NASA will hold a pair of science briefings tomorrow (Thursday) to debut new findings about the Moon and Mars.

• 2:00 pm EDT, NASA Headquarters. Briefing on findings from international and national lunar probes, especially the Moon Mineralogy Mapper, a NASA instrument on India’s Chandrayaan-1 lunar orbiter. This event will be shown on NASA Television.
• 3:00 pm EDT (noon PDT), JPL. Briefing on new findings from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. This is audio only. To listen to the audio, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio.

In other space science news, the Messenger spacecraft is poised to make its third and final loop around Mercury on September 29. The pass will provide a “gravity assist” to the spacecraft, positioning it to enter orbit around Mercury in 2011. This will be the first spacecraft to orbit that planet, which is closest to the Sun.

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter(LRO) and Lunar Crater Observing and Sensing Satellite(LCROSS) are ready to reveal the secrets of the Moon’s south pole. LRO and LCROSS were launched to the Moon together on June 18, 2009. They are the first steps in the Vision for Space Exploration announced by President George W. Bush.

NASA reportsthat LRO has begun detailed mapping of the Moon’s south pole from its 31-mile-high lunar orbit. Initial readings suggest that permanently shadowed areas at the pole may harbor water and hydrogen, but that the rough terrain would be difficult for astronauts to explore. The $540 million orbiter will stay in lunar orbit for at least a year to produce surface, temperature and radiation maps of the Moon, as well as scout for safe landing sites and potential resources for human explorers.

Meanwhile, the LCROSS mission appears to have recovered from problemsencountered in August. Daniel Andres, LCROSS project manager, confirmedSeptember 11 that the spacecraft has enough fuel to accomplish all its mission objectives. The Cabeus A crater at the Moon’s south pole has been selected as the impact point, an event scheduled for October 9, 2009. If executed successfully, LCROSS will measure the properties of the plume of dust – and perhaps ice crystals – caused by the impact of its Centaur upper-stage before colliding with the lunar surface itself four minutes later. Both impacts will be monitored from Earth by a team of astronomers participating in the LCROSS Observation Campaign to maximize the scientific return of the mission.

The National Research Council’s (NRC’s) Space Studies Board published a report, The Scientific Context for Exploration of the Moon, in 2007 discussing the importance of better understanding the Moon’s polar regions. Scientists theorize that water from comet impacts over the eons may still remain in permanently shadowed areas. A “South Pole-Aitken Basin” lunar mission was one of the top priorities of the 2003 NRC Decadal Survey on solar system exploration, a priority that was further endorsed by the 2007 study.

Read a SpacePolicyOnline.com 1-pager Fact Sheet about LRO and LCROSS.

President Obama has announced his intention to nominate Elizabeth “Beth” Robinson to be NASA’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO). Dr. Robinson is currently Assistant Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). She also has worked at the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), as a professional staff member of the House Science Committee, and at the former Office of Technology Assessment (OTA). She has a Ph.D. in geophysics from MIT.

With the release of the Augustine committee report, PolitiFact.com has added three more space program promises by President Obama to the category of “In the Works”: Support Human Mission to the Moon by 2020, Work with International Allies on the Space Station; and Speed Up the Development of the Next Generation Space Vehicle.

PolitiFact.com is tracking 18 space program promises made by the President during his campaign. To date, 10 are listed as “no action,” three as “kept,” and five as “in the works.”

A SpacePolicyOnline.com summary of the September 16, 2009 Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee’s Subcommittee on Science and Space hearing on the Augustine committee report is now available. Look on our left menu under “Our Hearing Summaries” or just click here. The Augustine committee was tasked with assessing options for the future of the human space flight program.

A SpacePolicyOnline.com summary of the House Science and Technology Committee’s hearing on the same topic the previous day is also available from our left menu.

NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver reined in expectations that the Obama Administration might significantly increase the NASA budget, according to Space News. Garver spoke at AIAA’s Space 2009 conference in Pasadena on September 16.

The newspaper quoted Ms. Garver as saying that budgets were tight when she previously was at NASA (in the late 1990s) and they are tighter now and that “Our budget has to compete with not only other scientific programs but all government service. To earn our trust from taxpayers we have to help create a better future through programs aligned with both the short-term and long-term national interest.”

Space News also quoted Space Operations Mission Directorate Deputy Administrator David Radzanowski with a similarly pessimistic message: ” I really don’t expect there to be significant increases in NASA’s budgets over the next 10 years…We need to think about what it means to potentially be operating under a flat budget.

A SpacePolicyOnline.com summary of the September 15, 2009 House Science and Technology Committee’s hearing on the Augustine committee report is now available. Look on our left menu under “Our Hearing Summaries” or just click here. The Augustine committee was tasked with assessing options for the future of the human space flight program.

A SpacePolicyOnline.com summary of the Senate Commerce Committee’s hearing on the same topic the next day is also available from our left menu.

Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL) closed his hearing on the Augustine committee report today on an optimistic note. While acknowledging how difficult it will be to find funds for human space flight in these budget deficit laden times, he said:

“I think the President really has a major decision here. There’s nothing like a President making a bold decision to focus the nation on where we ought to be going technologically. … I believe the President is a visionary and I believe that the President is going to make a bold stroke not unlike President Kennedy. He set this nation on a course that was extraordinary and it is my belief that President Obama will do that.”

A webcast of the hearing is available on the committee’s website. SpacePolicyOnline.com will post a summary of the hearing soon.

Two days of congressional hearings on the Augustine committee report on the future of the human space flight program begin this afternoon.

• House Science and Technology Committee, today (Sept. 15), 2:00-4:00, 2318 Rayburn — Witnesses: chair of the Augustine committee, Norm Augustine; former NASA Administrator Mike Griffin; chair of the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel Joe Dyer.
• Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee Subcommittee on Science and Space, Wednesday (Sept. 16), 2:30 pm, 253 Russell Senate Office Building — Witness, Norm Augustine.

Haven’t had time to read the Augustine committee’s report? Read our 1-page summary.

A personal email from former NASA Administrator Mike Griffin to friends expressing his views about the Augustine committee report found its way onto some space-related websites last week. SpacePolicyOnline.com decided to wait for Dr. Griffin’s official views as expressed in his testimony today to the House Science and Technology Committee. They are much the same. His key argument is that the best option is to restore funding for the Constellation program rather than set off on a different course. He adds that, if necessary, development of the Altair lunar lander could be postponed and the Ares V/Orion combination could embark on some of the “Flexible Path” missions discussed in the Augustine report until funding for Altair becomes available.

A SpacePolicyOnline.com summary of the hearing will be available soon.