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Volu me XV On the Cover: A rare storm rages ac ross the face of Saturn as Table of Number 5 se en by th e Hubble Space Telescope. Th e wh ite, • September/October 1995 arrowhead-shaped feature is about as big across Contents (1 2,700 kilometers or 7,900 miles) as Earth . The winds at the storm's latitude blow at about 1,600 ki lometers (990 miles) per hour. HST has been watching the storm since its discovery in Se ptember 1994. Flyby spacecraft such as the Voyagers ca n't give us such repeated cove rage, Features Departlnents which enhances the value of the HST data. This image was taken on December 1, 1994, Japan Looks to the MeRlbers' when Saturn was 1,455 mi llion kilometers 4 3 Future: A Long-TerRI Dialogue (904 million miles) from Earth . Lunar Plan Image: Reta Beebe, D. Gilmore, L. Berg eron and NASA The debate continues: Should the Moon or While the other space faring nations trim Mars be the focus of exploratory efforts? their ambitions, Japan is methodically moving toward the Moon and the planets World beyond. Here are the details of their plan 6 Watch Froln for the Moon. It includes both scientific This summer, NASA came under withering exploration and utilization. attack in the US Congress. Here we detail The the battle and let you know the role the 7 The Ne\IV Society is playing in the fight to save Editor Pluto Express planetary exploration. The Pluto Fast Flyby mission, which we ur efforts are often divided, reported on last year, has mutated again. 18 Ne\IVs and O at The Planetary Society, It's now the Pluto Express, with an even Revie\IVs between portraying for our members smaller spacecraft designed to explore Last year's collision of comet Shoemaker a hopeful future in the solar system the outermost planet. Levy 9 with Jupiter still holds center stage and alerting them of attacks on that in science magazines. Our faithful colum RORlancing the Stone: nist reviews several articles on the great future. This split is graphically illus 8 The Near-Earth crash of 1994. trated by this issue, in which we lay Asteroid Rendezvous out Japan's plans for lunar exploration The first wave of exploratory spacecraft Society and report on the most potentially passed by the small objects that orbit the 19 Ne\IVs devastating budget cuts in NASA's Sun in Earth's neighborhood. But as our Once again, we bring you up to date on history. knowledge has grown, so has our aware the latest Society projects and events. Political skirmishes have become ness of the importance of these bodies to weekly events. And not only NASA understanding the solar system. NEAR 20 Questions and is endangered: Some in the United will be the first in-depth mission to study Ans\IVers States Congress have threatened to an asteroid. It's a good question: Without landmarks eliminate the US Geological Survey, to guide observers, how do they find a main player in planetary science. 12 Traveling Through a objects in space? Plus, an alert reader Meanwhile, members of the Mirror: The Hubble raises a query about a Basics of Space European Space Agency can't agree Space Telescope fli ght column. on their space program, and in Russia Studies the Planets there's not enough money to fund The Hubble Space Telescope has now 22 Basics of even approved missions. Only Japan completed its initial survey of the planets. Spaceflight: seems committed to a future in space. The images are truly marvelous and the Attitude Control This may be the most critical time next best thing to being there. We present "Roll," "pitch" and "yaw" are common for citizen action in the Space Age. its finest planetary portraits so far, and terms used to describe the attitudes of Contact your government representa there will be more before Hubble completes spacecraft traveling among the planets. its mission. tives and let them know your vision You'll come to understand them in this next installment of our primer on planetary of the future. Now, more than ever, exploration. that future is in your hands. - Charlene M. Anderson The Planetary Report (ISSN 0736-3680) is published bimonthly at the editorial offices of The Planetary Society, 65 North Catalina Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91106-2301,818-793-5100. It is available to members of The Planetary Society. Annual dues in the US are $25 (US dollars); in Canada, $35 (Canadian dollars). Dues in other countries are $40 (US dollars) . Printed in USA. Third-class postage at Pasadena, California, and at an additional mailing office. Canada Post Agreement Number 87424. A Publication of Editor. CHARLENE M. ANDERSO N Technical Editor, JAMES D. BURKE THE-PL.A~TfRV SOCIETV ' Assistant Editor, DONNA ESCANDON STEVENS Copy Editor. GLORI A JOYCE Prpduction Editor, MIC HAEL HAGGERTY Art Director, BARBARA S. SMITH o .~ --e- cP -B- 0 V~wpojn t s expressed in columns or ed itorials are those of the authors and do nat necessarily represent positions of The Planetary Sociel y, ils officers or advisors. © 1995 by The Planetary SocIety. o Board of Direct~rs CARL SAGAN President Members' Director, Laboratory for Planetary Studies, Cornel! University BRUCE MURRAY Dialogue Vice President Professor of Planetary Science, California Institute of TechnOlogy LOUIS FRIEDMAN Executive Director NORMAN R. AU GUSTINE PreSident, Lockheed Martin Corporation JOSEPH RYAN Executive Vice President and Genera! Counsel, Marriott International STEVEN SPIELBERG director and producer Moon or Mars? space station and watching NASA one indulging in our era's warm LAUREL l. WILKENING Tom Harris and Paul Klarer have downsize yet again. and comfortable hypocrisy be Chancel/or, UniversHy of California, Irvine launched a much-needed debate Mars is the sexy goal, and I do allowed to claim that there is no Board of Advisors DIANE ACKERMAN within the Society (see the May/ agree that we should go there. But, money available to be invested in poet and author June 1995 issue of The Planetary we ought to establish ourselves on humanity'S future! BUZZ ALDRIN Report). While our main focus has the Moon first. -VINCE CREISLER, Apo ll o 11 astronaut RICHARD BERENDZEN long been Mars, perhaps the Moon Americans need to lose the Kent, Washington educator and astrophysicist JACQUES BLAMONT is a more realistic target. Why? "been there, done that" attitude of CIJief ScIentiSt, Centre National Because historically, politics and recent years and consider the real hnpact Crater d'Etudes Spatiales, France RAY BRADBURY economics have had more to do possibilities and scientific benefits. In Paul Geissler's interesting arti poet and author with exploration than either science A global effort to return to the Moon cle on Earth images returned by ARTHUR C. CLAR KE author or adventure. When America ought to be undertaken soon. It's Galileo (in the May/June 1995 CORNELIS DE JAGER Professor of Space Research, entered the Moon race, it was in painfully clear that the United issue), a feature we see commonly The Astronomiea/lnstitute at Utrecht, response to geopolitical concerns. States is not going to proceed on on many other bodies in the solar the Netherlands FRANK DRAKE Just as the detailed scientific study its own with such a project. system-but less often on our own Professor of Astronomy and AstrophysiCS, of the Moon was getting under - CATHERINE KOUNS BORN, planet-went unnoticed in one of University of California, santa Cruz JOHN GARDNER way, the Apollo program was cur Lakeview, Ohio the pictures. I refer, of course, to founder, Common Cause MARC GARNEAU tailed because our leaders thought the scar produced when an asteroid Canadian astronaut there was nothing to be gained Priorities? or comet collides with us. GEORGIY GOLITSYN Institute of AtmospheriC Physics, politically, nor economically, Whether humanity's drive to In the image of parts of Australia Russian Academy of Sciences through continued exploration. Or explore is instinctive or cultural is shown on page 10, mention is THEODORE M. HESBURGH President Emeritus, so it seemed at the time. Now we open to debate (see Tom Harris' made of the dry salt lakes on the University of Notre Dame SHIRLEY M. HUFSTEDLER know that the Moon is a potential letter in the May/June 1995 issue left. These are mostly of irregular educator and jurist source of energy. Helium 3 in the of The Planetary Report). But the shape, except for one, the most GARRY E. HUNT lunar regolith could power fusion question of why our generation southerly, which is close to circular space scientist, United Kingdom SERGEI KA PI TSA reactors here on Earth. Moreover, falters at the threshold of the new and about an eighth of an inch Institute for Physical Problems, Russian Academy of Sciences other lunar resources could be used frontier can be answered in a single across in that picture. This structure GEN. DON ALD J. KUTYNA (RET,) in the establishment of an Earth word: hypocrisy. is called Lake Acraman. In 1986, former Commander, US Space Command JOHN M. LOGSDON Moon transportation system. Within We stand upon the shoulders of it was recognized by University Space Policy Institute, the next 30 years, lunar exploration humble frontiersmen and women of Adelaide geologists Vic Gostin Washington University HANS MARK could become economically attrac who forged the hostile wilderness and George Williams to be an The University of Texas at Austin tive. Which, in my opinion, is the into our modern world. They impact scar. I call it a scar rather JAM ES MICH ENER author key to generating the political and endured deprivation and hardship than a crater because it has been MARVIN MINSKY Toshiba Professor of .