ESA awards OHB Italia a preliminary contract to build Ramses probe to Apophis
The European Space Agency (ESA) yesterday awarded the company OHB Italia a €63 million preliminary contract to begin work on mission dubbed Ramses that will launch in 2028 and rendezvous with the potentially dangerous asteroid Apophis when it flies past the Earth on April 13, 2029 at a distance of less than 20,000 miles.
The contract award is preliminary because the entire project still has to be approved by the ESA ministral council of nations, meeting in 2025. Because of the short development time, however, ESA’s management found funds from its existing budget to begin work.
To speed work, the project is also using as its design basis the Hera asteroid spacecraft, which was recently launched to study the binary asteroids Didymos-Dimorphos. That mission was also built remarkably fast for a European space project, going from contract to launch in just four years.
NASA has already re-tasked its OSIRIS-REx asteroid mission to head for Apophis, renaming it OSIRIS-APEX for reasons that baffle me. The mission had successfully delivered samples from the asteroid Bennu, but after completing that mission had sufficient fuel and was well placed to do this additional rendezvous as well.
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The European Space Agency (ESA) yesterday awarded the company OHB Italia a €63 million preliminary contract to begin work on mission dubbed Ramses that will launch in 2028 and rendezvous with the potentially dangerous asteroid Apophis when it flies past the Earth on April 13, 2029 at a distance of less than 20,000 miles.
The contract award is preliminary because the entire project still has to be approved by the ESA ministral council of nations, meeting in 2025. Because of the short development time, however, ESA’s management found funds from its existing budget to begin work.
To speed work, the project is also using as its design basis the Hera asteroid spacecraft, which was recently launched to study the binary asteroids Didymos-Dimorphos. That mission was also built remarkably fast for a European space project, going from contract to launch in just four years.
NASA has already re-tasked its OSIRIS-REx asteroid mission to head for Apophis, renaming it OSIRIS-APEX for reasons that baffle me. The mission had successfully delivered samples from the asteroid Bennu, but after completing that mission had sufficient fuel and was well placed to do this additional rendezvous as well.
Readers!
My annual February birthday fund-raising drive for Behind the Black is now over. Thank you to everyone who donated or subscribed. While not a record-setter, the donations were more than sufficient and slightly above average.
As I have said many times before, I can’t express what it means to me to get such support, especially as no one is required to pay anything to read my work. Thank you all again!
For those readers who like my work here at Behind the Black and haven't contributed so far, please consider donating or subscribing. My analysis of space, politics, and culture, taken from the perspective of an historian, is almost always on the money and ahead of the game. For example, in 2020 I correctly predicted that the COVID panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Every one of those 2020 conclusions has turned out right.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
NASA has already re-tasked its OSIRIS-REx asteroid mission to head for Apophis, renaming it OSIRIS-APEX for reasons that baffle me.
Somewhere, there’s a senior manager in the science mission directorate who loves coming up with mission acronyms, who simply would not be denied.
It’s probably also the case, though, that this little nomenclature dance had some measurable impact on getting the new mission funded.