Telescope President Tried To Cancel Launches Ahead Of Schedule And Within Budget
Congress preserved NASA's Roman mission through two Trump administrations. The observatory responded by departing early.
CAPE CANAVERAL—NASA launched the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope on Sunday, sending an observatory completed ahead of schedule and within budget toward a destination one million miles from Earth.
The telescope lifted off aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy at 7:26 a.m. and began a three-month journey to the same region of space used by the James Webb Space Telescope. Roman will survey wide sections of the sky to study dark matter, dark energy and planets beyond the solar system. It is NASA’s first space telescope named for a woman.
President Trump called NASA’s post-launch news conference to praise the mission and remind the team that he was supplying the money. His administrations had tried during both his first and second terms to reduce or eliminate that funding. Congress repeatedly restored it, an inefficient legislative habit that left the project enough resources to finish efficiently.
Roman’s mirror is the same diameter as Hubble’s, but its wide-field view will let it survey far more sky at once. Engineers and scientists delivered the observatory nearly a year ahead of an earlier launch target while other federal programs demonstrated their commitment to schedule discipline by missing paychecks and reopening deadlines.
The mission is now beyond the reach of another annual budget proposal. After surviving Washington, traveling a million miles through space is the portion NASA planned for.
Sources: NASA: Dark universe-seeking Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope launchesAssociated Press: NASA's newest space telescope launches to explore the hidden universeReuters: NASA launches powerful new Roman Space Telescope from Florida
