NUSEL Update #9 - February 3, 2004
1) Thanks & Kevin Lesko
The Executive Committee has wisely decided that Kevin Lesko will
now coordinate our efforts. Kevin, from Lawrence Berkeley
Laboratory, has been in the middle of NUSEL activities for a very
long time. He was cochair of the Bahcall Committee and
instrumental in the Technical Subcommittee's work. He also has
logged many, many hours underground at SNO, so he should know
what our community needs! Kevin is a great choice, and I hope
you will give him your full support.
2) Advice: I continue to hope that matters will work out at
Homestake. The advice that I have given the group over the
past eight months is to continue to support the Reference
Design proposal, as I believe the proposal is solid, as detailed as
possible, fairly costed, and consistent with the Bahcall
Committee vision of creating a world-leading laboratory.
If we could get a definitive site agreement and a South Dakota
proposal to dewater, we'd be back in the game.
3) NUSEL Supporters Group: Several people in the last month
suggested independently that we should have a NUSEL support
group that is site independent. One goal would be to have
support for NUSEL as a concept embraced by the largest
possible community. To that end we have set up a web page
that links to current (and we will add future) proposals:
http://www.int.washington.edu/DUSEL/
Please join the group by filling out the form you will find
there. Group members (but not emails) will be listed; the
email list will be made available to any group wanting to
communicate about NUSEL science (no politics!)
4) Icicle Creek: One reason for stepping down at this
time was a decision reached recently to submit a proposal
for the Icicle Creek site. NUSEL has yet to reach the Science
Board, and there are indications from the NSF that their
roadmap for the laboratory may be a deliberate one. For
this reason we want to put a backup idea on the table, in case
the NSF decides it needs one. We intend to make the proposal
public on approximately March 1.
Cheers,
2) Advice
3) NUSEL supporters group
4) Icicle Creek
1) Thanks & Kevin Lesko: This is my ninth and last NUSEL update.
I stepped down as the Homestake Collaboration spokesperson
on January 6. While it is disappointing not to have gotten closer
to NUSEL groundbreaking, working with the group was certainly not
a disappointment! For a community not used to organizing, I think
things went well. I want to thank every collaboration member for
your support and help over the past two years. You were great
individually and as a group, always willing to pitch in when needed.
Wick