Tag: Moon

Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander wins its fourth lunar NASA contract

9:32 am

Peregrine landing site

NASA yesterday awarded the rocket startup Firefly a $179.6 million contract to carry six NASA science instruments to the Moon on its Blue Ghost lunar lander, the third lander contract the company has won and the fourth Moon contract overall.

[The four contracts include] three lunar landers as well as one to provide radio frequency calibration services from orbit to support a radio science payload on the second lander mission.

The first mission, Blue Ghost 1 or “Ghost Riders in the Sky,” is scheduled for launch in mid-January, with a landing in the Mare Crisium region of the near side of the moon about 45 days after launch. Blue Ghost 2 will follow in 2026, landing on the lunar farside. That mission will also deploy ESA’s Lunar Pathfinder communications satellite into orbit. Both the second and third Blue Ghost missions will use Firefly’s Elytra Dark as an orbital transfer vehicle, delivering the landers to lunar orbit. Those vehicles will remain in lunar orbit to provide communications services.

This new contract will have Blue Ghost land in the Gruithuisen Domes region, as shown on the map to the right. This had been the landing target for the Astrobotic’s Peregrine lander when it launched in January 2024, but that mission failed when it developed a fuel leak shortly after launch. Astrobotic was able to operate the spacecraft through most of its trip to and from the Moon, but had to cancel the landing.

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Part 2 of 2: De-emphasize a fast Moon landing and build a real American space industry instead

10:41 am

In part one yesterday of this two-part essay, I described the likelihood that Jared Isaacman, Trump’s appointment to be NASA’s next administrator, will push to cancel NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and its Orion capsule, deeming them too expensive, too unsafe, and too cumbersome to use for any viable effort to colonize the solar system.

I then described how the Artemis lunar landings could still be done, more or less as planned, by replacing SLS with Starship/Superheavy, and Orion with Starship. Such a change would entail some delay, but it could be done.

This plan however I think is short-sighted. The Artemis lunar landings as proposed are really nothing more than another Apollo-like plant-the-flag-on-the-Moon stunt. As designed they do little to establish a permanent sustainable human presence on the Moon or elsewhere in the solar system.

Isaacman however has another option that can create a permanent sustainable American presence in space, and that option is staring us all in the face.

And now for something entire different

Capitalism in space: I think Isaacman should shift the gears of Artemis entirely, and put a manned Moon landing on the back burner. Let China do its one or two lunar landing stunts, comparable to Apollo but incapable of doing much else.
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Part 1 of 2: What NASA’s next administrator should do if SLS and Orion are cancelled

2:29 pm

When George Bush Jr. first proposed in 2004 an American long term effort to return to the Moon that has since become the Artemis program, he made it clear that the goal was not to simply land in 2015 and plant the flag, but to establish an aerospace industry capable of staying on the Moon permanently while going beyond to settle the entire the solar system.

The problem was that Bush proposed doing this with a government-built system that was simply not capable of making it happen. Though this system has gone through many changes in the two decades since Bush’s proposal, in every case it has been centered on rockets and spacecrafts that NASA designed, built, and owned, and were thus not focused on profit and efficiency. The result has been endless budget overruns and delays, so that two decades later and more than $60 billion, NASA is still years away from that first Moon landing, and the SLS rocket and Orion capsule that it designed and built for this task are incapable of establishing a base on the Moon, no less explore the solar system.

The real cost of SLS and Orion
The expected real per launch cost of SLS and Orion

For one thing, SLS at its best can only launch once per year (at a cost of from $1 to $4 billion per launch, depending on who you ask). There is no way you can establish a base on the Moon nor colonize the solar system with that launch rate at that cost. For another, Orion is simply a manned ascent/descent capsule. It is too small to act as an interplanetary spacecraft carrying people for months to years to Mars or beyond.

These basic design problems of both SLS and Orion make them impractical for a program to explore and colonize the solar system. But that’s not all. Orion has other safety concerns. Its heat shield has technical problems that will only be fixed after the next planned Artemis-2 manned mission around the Moon. Its life support system has never flown in space, has issues also, and yet will also be used on the next manned flight.

Thus, it is very likely that when Jared Isaacman, Trump’s appointee for NASA administrator, takes over running the agency, he will call for the cancellation of both SLS and Orion. How can he ask others to fly on such an untested system?

When he does try to cancel both however the politics will require him to offer something instead that will satisfy all the power-brokers in DC who have skin in the game for SLS/Orion, from elected officials to big space companies to the bureaucrats at NASA. Isaacman is going to have to propose a new design for the Artemis program that these people will accept.

Artemis without SLS and Orion

Before I propose what Isaacman should do, let’s review what assets he will have available within the Artemis lunar program after cancelling these two boondoggles.
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Why Orion’s heat shield problems give Jared Isaacman the perfect justification to cancel all of SLS/Orion

9:43 am

Orion's damage heat shield
Damage to Orion heat shield caused during re-entry in 2022,
including “cavities resulting from the loss of large chunks”

In yesterday’s press conference announcing new delays in NASA’s next two SLS/Orion Artemis missions to the Moon, agency officials were remarkably terse in providing details on why large chunks of Orion’s heat shield material broke off during its return to Earth in 2022 during the first Artemis mission. That damage, shown to the right, is one of the main reasons for the newly announced launch delays.

All they really said was that the damage was caused during re-entry, the atmosphere causing more stress than expected on the heat shield.

Today NASA finally released a more detailed explanation.

Engineers determined as Orion was returning from its uncrewed mission around the Moon, gases generated inside the heat shield’s ablative outer material called Avcoat were not able to vent and dissipate as expected. This allowed pressure to build up and cracking to occur, causing some charred material to break off in several locations.

…During Artemis I, engineers used the skip guidance entry technique to return Orion to Earth. … Using this maneuver, Orion dipped into the upper part of Earth’s atmosphere and used atmospheric drag to slow down. Orion then used the aerodynamic lift of the capsule to skip back out of the atmosphere, then reenter for final descent under parachutes to splashdown.

[Ground testing during the investigation showed] that during the period between dips into the atmosphere, heating rates decreased, and thermal energy accumulated inside the heat shield’s Avcoat material. This led to the accumulation of gases that are part of the expected ablation process. Because the Avcoat did not have “permeability,” internal pressure built up, and led to cracking and uneven shedding of the outer layer.

In other words, instead of ablating off in small layers, the gas build-up caused the Avcoat to break off in large chunks, with the breakage tending to occur at the seams between sections of the heat shield.
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Next two Artemis missions delayed again, with the future of SLS/Orion hanging by a thread

1:22 pm

Orion's damage heat shield
Damage to Orion heat shield caused during re-entry in 2022,
including “cavities resulting from the loss of large chunks”

In a press conference today, NASA officials admitted that their present schedule for the next two Artemis missions will not be possible, and have delayed the next mission (sending four astronauts around the Moon) from the end of 2025 to April 2026, and the next mission (landing astronauts on the Moon) to a year later.

It must be noted that when first proposed by George Bush Jr in 2004, he targeted 2015 for this manned landing. Should the present schedule take place as planned, that landing will now occur more a dozen years late, and almost a quarter century after it was proposed. We could have fought World War II six times over during that time.

Several technical details revealed during the conference:

  • It appears a redesign of Orion’s heat shield will take place, but not until the lunar landing mission. For Artemis-2 (the next flight), engineers have determined they can make the shield work safely by changing the re-entry path. They have also determined that the design itself is still insufficient, and will require redesign before Artemis-3.
  • Though Orion’s life support system will still be flown for the first time on Artemis-2, the first to carry humans, they have been doing extensive ground testing and have resolved a number of issues. They are thus confident that it will be safe to fly with people on its first flight.
  • Though SLS’s two solid-fueled strap-on boosters will be stacked for more than one year when Artemis-2 launches in April 2026, they are confident based on data from Artemis-1 that both will still be safe to use.

The political ramifications that lurked behind everything however are more significant.
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Japan awards $32.5 million contract for lunar GPS-type satellite constellation to startup

9:52 am

Capitalism in space: As part of the multi-billion dollar fund the Japanese government has allocated to encourage private enterprise by new Japanese startups, its space agency JAXA has now awarded a $32.5 million development contract to the startup ArkEdge Space to design and fly a GPS-type satellite in orbit around the Moon, thus demonstrating the technology.

Under the agreement, ArkEdge Space will plan and design the mass production and operation of micro-satellite constellations to lead the development of a next-generation Lunar Navigation Satellite System (LNSS), a vital component to the International “LunaNet” initiative driven by National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), European Space Agency (ESA) and JAXA. LunaNet seeks to establish essential infrastructure to support sustainable lunar exploration and foster the growth of the lunar economy.

The real significance of this contract award is that it signals JAXA’s growing shift from designing, building, and owning everything to simply becoming the customer who gets what it needs from the private sector. The Japanese government had established that fund for this express purpose, but JAXA has shown a reluctance to proceed, as it directly threatens its turf. This award indicates that reluctance is finally being pushed aside.

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Analysis of Chang’e-6’s lunar samples suggest the giant impact that caused Aitken Basin occurred 2.83 billion years ago

10:33 am

Chang'e-6's landing site
Click for original image of Chang’e-6 on the Moon

In a paper published in mid-November, Chinese scientists have concluded that — based on their analysis of the lunar samples returned by their Chang’e-6 spacecraft — the giant impact that created the 1,600-mile-wide South Pole-Aitken Basin on the Moon occurred about 2.83 billion years ago.

This conclusion is based both on the dating of the samples as well an analysis of the cratering rate on the Moon. It also suggests the landing site as well as Aitken basin were volcanically active for longer than previous predictions. Overall, scientists believe most volcanic activity on the Moon ceased around three billion years ago.

As noted in the paper, the near and far sides of the Moon are very different.

The Moon has a global dichotomy, with its near and far sides having different geomorphology, topography, chemical composition, crustal thickness, and evidence of volcanism. Volcanic eruptions flooded parts of the surface with lava, producing rocks known as mare basalts, which are more common on the nearside (4), where they cover ~30% of the surface compared to 2% of the farside.

The farside’s crust is also thicker, though under Aitken Basin the difference largely disappears.

This first precise dating for the far side is the first step for understanding why the Moon’s hemispheres are so different. Though many theories exist, none can be considered definitive because we so far have only one data point for the far side.

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NASA: forcing it to fly VIPER would cause it to cancel funding to 1 to 4 other commercial lunar landers

10:31 am

VIPER's planned route on the Moon
VIPER’s now canceled planned route at the Moon’s south pole

According to a response by NASA to a House committee and obtained by Space News, if Congress forces the agency to fly its canceled VIPER moon rover NASA would have to cancel funding to one to four other commercial lunar landers being built by private companies as part of NASA’s CLPS program.

In one scenario, NASA assumed VIPER would launch on Astrobotic’s Griffin lander as previously planned in September 2025. The agency estimated it would need to spend $104 million to prepare VIPER itself, $20 million of which had already been allocated for activities in fiscal year 2024, along with $20 million in “additional risk mitigation activities” for Griffin. “NASA estimated that these additional funding requirements would lead to cancellation of one CLPS delivery and delay of another delivery by a year,” it stated.

A second scenario anticipated a one-year slip in VIPER’s launch to September 2026. NASA projected an additional $50 million in costs for VIPER and $40 million for Griffin. That would have resulted in two canceled CLPS task orders and a one-year delay to two others.

NASA also revealed it considered “alternative delivery means” for VIPER other than Griffin. NASA did not disclose details about those alternatives, calling them “highly proprietary” but which would have delayed the launch of VIPER beyond 2026 “and would still include significant uncertainty about the reliability of delivery success.” NASA projected total costs of $350 million to $550 million with this scenario, resulting in the cancellation of four CLPS task orders and delaying three to four more by two years.

NASA preferred option is for a private company to take over VIPER. At the moment the agency is reviewing eleven proposals put forth by such companies that has “enough spaceflight experience and technical abilities to conduct the VIPER mission.”

Congress has gotten involved because the science community has lobbied hard to save it. The project itself has been a problem for NASA since its first iteration as Resource Prospector, when NASA would have built both the rover and lander. It has consistently gone over budget and behind schedule, even after NASA gave the lander portion to a private company, Astrobotic. At present the rover is 3X over budget with more overages expected, which is why NASA cancelled it.

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Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander now targeting mid-January launch window

10:08 am

Landing sites on Moon

According to a media update from NASA yesterday, Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander now targeting mid-January launch window for its unmanned mission to the Moon.

A six-day launch window opens no earlier than mid-January 2025 for the first Firefly Aerospace launch to the lunar surface.

The Blue Ghost flight, carrying 10 NASA science and technology instruments, will launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 39A at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Media prelaunch and launch activities will take place at NASA Kennedy.

The first quarter of 2025 will be a busy time for unmanned missions to the Moon. In addition to Firefly’s mission, the American startup Intuitive Machines also hopes to launch its Athena lander to the Moon’s south pole in February. Though it will launch after Blue Ghost, it will get to the Moon first, as it is taking a more direct week-long route compared to Blue Ghost’s 45-day journey. In addition, the Japanese company Ispace is targeting its own January launch for its Resilience lander.

If all three lift off as planned, there will be three landers heading for the Moon in early 2025.

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Starship gets contract to deliver Lunar Outpost’s rover to Moon

11:10 am

Capitalism in space: The lunar lander version of SpaceX’s Starship has won a contract from the startup Lunar Outpost to deliver its manned rover to the Moon.

The Colorado company announced Nov. 21 that it signed an agreement for SpaceX to use Starship to transport the company’s Lunar Outpost Eagle rover to the moon. The companies did not disclose a schedule for the launch or other terms of the deal.

This announcement is less a new deal for SpaceX and more an effort to convince NASA to award Lunar Outpost the full contract to build the rover. In April 2024 Lunar Outpost was one of three companies chosen by NASA to receive initial development grants to design their proposed manned lunar rovers. NASA expects to award the full contract, worth potentially up to $4.6 billion, to one of these three companies later this year, after seeing their preliminary designs. It wants to choose two, but at present says budget limitations make that impossible.

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NASA once again gambling on the lives of its astronauts for political reasons

10:07 am

Orion's damage heat shield
Damage to Orion heat shield caused during re-entry in 2022,
including “cavities resulting from the loss of large chunks”

NASA this week began the stacking one of the two strap-on solid-fueled boosters that will help power SLS on the Artemis-3 mission, still officially scheduled for September 2025 and aiming to send four astronauts around the Moon.

A NASA spokesperson told Ars it should take around four months to fully stack the SLS rocket for Artemis II. First, teams will stack the two solid-fueled boosters piece by piece, then place the core stage in between the boosters. Then, technicians will install a cone-shaped adapter on top of the core stage and finally hoist the interim cryogenic propulsion stage, or upper stage, to complete the assembly.

At that point the rocket will be ready for the integration of the manned Orion capsule on top.

The article at the link sees this stacking as a good sign that NASA’s has solved the Orion capsule’s heat shield issue that occurred during the unmanned return from the Moon on the second Artemis mission. The image to the right shows that heat shield afterward, with large chunks missing. Though it landed safely, the damage was much much worse than expected. At the moment NASA officials have said it has found the root cause, but those officials also refuse to say what that root cause is, nor how the agency or Orion’s contractor Lockheed Martin has fixed it.
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China’s plan to land astronauts on the Moon

9:31 am

Mengzhou as of 2023
Click for source.

The new colonial movement: China’s state-run press yesterday revealed the basic flight plan its space program will use to land astronauts on the Moon in 2030.

China’s first manned lunar mission will begin with the launch of the Lanyue lunar lander aboard the country’s new heavy carrier rocket [the Long March 10], and Lanyue will then await the subsequent arrival of the Mengzhou manned spacecraft in space. Mengzhou will be poised for its rendezvous with Lanyue in lunar orbit, at which time the astronauts will transfer into the lander.

The lander will then separate and descend to the moon’s surface. Upon the completion of their lunar exploration, the astronauts will return to lunar orbit in the lander’s ascent stage. This stage will involve re-docking with the spacecraft, and will mark the beginning of the astronauts’ journey back to Earth.

This plan is a variation of the Apollo approach, but rather than sending the ascent/descent capsule and lunar lander on the same rocket, China will launch them separately and have them rendezvous in lunar orbit.

Mengzhou is intended to be a larger and reusable replacement for the Shenzhou capsules China is presently using to transport its astronauts to and from its Tiangong-3 space station. Unlike Shenzhou, which appears to be an upgrade of Russia’s Soyuz capsules, Mengzhou instead appears more conelike, as shown by the mockup image to the right, first revealed in 2023.

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