Tag: spaceflight

Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter snaps picture of Chang’e-6 on far side of the Moon

10:23 am

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

The science team running Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) have now released an image of China’s Chang’e-6 lander on far side of the Moon, taken on June 7, 2024 one week after the spacecraft touched down.

Chang’e 6 landed on 1 June, 2024, and when LRO passed over the landing site almost a week later, it acquired an image showing the Chang’e 6 lander on the rim of an eroded ~50 meter diameter crater.

The LROC team computed the landing site coordinates as 41.6385°S, 206.0148°E, at -5256 meters elevation relative to the average lunar surface, with an estimated horizontal accuracy of plus-or-minus 30 meters.

The overview map to the right, showing the entire far side of the Moon, shows that picture as the inset in the lower left, cropped to post here. The black and white dot in the center is Chang’e-6’s lander, with the surrounding brightened ground showing the blast area produced by the engines during touchdown.

According to the LRO press release, the large dark area that surrounds the lander — as seen in the wider inset in the upper right — is a “basaltic mare deposit” — similar to the vast dark frozen lava seas evident to our own eyes on the near side of the Moon.

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Webb produces false color infrared image of the Crab Nebula

9:30 am

The Crab Nebula as in infrared by Webb
Click for original image.

The false-color infrared picture to the right, reduced and sharpened to post here, was taken by the Webb Space Telescope of the Crab Nebula, located 6,500 light years away and created when a star went supernova in 1054 AD, in order to better understand its make-up and origins. From the caption:

The supernova remnant is comprised of several different components, including doubly ionized sulfur (represented in green), warm dust (magenta), and synchrotron emission (blue). Yellow-white mottled filaments within the Crab’s interior represent areas where dust and doubly ionized sulfur coincide.

The spectroscopic data from this infrared observation has in fact increased the puzzle of the Crab’s origin. Previously the data suggested the supernova that caused it was one type of supernova. This data now suggests it could have been a different type, without precluding the possibility of the first.

“Now the Webb data widen the possible interpretations,” said Tea Temim, lead author of the study at Princeton University in New Jersey. “The composition of the gas no longer requires an electron-capture explosion, but could also be explained by a weak iron core-collapse supernova.”

You can read the published science paper here [pdf].

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German rocket startup looking for alternatives to Saxavord spaceport

9:13 am

Australian commercial spaceports
Australia’s commercial spaceports. Click for original map.

Because of regulatory delays at the Saxaford spaceport in Great Britain, the German rocket startup Hyimpulse has signed a launch deal with the Australian commercial spaceport Southern Launch.

In May, HyImpulse launched the inaugural flight of its suborbital SR75 rocket from the Southern Launch Koonibba Test Range. The flight had initially been expected to be launched from SaxaVord in Scotland, but delays in the construction of the facility forced the company to look elsewhere for a host.

On 6 June, Southern Launch announced that it had signed a Memorandum of Understanding with HyImpulse for the launch of additional SR75 missions from Koonibba. The agreement also included provisions for the pair to explore the possibility of launching orbital flights aboard the HyImpulse SL1 rocket from Whalers Way Orbital Launch Complex on the south coast of Australia.

According to Hyimpulse’s November 2023 deal with Saxaford, it was to have flown two suborbital flights of the SR75 in 2024 and one orbital flight of SL1 in 2025.

It could very well be that SL1’s first orbital test launch will still take place from Saxavord, but the several years of delays caused by the red tape from the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority in approving Saxavord has forced its customers to seek alternatives. Hyimpulse for example now has agreements not only with Southern Launch in Australia. The French space agency CNES has approved it to launch from French Guiana as well.

In addition, the German rocket startup Isar Aerospace in November 2023 signed a deal with the new Andoya commercial spaceport in Norway. Andoya had come into this spaceport competition very late, but it apparently won this deal because Isar saw the regulatory problems in the UK and decided to look elsewhere.

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Perseverance looks back at downstream Neretva Vallis

9:58 am

Perseverance looks backwards
Click for full resolution version. Highly recommended!

Cool image time! The panorama above was released today by the science team of the Mars rover Perseverance, created from 56 pictures taken by the rover’s high resolution camera. It looks east, downstream into Neretva Vallis, what is believed to be the ancient riverbed that produced the delta that now exists inside Jezero Crater.

The yellow lines in the overview map below indicate the approximate area shown by the panorama. The blue dot marks where Perseverance was located when it took these pictures on May 17, 2024.

Make sure you look at the full resolution image. Neretva Vallis, the depression in the center of the panorama, is about a quarter-mile wide. The green dot on the map marks Ingenuity’s final landing spot. Though the helicopter is somewhere inside that panorama, it does not appear to be visible as it lies on the far side of one of those dunes.

It is also possible that Ingenuity is visible, but is only a tiny dark dot that makes it hard to identify. In reviewing the high resolution image closely, there is one dot that could be Ingenuity.

Overview map
Click for interactive map.

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Space Force names SpaceX, ULA, and Blue Origin as its launch providers for the next five years

9:14 am

As part of the military’s program for issuing launch contracts, the Space Force yesterday announced that it has chosen SpaceX, ULA, and Blue Origin as its launch providers, allowing them to bid on $5.6 billion worth of planned launched over the next five years.

The NSSL Phase 3 program was structured into two “lanes.” Lane 1 is for less demanding launches to low Earth orbit, while Lane 2 is reserved for heavy lift rockets capable of delivering payloads to nine reference orbits, including some of the most demanding national security missions.

The selection of Blue Origin, SpaceX, and ULA for Lane 1 contracts confirms that no other launch providers met the criteria. Seven bids were submitted, according to the DoD announcement.

The Space Force apparently rejected the other four unnamed companies because they “are still maturing their launch capabilities.” It will allow them to re-submit applications next year, and could approve others for bidding at that time, which is a major change from past policy. Previously the military would name approved companies, but not reconsider others for years, a policy that limited its options and reduced competition. Now it appears it will be doing so frequently, possibly every year, in order to regularly increase the number of companies that can bid on military contracts.

This change is excellent news for the American launch industry, as it means the Pentagon has finally ended its long standing launch policy that played favorites.

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Voyager-1 now returning science data from all working instruments

8:59 am

Engineers have now resumed full science operations on Voyager-1, presently more 15 billion miles from Earth, after computer issues shut the spacecraft down in November 2023.

The team partially resolved the issue in April when they prompted the spacecraft to begin returning engineering data, which includes information about the health and status of the spacecraft. On May 19, the mission team executed the second step of that repair process and beamed a command to the spacecraft to begin returning science data. Two of the four science instruments returned to their normal operating modes immediately. Two other instruments required some additional work, but now, all four are returning usable science data.

The four instruments study plasma waves, magnetic fields, and particles. Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 are the only spacecraft to directly sample interstellar space, which is the region outside the heliosphere — the protective bubble of magnetic fields and solar wind created by the Sun.

Voyager-2 is 12 billion miles from Earth. Both spacecraft are using what are the longest continously running computers ever built, having been turned on 47 years ago. Both spacecraft however do not have much longer to live, despite the recent fixes. The nuclear power source for both no longer provides enough power to run all their instruments, and will run down completely sometime in 2026, as expected, when operations will finally cease.

The spacecraft however will continue to fly out into interstellar space. In 40,000 years or so Voyager-1 will get within 1.6 light years of the star Gliese 445 in the constellation Camelopardalis, while at the same time Voyager 2 will pass 1.7 light-years from the star Ross 248 in the constellation Andromeda.

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Starliner’s return delayed again

8:44 am

NASA today announced that the return of Starliner from ISS, carrying two astronauts, has been delayed again, from June 18th to June 22nd.

It appears engineers want to perform more tests of the the spacecraft’s attitude thrusters before undocking. The failure of some thrusters during docking on June 6th has raised some concerns.

NASA and Boeing teams also prepared plans for Starliner to fire seven of its eight aft-facing thrusters while docked to the station to evaluate thruster performance for the remainder of the mission. Known as a “hot fire test,” the process will see two bursts of the thrusters, totaling about a second, as part of a pathfinder process to evaluate how the spacecraft will perform during future operational missions after being docked to the space station for six months. [emphasis mine]

The highlighted words are kind of a lie. While there is no doubt this test will tell engineers a lot about future operations, such a test, while attached to ISS, would never have been approved had the thrusters all worked as planned during docking. The real reason for this static fire test is to make sure the thrusters will work once undocked.

If they don’t work, there could be a safety issue putting the astronauts in Starliner for return to Earth.

NASA plans a press briefing on June 18th at noon (Eastern) to outline in better detail the situation.

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Study: Dust removal at Jezero 9x greater than InSight landing area

11:41 am

Figure 2 from the paper
Figure 2 from the paper. Click for original.

Using data from the Mars rover Perseverance, scientists have concluded that dust removal rate in Jezero crater is almost ten times greater than where InSight landed in western Elysium Planitia.

The graph, figure 2 from their paper, illustrates that differents starkly. From their abstract:

Dust removal is almost 10 times larger than at InSight’s location: projections indicate that surfaces at Jezero will be periodically partially cleaned. The estimations of the effect of the accumulated dust as a function of time are encouraging for solar-powered missions to regions with similar amounts of dust lifting, which might be determined from orbital data on where dust storms originate, dust devils or their tracks are found, or seasonal albedo changes are noted.

In other words, it might be practical to send solar powered rovers to different places on Mars, if first research was done to see if the conditions there would regularly clear dust from those panels.

This research confirms what had been implied by the different experiences of landers/rovers in different places on Mars. InSight landed near the equator in a region south of the giant shield volcano Elysium Mons. It only survived four years, with steadily lower energy levels, because no wind or dust devil ever cleared the accumulating dust on its solar panels. Spirit meanwhile landed about 1,500 miles southwest of InSight, yet its power levels were still healthy after more than five years of operations, when those operations ended because the rover could no longer move. The rover Opportunity meanwhile on the other side of the planet lasted more than fourteen years. Both rovers relied on solar power, like InSight, but their solar panels kept getting cleared of dust by wind and dust devils.

It is unclear if this wind research has been done for Europe’s Franklin rover, presently scheduled to land in Oxia Planum in 2028. Franklin will rely on solar panels, and though its nominal mission on the surface is only supposed to last seven months, it is always assumed it will continue until the rover fails.

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Astronauts cancel ISS spacewalk due to “spacesuit discomfort issue”

9:55 am

UPDATE: A later update by NASA provided no new information on why the spacewalk was canceled, but did announce a new date for the EVA, June 24th, while adding “The crew members on the station are healthy, and spacesuits are functioning as expected..”

My guess is that one of the astronauts had a personal but minor health issue, that out of privacy concerns NASA cannot reveal.

Original post:
——————
A spacewalk planned for today was postponed when the two astronauts involved stopped putting on their spacesuits and instead put them aside “due to spacesuit discomfort issue.”

That is all we know at this point. Was the issue a technical problem with the suits? Or was it something related to the astronauts themselves, such as one experienced stomach problems for instance?

No more details are as yet available. The NASA-designed American spacesuits used on spacewalks on ISS are very complicated and prone to technical problems. If that was the cause it could result in a serious delay before the next spacewalk takes place.

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FAA announces schedule for new EIS public meetings on SpaceX’s Starship/Superheavy operations at Cape Canaveral

9:48 am

FAA has now announced the schedule of public meetings in connection with the new environmental impact statement (EIS) it is doing for SpaceX’s proposed Starship/Superheavy operations at Cape Canaveral.

On June 12 and 13, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) will host a series of public scoping meetings to inform the public and answer questions about SpaceX’s proposal to launch Starship from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A). There will also be a virtual meeting on June 17 for those unable to attend in person.

…Among those attending the public hearings will be representative of the Department of the Air Force, the U.S. Space Force, the U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, Canaveral National Seashore and SpaceX.

FAA officials claim this new EIS is required, after doing one only five years ago, because of major changes in SpaceX’s design of Superheavy. For example, it originally planned to land the rocket on a drone ship. Now it wants to catch it with the arms on the launch tower.

The FAA’s argument for this new EIS might sound plausible at first glance, but these regulations were never intended to require new environmental statements every time a project underwent changes. The goal was to make sure the environment would not be impacted by the work, and the first 2019 EIS achieved that. None of the changes SpaceX is proposing change significantly its impact on the local environment.

Moreover, the FAA has three-quarters of a century of empirical data at Cape Canaveral proving that spaceports help the local environment, not hurt it. We know without doubt that none of SpaceX’s launch plans will do harm. The FAA should get out of the way.

Instead, it is sticking its nose into everything. This new EIS is merely mission creep, government bureaucrats both covering their backsides while creating new work that increases their power and justifies bigger budgets for their existence.

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Review of 4th Superheavy/Starship flight; FAA clears SpaceX for next flight

9:32 am

Link here. The article provides a detailed step-by-step review of everything that happened on the fourth Superheavy/Starship orbital test flight on June 6, 2024, as well as describing the changes being applied to Starship and Superheavy due to that flight.

However, the article also included this announcement from the FAA, stating that it will not do its own mishap investigation on that flight.

The FAA assessed the operations of the SpaceX Starship Flight 4 mission. All flight events for both Starship and Super Heavy appear to have occurred within the scope of planned and authorized activities.

While this decision means SpaceX can go ahead with the fifth test launch as soon as it is ready — no longer delayed while it waits for the FAA to retype SpaceX’s investigation and then approve it — it is unclear whether this FAA decision will allow SpaceX to attempt a tower landing of Superheavy, with the tower’s arms catching the rocket.

If the FAA has not yet approved a tower landing, I suspect SpaceX will forgo that attempt on the next launch in order to get it off the ground as soon as possible, even as it pushes the FAA for such an approval for a subsequent launch.

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NASA accidently airs simulated medical emergency on ISS, panicking the public

9:18 am

NASA yesterday accidently aired an on-going drill where ground astronauts were simulating a serious medical emergency, causing public alarm because it appeared the emergency was on ISS itself.

The regular scheduled livestream was interrupted at 6:28 p.m. ET by an unidentified speaker — apparently a flight surgeon — liaising with the crew on the ISS on how to deal with a commander suffering from serious compression sickness.

The speaker advises the crew to “check his pulse one more time,” before placing the stricken astronaut inside a suit pumped full of pure oxygen. She says any action would be “best effort treatment” and better than doing nothing. “Unfortunately, the prognosis for Commander is relatively tenuous,” she says.

She says she is “concerned that there are some severe DCS [decompression sickness] hits” and tells the crew to get him in a suit as soon as possible. She mentions that there is a hospital in San Fernando, Spain, with hyperbaric treatment facilities, in an apparent suggestion of ordering an emergency evacuation from the space station.

But after fueling alarm among the space enthusiasts listening, NASA revealed that the scenario wasn’t real — the ISS crew were all safely asleep at the time.

It appears this was a training exercise on the ground. For reasons that have not been explained, the audio somehow got rerouted onto NASA’s public live stream channel, forcing the agency to quickly issue an explanation.

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