http://planetary.org/solarsailblog/index_05.html

Jun 25, 2005 | 16:54 PDT | 23:54 UTC

What Lou said

Yesterday, late in the evening, Lou and Bud returned to Pasadena from Moscow. Lou was surprisingly upbeat and coherent given the experiences of the week, plus the long trip home. Rather than go straight home to his wife, Lou came straight to the Society to convene a meeting to talk about what happened in Russia, and what happens next.

So, late yesterday, there was a small group seated around the round table in the dining room of the 1920s Craftsman house that is the home of The Planetary Society. It was Lou and Bud, plus Bruce Murray (co-founder and Board chairman emeritus), Ann Druyan (Board member and primary sponsor of Cosmos 1), Charlene Anderson (Associate Director) and Bruce Betts (Director of Projects). Jennifer Vaughn (Director of Publications) and I (hopefully you know me by now) formed a peanut gallery, sitting on the couch nearby.

First, Lou and Bud described what had happened, from their point of view. But what the group was really there at the table to do was to talk about the future. What did the launch vehicle failure of Cosmos 1 mean for the Society's involvement in solar sailing? Should we do it again, or try something different? I think Lou did a great job of describing the general feeling around that table in the update he just wrote for the Solar Sail website, so I'll just quote a little of it here:

"Because I first became involved with solar sailing 30 years ago, they think that some dream of mine has now been destroyed. But, I am not about dreams, nor technologies, no matter how sweet. Rather, I want to make space missions happen, to shape the future – so you might think that I should be even more 'bummed out.' After all, solar sailing is in our future; the Cosmos 1 mission is now in our past.

"Surprisingly, I am not bummed out. I expected to be. Secretly, not sharing with anyone, I thought that if this mission failed I would come back devastated and in a mood to give it up. So, at about 20:25 GMT on 21 June when it became evident that something had gone gravely wrong with the mission, I waited for the depression to set in. Instead, I got caught up in the immediacy of the situation, and now, four days afterward, I am more focused on what we did, what we still are doing, and what we might do in the future than I am with regret about what might have been.

"We deeply appreciate and are buoyed by the determination and spirit of Planetary Society members and by the public who wish us well, congratulate us for our efforts, and are telling us even now, 'Keep going.' We will keep going. Although right now, I don’t know exactly how, I do know that we are committed to trying again, for The Planetary Society exists to make space exploration happen. Join us on this continuing adventure. "

You can read the rest of Lou's personal report here.

The Society will be ready, very soon, to tell you where we're going next. But first, I think all of us need a day off, to catch up on sleep, spend time with our loved ones, maybe go to the beach. After a day of rest, we'll be ready to set out on a new adventure.

I'll write next on Monday.