NASA To Address “Unrealistic” Mars Sample Return Budget by March 2024

NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover collecting two samples of regolith – broken rock and dust – with a regolith sampling bit on the end of its robotic arm.
Image credit: NASA.
Close to two months after an independent review board found NASA has a “near zero probability” to get crucial components of the Mars Sample Return (MSR) mission ready to launch by 2027 or 2028 as initially projected, the space agency said today (October 20) that it has formed a team that will respond to budgetary concerns by the end of March 2024.