As you probably know, the FY00 budget voted on by the House Appropriations Committee cuts $60M from the Explorer budget. If this budget is approved by the full Congress, and signed into law by the President, then the Explorer program will clearly not move forward as we had planned. Under this budget we can not start a MIDEX mission for a 2003 launch.
For details, look here.
We are proceeding with the evaluation of the Concept Study Reports. After the evaluation is complete (around September 7), and taking into consideration the status of NASA's FY00 budget at that time, the Associate Administrator for Space Science will decide whether to proceed with the MIDEX selection. I will inform you ASAP when a decision is made, but it will not be before September 7.
If we proceed with the MIDEX selection, the science presentations will take place on Tuesday 14 September in the Program Review Center, Room 9H40, at NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC. The "rules" for the presentations are here.
Note that the science presentations will be "closed." In addition to your team, only NASA personnel will be present.
The order of the missions is arbitrary, but here it is.
| 8:15 (45 min) | Full-sky Astrometric Mapping Explorer |
| 9:30 (45 min) | Auroral Multiscale Midex |
| 10:45 (45 min) | Swift Gamma Ray Burst Explorer |
| 12:30 (45 min) | Advanced Solar Coronal Explorer |
| 1:45 (45 min) | Next Generation Sky Survey |
Please send the names and institutions of your (up to five) attendees, noting the (up to three) presenters, by Tuesday September 7 to the MIDEX Program Scientist. You will be sent instructions on getting through security, and where to go, about one week before September 14.
Return to MIDEX Downselect Page
NASA Headquarters Responsible Office: Code SR
Last Updated: 6 August 1999
Author: Paul Hertz (Code SR)