What will NASA announce regarding Mars Sample Return in their Tuesday press conference?

Ṁ200Ṁ93

resolved Jan 7

ALL

100%60%

Deferring to next administration

12%

Indefinitely postponing the effort

13%

Moving forward with a contract with one or more commercial companies

15%Other

https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-to-host-media-call-highlighting-mars-sample-return-update/

Open to suggestions for answers!

Update 2025-07-01 (PST) (AI summary of creator comment): - Resolution Criteria:
- Announcement will be either Sky Crane from JPL or a commercial partner.
- Decision expected in 2026.
- Resolution Method: Deferring.

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They announced more details, but pretty much said “it will be either Sky Crane from JPL or a commercial partner. expect a decision in 2026.”

Resolving as “deferring”.

bought Ṁ5 YES

"Bill Nelson: On Tuesday, we're going to announce the Mars sample return decisions, and it will not put the new administration in a box. We're going to work it up with options for them to consider, and then, in large part, it's going to be their decisions because of the funding. But sooner or later, the samples will be returned from Mars, ..."

https://arstechnica.com/space/2025/01/outgoing-nasa-administrator-urges-incoming-leaders-to-stick-with-artemis-plan/

If they announce that going forward they will not be spreading out the samples in the terrain but will store the samples on the rover indefinitely so they can be collected en masse, is one answer that perhaps in my ignorance comes to mind, but perhaps there is a reason it is a non started.

@JussiVilleHeiskanen They are already doing both. The nominal operations for Perseverance involves storing two copies of each sample: one on the ground, one in Percy. Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong!

@miles I am speaking from profound ignorance.

Probably wouldn't be framed as being about the program as such if the news was they had such a spectacular sample they absolutely wanted to analyze it on earth.