JPL Director Dr. Edward Stone addressed Laboratory staff in a town hall meeting on Nov. 11, one day following a briefing on the findings of the Mars Climate Orbiter investigation board. Following is the text of his remarks.

Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow

Good morning. Thank you for coming. I want to talk to you about yester-day, today, and tomorrow. And I'll begin with yesterday.

Without question, yesterday was the hardest day I've experienced in all my years at JPL It was hard because of an old truth. It goes something like this: the higher the expectation, the greater the impact of failure.

At JPL there are the highest of expectations for success. The world expects that of us. And we expect it of ourselves. It's part of our culture to accept nothing less than the best- and to have no expectation but to succeed. That's why failure is so difficult for us to accept. I know that you must be experiencing these feelings, because I certainly am. If yesterday was hard for me, I know that today is hard for you.

Let's talk about today. There are a number of pressing issues which we must take on and master quickly. And I'd like to share some of them with you.

Open communications

Our number one priority for the next three weeks is to land safely on Mars. I consider it the obligation of every single person at the Lab to make it their highest priority. It is your obligation to raise any issue that might interfere with a safe landing.

Checks and balances

As you know, we are taking a wide range of actions on Mars Polar Lander in the areas of management, navigation, systems engineering, engineering, peer review, and mission assurance. We're doing this because the loss of Mars Climate Orbiter was, at its heart, an issue of teamwork. In the press conference I stressed the importance of checks and balances because of the need to ensure we are functioning as a team throughout the Laboratory.

Teamwork is not just an idea; it's a way of working. Teamwork means that we are willing to listen to one another. Respect one another. Help one another. And what all of us need to do now is support the mars team. How? In any way you possibly can. And let me share some ideas.

Staying focused

• You can help the Mars team stay focused by staying focused yourself. Dwelling on yesterday is not going to help us land on Dec. 3.

• You can help the Mars team by not engaging in fault finding. Fault finding is not gong to help us land on Dec. 3.

• It is also going to be very easy to become distracted by the media. Concentrating on today's headlines is not going to help us land on Dec. 3.

The NASA report has many excellent recommendations for Mars Polar Lander- and we are acting upon all of them. That means we are questioning everything-from top to bottom. But raising questions is not the same as concluding that something is wrong. Rumors have already gone from our hallways to the Internet and then into main-stream print and broadcast media. In this way rumors can take on the appearance of conclusions, and that can be source of further distraction. We just completed an in-depth look at the Polar Lander design by our engineers. Although there is a lot to do in the next three weeks, we know of nothing that stands in our way of landing safely on Dec. 3.

But now let me talk about the importance of today and what it means for JPL's future. We are in the midst of one of those rare instances when we know not only that history is being made, but we are a part of how that history will be remembered. This is, without question, a defining moment. What the Laboratory will be doing 10 years from now-and indeed the very nature of our space science program-is going to be determined here and now.

The future will depend on what we collectively learn from the loss of Mars Climate Orbiter.

• Can we learn to accept and learn from by our failures as well as our successes?

• When we fail, do we learn to fix the blame on individuals or do we learn to accept failure as a team?

• Do we learn that the pain we experience in losing a mission is so great that we avoid difficult challenges? Or do learn to accept the challenges, knowing that either great satisfaction or occasional disappointment awaits.

• Do we learn that teams must be large enough to be self sufficiently successful? Or do we learn that the success of small teams is reliant on JPL as a whole working as a team?

• Do we learn that each mission must have its own independence and autonomy? Or do we learn that we need to embrace interdependence and teamwork?

• Finally, do we learn out of this experience that this new era of space exploration is too difficult to pursue, or do we learn how to improve our success in going often, landing, and bringing samples of our solar system back to Earth?

Let me tell you what I believe about all these options. My choices are to embrace the tremendous future that can be ours. But just as our past successes did not come easily, neither will the future. In the future, success will be defined not only by what we do, but how we do it. And how we do it starts now.

In closing, I want you to know how proud I am of you. I know you care very much. I know you are dedicated to being the best. There's no better lab in the world. We have our work cut out for us. But we can do it. And when fly high again. Thank you.

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