MA or Phd...and spend the rest of your working life just on that...you might even retire before the mission ends.

 

[publiusr]

Ed Stone was the face of the Voyager probes for a long time.

 

[blackstar]

I can never get over the fact that you could start on that programme now straight out of an MA or Phd...and spend the rest of your working life just on that...you might even retire before the mission ends.

That is actually a problem. The New Horizons mission actually staffed based upon the mission duration. They hired with the idea that younger people would be ready to take on mission responsibilities when the spacecraft flew past Pluto.

But this is a problem in other ways too. Not always obvious, but when it comes to getting prioritization (meaning that the science community says "this is worth doing"), the length of a mission works against it. The science community is wary of putting finite money behind something that will not return data for a very long time. There are lots of potential missions that will return data faster.

 

[timmymagic]

That is actually a problem. The New Horizons mission actually staffed based upon the mission duration. They hired with the idea that younger people would be ready to take on mission responsibilities when the spacecraft flew past Pluto.

But this is a problem in other ways too. Not always obvious, but when it comes to getting prioritization (meaning that the science community says "this is worth doing"), the length of a mission works against it. The science community is wary of putting finite money behind something that will not return data for a very long time. There are lots of potential missions that will return data faster.

Also in terms of career progression. As the mission progresses you'll have natural wastage of personnel...and the ones remaining will become increasingly critical so you can't move them on, even if they want to...

 

[blackstar]

Also in terms of career progression. As the mission progresses you'll have natural wastage of personnel...and the ones remaining will become increasingly critical so you can't move them on, even if they want to...

Yes. I am sure this is in Alan Stern's Pluto book (which I have but have not read). I have heard him talk about it. You have to keep in mind that a lot of people working on a mission like this are on "soft money," meaning that they're paid by grants that expire. When you bring on younger people for a mission that won't arrive at its goal until later, there's a gap that you have to worry about. They will be paid early on, and then they're going to go get paid by other things until years later when they're needed again. That's a bit of a risk, because it's not clear that they'll still be in the same field later when you need them.