Douglas Isbell 
Headquarters, Washington, DC                 September 21, 1998 
(Phone:  202/358-1753)

RELEASE:  C98-o

NASA AWARDS NEW CONTRACT FOR 
OPERATION OF JET PROPULSION LABORATORY

     The NASA Management Office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory 
(JPL), Pasadena, CA, has awarded a new five-year contract to the 
California Institute of Technology in Pasadena to continue 
managing and operating JPL for NASA as a Federally Funded Research 
and Development Center through the year 2003. 

     "NASA and Caltech have a long and successful history of 
studying the Earth and exploring space together through the work 
of JPL, and this new contract enables that productive relationship 
to continue," said Dr. Wesley T. Huntress Jr., NASA Associate 
Administrator for Space Science. 

     The estimated annual value of the cost-plus-award-fee 
contract is $1.25 billion, for an estimated total contract value 
of $6.25 billion. 

     The contract supports a variety of ongoing and planned 
activities, including the Mars Surveyor robotic exploration 
program; the Cassini mission to Saturn; NASA Origins Program 
missions such as the Space Infrared Telescope Facility; Earth-
observing spacecraft such as the upcoming QuikScat mission; and 
the Deep Space Network of communications antennas. 

     Further information about JPL and the programs that it 
manages for NASA is available on the Internet at the following 
address: 

                http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

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