NASA Deciding Between Saving Earth From Asteroids or Studying Gases on Venus

Wednesday, NASA outlined the five finalists for future planetary missions, one or two of which it will actually launch. Here are the objectives of those missions, which will cost about $500 million each (they are outlined in much more detail here by my colleague Becky Ferreira):

• Study noble gases surrounding Venus
• Create a topographical map of Venus
• Explore the metallic core of an asteroid called Psyche
• Investigate Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids
• Watch Earth for asteroids that might kill us

One of these things is not like the other. In a perfect world, with a perfect government that properly funds its space agency, NASA would be able to do all of these missions. In the meantime, here are my feelings on the issue.

Becky is right. The gas must be studied. But it’s worth remembering that our asteroid detection system is vastly underfunded and is only getting worse.