It's Been 14 Days Since We Lost Triton to Venus...

NASA / JPL - Caltech

So today marks two weeks since NASA rejected the Trident flyby to Neptune's moon Triton as its next Discovery-class mission, and I'm still fuming. What makes me even more angry—and perplexed—is the fact that one aerospace contractor, Aerojet Rocketdyne, received a contract four months ago to build flight hardware that was no doubt intended for Trident. Aeroject was to have assembled two Multi-Mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators (MMRTGs, which are used by the Curiosity and Perseverance Mars rovers, as well as Dragonfly during its upcoming investigation of Saturn's moon Titan) for a future mission...which, as indicated in the schematics posted at the end of this Blog entry, were very likely meant for Trident.

The schematics below show that Trident was to have been powered by two MMRTGs—the exact number of Plutonium 238-fueled generators that Aerojet was hired to construct. The Io Volcanic Observer, the other Discovery-class finalist that came up short two weeks ago, would've used large solar array wings to generate electricity...just like Juno and the Europa Clipper orbiters. VERITAS and DAVINCI+ (this will be one of those rare instances where I begrudgingly mention the names of those two dreaded Venus-bound missions here) will not need to rely on nuclear power since they're heading to a hellish world (that has no real future for crewed space exploration) located only 67 million miles from the Sun.

So what gives? Methinks that NASA initially chose Trident, but then changed its mind in the four months leading up to the disappointing June 2 announcement. Why, you ask? We'll never find out. But I'll never let this go until NASA gives us another exciting journey to the outer Solar System and beyond. And by beyond I obviously mean another flyby mission... Eris, Sedna, Makemake and the rest of those unexplored dwarf planets beyond Pluto beckon! Carry on.