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Extending the Effective Lifetimes of Earth Observing Research Missions (2005) / Chapter Skim
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2 Evaluating the Effectiveness of the Mission-Extension Paradigm
Pages 4-7

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From page 4...
... Because the cost of extending mission operations is only a fraction of that required for developing new systems, 1 approving mission extensions provides a means for achieving high-quality science for relatively low cost in many cases. Box 2.1 provides historic examples of missions extended for scientific reasons.
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From page 5...
... The MODIS instrument on the Terra mission provides a global land cover data set. The higher spatial detail provided by the ETM+ instrument on the Landsat mission, launched many years before the Terra mission, has proven essential to algorithm training for this data set.
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From page 6...
... This is often true for missions with known operational utility but no funded operational follow-on mission.4 It is also true for missions with science returns that are not expected to decline over time, such as those contributing to long time-series data sets. 2 NASA safety guidelines call for a controlled reentry when a satellite would pose a greater than 1 in 10,000 chance of harming people or damaging property on the ground if it were left to reenter in an uncontrolled manner.
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From page 7...
... · Earth science missions have unique considerations, such as future operational utility and interagency partnerships, that distinguish them from space science missions; these considerations should be explicitly included in a mission-extension decision-making process. Recommendation.
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Key Terms

  • earth science
  • science missions
  • extending operations
  • historic examples
  • nominal mission

  • terra mission
  • mission life
  • extending missions
  • mission lifetime
  • space science

  • life cycles
  • ocean surface
  • research missions
  • uniformly applied
  • missions extended

  • future operational
  • provides historic
  • surface wind
  • unique considerations
  • applied process

  • extending mission
  • mission perspective
  • mission extension
  • mission extensions
  • landsat mission

  • extended mission
  • approving mission
  • uars mission
  • nasa data
  • measuring mission


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