Jul 23 1979
From The Space Library
"Once again," wrote editor Robert Hotz in Aviation Week & Space Technology magazine, "the American public is far ahead of its political leadership" in grasping the significance of NASAs program of planetary exploration. NASA Headquarters was "astounded by the vast amount of unsolicited public reaction to the Viking and Voyager missions," in the form of 17,000 letters it received in the first weeks after the Mars pictures reached Earth; the "Voyager flybys of Jupiter... have aroused similar public interest." In Europe and Japan, interest in U.S. planetary exploration was even stronger; media coverage there "far surpasses domestic interest." Hotz criticized the "penny-wise, pound-foolish policy" that would force NASA to use a single spacecraft for future planetary missions, not the dual-spacecraft approach used through Voyager. "Some day," he added, "the high price for this folly will be paid in spectacular `low cost' failures." (Av Wk, July 23/79, 9)
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