Donald L. Savage
Headquarters, Washington, D.C.                                                
December 11, 1992
(Phone:  202/453-8400)

Franklin O'Donnell
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
(Phone:  818/354-5011)


RELEASE:  92-222

CASSINI SATURN MISSION, SPACECRAFT FINALIZED

     NASA's Cassini mission to Saturn has passed a major milestone 
with the completion this week of a project-wide critical design 
review.

     The review, which included a comprehensive examination of the 
mission and spacecraft, closed today at NASA's Jet Propulsion 
Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

     "We are very pleased with the outcome of the review and the 
status of all elements of the project," said Richard J. Spehalski, 
Cassini Project Manager at JPL.  "The design process is moving 
forward very briskly."

     In addition to JPL Cassini team members, the review included 
presentations by Dr. Hamid Hassan, European Space Agency Project 
Manager for Cassini's Huygens Titan probe and Dr. Romeo Pernice of 
the Italian Space Agency which is contributing Cassini's high-gain 
antenna and science instrumentation.

     In other recent activities related to Cassini, NASA issued 
letters to scientific investigators formally confirming the 
mission's experiment payload.

     The 12 experiments onboard the Cassini orbiter were 
tentatively selected in 1990, subject to evaluation during an 
"accommodation period" until the confirmation was issued.  Another 
six experiments are on ESA's Huygens probe.

     Planned for launch on a Titan IV-Centaur in October 1997, 
Cassini will fly by Venus twice as well as by Earth and Jupiter 
before arriving at Saturn in November 2004 to begin a 4-year 
orbital tour of the ringed planet and its 18 moons.  The Huygens 
probe will descend to the surface of one of the moons, Titan, in 
June 2005.

     JPL manages the Cassini mission for NASA's Office of Space 
Science and Applications, Washington, D.C.
                             - end -