According to the “Space.com” website, the cancellation decision came during environmental tests to ensure that the fully assembled VIPER could withstand launch and space conditions.
The VIPER program aimed to land near the South Pole of the Moon and investigate the ice beds on the Moon for 100 days, but NASA announced that it canceled the program for financial reasons.
While the VIPER program has already spent $450 million, excluding launch costs, this cancellation is expected to save NASA an additional $84 million in development costs.
With the mission cancelled, VIPER is expected to be disassembled and reused or sold.
NASA’s Deputy Administrator for Science, Nicola Fox, said the decision was “completely due to budgetary concerns, and had nothing to do with the research team or the success of the program.”
On the other hand, NASA is confident that the same scientific goals can be achieved with future lunar exploration projects.
NASA’S BUDGET
NASA’s 2024 budget had reached $24 billion 875 million, despite a 2 percent cut from last year and 8.5 percent less than requested funding.
Drilling for other planets and moons has been postponed due to the outage, while a NASA laboratory in California announced in February that it would lay off 530 employees (8 percent of its staff) due to lack of funds.
