I thought this baby was dead as a door nail.

However, an analysis of alternative (Prometheus flagship) mission ideas was completed last month at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. The six ideas are:

· Technology Demonstration Mission to test fission power system in deep space with no specific science goal or destination.

· Lunar Geophysical Orbiter that in extended mission mode could serve as a telecom asset for future lunar missions.

· Next Generation Mars Telecommunications Station.

· Near Earth Object (NEO) Asteroid Mission that would involve stopovers at multiple objects, perhaps landing hardware on a NEO to assess the ability to modify the trajectory of a celestial body.

· Venus Orbiter, more like a Magellan II spacecraft that would carry out low altitude runs over the cloudy planet with state-of-the-art radar.

· Astrophysics Mission that would use high power levels from a fission power source, likely sending collected science information at very high data rates.

In addition to these missions, a Europa Orbiter mission for a 2012 launch, using chemical propulsion, would have the spacecraft energized by radioisotope power system (RPS) technology

I'd love to see EO back and an alternate prometheus mission flown to push an asteroid out of its orbit.