Jul 11 2007
From The Space Library
NASA Administrator Michael D. Griffin selected Christopher J. Scolese to succeed Associate Administrator Rex D. Geveden, who would leave NASA at the end of July to accept the position of President of Teledyne Brown Engineering in Huntsville, Alabama. Geveden had joined NASA in 1990 and had served as Associate Administrator, the number three position in NASA, since August 2005. Before Geveden’s appointment, the position had been vacant for several decades, but Griffin had reestablished it, to provide programmatic integration between NASA’s mission directorates and field centers. At the time of his appointment to succeed Geveden, Scolese was serving as NASA’s Chief Engineer. Scolese had joined NASA in 1987 and had served as Deputy Director of NASA’s GSFC and Deputy Associate Administrator in NASA’s Office of Space Science. In the Office of Space Science, he had directed NASA’s Space Science Flight Program, mission studies, technology development, and the overall contract management of NASA’s JPL in Pasadena, California.
NASA, “Scolese To Succeed Geveden as NASA Associate Administrator,” news release 07-152, 11 July 2007, http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2007/jul/HQ_07152_Geveden_departure.html (accessed 9 June 2010).
The Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee held a hearing to discuss planned budget cuts to weather and environmental satellite programs, reductions that could significantly affect scientists’ ability to study Earth’s climate. Antonio J. Busalacchi, Director of the Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center of the University of Maryland, spoke extensively about the causes of the delays and cost overruns in the National Polar-Orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS), a joint project of DOD, NASA, and NOAA. The partner agencies, intending for NPOESS to replace NASA’s QuikSCAT satellite, which had launched in 1999 with a three- to five-year life expectancy, had originally scheduled NPOESS satellites to begin launches to replace aging satellites in 2008. However, at the time of the hearing, the partners had postponed the launches, now scheduled to occur during 2013-2026. Busalacchi characterized the status of the program as “one giant leap backward for mankind,” and Commerce Committee Chair Clarence William “Bill” Nelson (D-FL) called the implementation of the NPOESS program a disaster. David A. Powner of the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) testified that, although the initial cost estimate for the program had been US$6.5 billion for six satellites, the projected cost had since reached US$12.5 billion, with two satellites and some instruments dropped from the program. The report also found that the agencies had not coordinated effectively and had not filled critical NPOESS jobs. Mary Ellen Kicza, Assistant Administrator for Satellite and Information Services at NOAA, testified to the committee that the agencies had already addressed many of the problems that GAO had identified.
U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, U.S. Weather and Environmental Satellites: Ready for the 21st Century? 110th Cong., 1st sess., 11 July 2007; see also statements of Ellen Kicza, David A. Powner, and Antonio J. Busalacchi, http://commerce.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?p=Hearings (accessed 29 October 2010) ; Wes Allison, “Politics Aging Satellite Won’t Cripple Storm Trackers,” St. Petersburg Times (FL), 12 July 2007; Jessica Gresko for the Associated Press, “Senate Committee Hears Recommendations on Weather Satellites,” 11 July 2007.
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