Archive for January, 2025
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January 31st, 2025
Pre-launch image of Blue Ghost lunar lander. Image credit: Firefly Aerospace
The commercial Blue Ghost moonbound lander has just over a week left in Earth orbit.
What comes next is performing the critical Trans Lunar Injection, a propulsive nudge that gives the craft a “transit ticket” to the Moon for about four days of coast period.
That engine burn will last for about 16 seconds, Firefly Aerospace told Inside Outer Space.
So far, following its January 15 takeoff, the moonbound lander is over two weeks into the group’s first mission to the Moon.
Image credit: Firefly Aerospace
Landing date
“Our Blue Ghost lunar lander has already clocked 715,000 miles, downlinked more than 7 GB of data, and completed several NASA payload science operations,” a just-issued Firefly Aerospace statement explains.
Blue Ghost is then slated to perform a Lunar Orbit Insertion and spend 16 days in lunar orbit before descent.
Blue Ghost’s final autonomous descent will take roughly an hour, starting with a Descent Orbit Insertion burn that will place Blue Ghost on its descent trajectory on March 2.
Blue Ghost will capture imagery of the lunar sunset and provide critical data on how lunar regolith reacts to solar influences during lunar dusk conditions. The lander will then operate for several hours into the lunar night.
Artwork credit: Firefly Aerospace/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Day/night operations
Blue Ghost is targeted to touchdown on the near side of the Moon near a volcanic feature called Mons Latreille within Mare Crisium.
If all goes well, upon touchdown, Blue Ghost will operate 10 NASA instruments for a complete lunar day (about 14 Earth days). Just before lunar night also approximately a 14 day period of time, Blue Ghost will capture high definition imagery of a total eclipse from the Moon where the Earth blocks the sun.
Those NASA instruments are onboard as part of the space agency’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative.
At the end of the mission, the Blue Ghost Moon lander will capture the lunar sunset before operating several hours into the lunar night.
Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander captured the Moon in the distance and Earth on the horizon from its top deck, showing the LEXI payload (right) and X-band antenna.
Image credit: Firefly Aerospace
First-ever images
One of Blue Ghost’s scientific payloads is a telescope that will capture the first-ever global images of the magnetic field that shields Earth from solar radiation.
The X-ray telescope is mounted on top of the lander, an instrument designed to capture the first-ever images of X-rays emanating from the edges of our planet’s vast magnetosphere.
That instrument, the Lunar Environment heliospheric X-ray Imager, or LEXI, was created by Brian Walsh, a Boston University College of Engineering associate professor.
Following Blue Ghost’s lunar landing, LEXI is set to deploy and power up, directing its focus back toward Earth as it collects images of the X-rays emanating from the edges of Earth’s magnetosphere.
Status report video
An array of other instruments are on the lunar lander, including devices designed to characterize the structure and composition of the Moon’s mantle by measuring electric and magnetic fields, collect regolith samples from the lunar surface using a burst of compressed gas, and gauge heat flow from the Moon’s interior.
Go to this informative, status-report video at:
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Image credit: NASA/Association of Space Explorers
This video makes use of ethereal images recently taken on the International Space Station (ISS). Don Pettit, NASA astronaut, is a talented photographer of Earth. Currently on orbit (his 4th mission to the ISS) he took a series of long-duration photos, revealing tracks of urban night lights as the ISS passed over.
The stars show their own curving pattern, and the aurora adds even more mystery. For the movie, one frame morphs into the next in a magical dance.
In-space photographer, Don Pettit.
Image credit: NASA
Floating music
The music is by Mario Quiroga, a composer and musician in Chile. He is a “musico-terapista” (musical therapist), who creates floating music with his digital synthesizers, designed to help soothe the soul.
Featured is Quiroga’s “Aurora Boreal” composition – like a musical magic carpet as we soar over these ethereal views.
Produced by Association of Space Explorers, the professional association of flown astronauts.
For more videos in the Earth Music Theater series, go to:
Image credit: Thales Alenia Space/E.Briot
Autonomous access to the Moon by Europe is getting a boost by development of the Argonaut Lunar lander – a cargo delivery project.
The European Space Agency (ESA) and Thales Alenia Space in Italy have inked a new contract to have that aerospace firm develop Argonaut to deliver cargo, infrastructure and scientific instruments to the Moon’s surface.
Tons of cargo
The plan calls for Argonaut to be launched from the 2030’s. Tons of cargo will be delivered to the Moon’s surface by the vehicle.
“An Argonaut mission from launch to landing could take from a week to a month, depending on orbits and mission design. No area is off-limits for Argonaut – the spacecraft will be able to land at any region on the Moon,” according to ESA.
Image credit: ESA – P. Carril
Argonaut consists of three main elements:
- A lunar descent element (LDE) for flying to the Moon and landing on the target
- A cargo platform element that is the interface between the lander and its payload
- The element that the mission designers want to send to the Moon.
Package delivery
Argonaut cargo includes delivery of hardware for astronauts near the craft’s landing site, a rover, technology demonstration packages, production facilities using lunar resources, a lunar telescope or even a power station, according to a Thales Alenia Space statement.
A Lunar Crater Radio Telescope on the moon’s far side, a proposed idea funded by the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program.
Image credit: Volodymyr Vustyansky
“Thales Alenia Space is the prime contractor for the development of the Lunar Descent Element. The overall mission responsibility, i.e. the use of the LDE and integration with payload, will be the subject of a separate procurement in the future,” the company statement notes. “The Lunar Descent Element is an independent architecture block of the international lunar exploration activities, namely a versatile system to support a variety of missions.”
First mission
Argonaut’s first mission is envisioned to deal with delivery of dedicated navigation and telecommunication payloads as well as energy generation and storage system, as European enterprises explore the Moon’s southern area.
This major contract to develop the European lunar lander will enable Europe to access autonomously to the Moon’s surface.
Starship 7 leftovers arc into the Atlantic near the Turks and Caicos Islands.
Image credit: Dean Olson
Uncontrolled space debris reentries are of growing concern.
The prospect of leftovers from space hotfooting into the Earth’s atmosphere can create a collision risk with aircraft in flight.
While the probability of a strike is low, the consequences could be catastrophic.
Mishap investigation
Recently, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) required SpaceX to perform a mishap investigation into the loss of their Starship vehicle during the private firm’s launch operations on January 16 from the Texas-based “SpaceX Starbase.”
Starship 7 leftovers arced into the Atlantic near the Turks and Caicos Islands, with reported debris being found on land.
A main propellant tank of the second stage of a Delta 2 launch vehicle landed near Georgetown, Texas in January 1997.
Image credit: NASA Orbital Debris Program Office
During the Starship 7 destructive event, the FAA activated a Debris Response Area and briefly slowed aircraft outside the area where space vehicle debris was falling or stopped aircraft at their departure location.
Several aircraft requested to divert due to low fuel levels while holding outside impacted areas, said the FAA in a statement, called preliminary and subject to change.
Image credit: LeoLabs/McKnight
New research
That incident underscores the output from new research – “Airspace closures due to reentering space objects” – published in Scientific Reports, an open access journal.
The research points out that the risk is rising due to increases in both reentries and flights.
“In response, national authorities may choose to preemptively close airspace during reentry events; some have already done so,” explains the paper authored by Canada-based researchers.
Airspace
“In short, there is a 26 percent chance of an uncontrolled space debris reentry in busy airspaces such as the Northeastern United States or Northern Europe each year,” said Ewan Wright at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada.
Number of aircraft in the sky throughout the first day of each month in 2023, sampled hourly. In general, the number of aircraft peaks in the Northern Hemisphere summer, though other periodic effects such as the day of the week and year (e.g., New Year’s Day) will also affect the number.
Image credit: Wright, et al.
“Authorities may choose to close airspace in response, as occurred in Europe in 2022, but this has economic impacts and further safety consequences,” Wright told Inside Outer Space.
Wright, along with colleagues Aaron Boley and Michael Byers, write in their paper that, for a given reentry, the collision risk in the underlying airspace increases with the air traffic density.
They point out that the economic consequences of flight delays also increase should that airspace be closed.
Dilemma
“This situation puts national authorities in a dilemma—to close airspace or not—with safety and economic implications either way. The collision risk could be mitigated if controlled reentries into the ocean were required for all missions,” the researchers contend.
However, over 2,300 rocket bodies are already in orbit and will eventually reenter in an uncontrolled manner.
Image of spent rocket body captured by commercial debris inspection demonstration satellite, Active Debris Removal by Astroscale-Japan (ADRAS-J).
Image credit: Astroscale-Japan
“Airspace authorities will face the challenge of uncontrolled reentries for decades to come,” the research team concludes.
For access to the paper – “Airspace closures due to reentering space objects” – go to:
Image credit: Intuitive Machines
The Athena Moon lander is now at Cape Canaveral, Florida, targeted for a four-day launch window that opens no earlier than February 26.
Built by Houston, Texas-based Intuitive Machines, the spacecraft is the second of four manifested lunar missions as part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative.
Payload customers
The factory-equipped Athena is outfitted with a set of payloads, designed to validate resource prospecting, mobility, and communications infrastructure in the Moon’s Mons Mouton region, one of nine potential Artemis III landing sites.
Nine candidate landing regions for NASA’s Artemis III mission The background image of the lunar South Pole terrain within the nine regions is a mosaic of LRO (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter) WAC (Wide Angle Camera) images.
Image credit: NASA
Payload customers are: NASA, Lonestar Data Holdings, Columbia Sportswear, Nokia, Lunar Outpost, Puli Space, Dymon Co. Ltd., German Aerospace Center.
Broader efforts
Intuitive Machines CEO Steve Altemus, pointed out in a press statement: “This commitment to flying missions reinforces our broader efforts of developing a heavy cargo lander, establishing a lunar data relay satellite constellation, and providing sustainable infrastructure services at the Moon to enable further exploration of the solar system.”
Intuitive Machines (IM-2), a Nova-C lunar lander dubbed Athena is being prepared for sendoff to the moon’s south pole. Onboard the lander is the Polar Resources Ice Mining Experiment-1 (PRIME-1), a NASA experiment designed to search for water ice on the moon.
Image credit: Intuitive Machines
Athena will be lofted by a SpaceX Falcon-9 booster with backup launch opportunities depending on the “lunar blackout window” and other factors, Intuitive Machines adds.
Athena is to be joined near-term with another Moonbound spacecraft, the Lunar Trailblazer as a rideshare probe. Lunar Trailblazer is a Caltech-led orbiter dedicated to pinpointing water ice deposits on the Moon.
Image credit: NASA
Be it on Earth’s Moon or distant Mars, the elixir for long-term space exploration is the critical role of water.
That topic is captured in a new issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
“The inclination to explore across vast expanses has been a continual part of human history. In voyages across the Atlantic, or North America, one of the greatest obstacles was the availability of water. It was a life or death struggle,” explains an introduction to the PNAS volume, led by Mark Thiemens, a scientist at the division of physical sciences at the University of California San Diego in La Jolla, California.
Image credit: PNAS/NASA/Ben Smegelsky
“As terrestrial inhabitants make the first expansions to non-Earth habitations, water remains a major obstacle. As in the past, knowledge of where water resources are and how much remains is a fundamental question,” Thiemens and colleagues write.
Collection of papers
The PNAS journal focuses on NASA’s Artemis program, which plans to “reboot” the Moon in coming years.
The collection of PNAS papers highlight water’s significance for sustainability in future Moon and Mars habitats, and also addresses the scientific aspects such as water origins, mining, and its physical and chemical properties in extreme environments.
Artistic depiction of NASA astronauts at the lunar south pole carrying out early work to establish an Artemis Base Camp.
Image credit: NASA
The PNAS special feature includes research from international experts and early-career scientists, emphasizing the importance of water for extended human presence in space, astrobiology and planetary geology.
Finding water: elusive
The collection titles are:
- Finding water on the Moon and Mars: Humanity’s extraterrestrial future
- A mining code for regulating lunar water ice mining activities
- Exploring the lunar water cycle
- The elusive nature of Martian liquid brines
- Triple oxygen isotopes of lunar water unveil indigenous and cometary heritage
- Oxygen isotope identity of the Earth and Moon with implications for the formation of the Moon and source of volatiles
- Exploring, sampling, and interpreting lunar volatiles in polar cold traps
- The present epoch may not be representative in determining the history of water on Mars
To access the collection of papers, go to:
https://www.pnas.org/toc/pnas/121/52
Artist’s concept depicts astronauts and human habitats on Mars.
Image credit: NASA
Image credit: Interlune
Exploration of Earth’s Moon beckons – not solely as a time capsule, indeed a witness plate, to help piece together the puzzling history of our solar system.
The Moon is also a rocky, airless world of energy, mineral, and water resources to help fuel a projected cis-lunar economy.
Enter Interlune, a Seattle-based group founded in 2020, drawing upon former technologists at Blue Origin. Serving as the group’s executive chairman is Apollo 17 moonwalker and geologist Harrison “Jack” Schmitt.
Artwork depicts moon mining operations for Helium-3 involving harvesters, solar power plant, rover, and return launchers.
Image credit: Interlune
Interlune plans to gather scarce lunar Helium-3 for quantum computing on Earth
Heavy isotope
What Interlune has been established to do, in time, is harvest lunar resources, be they industrial metals, rare Earth elements, and water to support a long-term presence on the Moon and a full-bodied, in-space economy.
But the up-front lunar resource demanding Interlune’s attention is extracting the heavy isotope of helium-3, explains Rob Meyerson, the CEO of Interlune.
Found in small quantities in the solar wind, helium-3 is implanted into the lunar regolith in tiny concentrations by mass, as measured in samples brought back to Earth via the NASA Apollo Moon landing program.
Interlune technology testing: Airborne shake-out flights to evaluate lunar machinery making use of the Zero-G Corporation’s modified B-727-200 aircraft to mimic one-sixth lunar gravity conditions during parabolic dives.
Image credit: Interlune
For more information on harvesting helium-3 on the Moon, go to my new SpaceNews story at:
What Are UFOs? – Can science reveal the secrets of mysterious objects seen in our skies?
That’s the central theme of a new NOVA program premiering tonight, January 22, at 9 pm on PBS television stations.
“For decades UFOs have captivated the public, even as many scientists saw them as too taboo to investigate. Now, after highly publicized sightings of unidentified objects by Navy pilots, UFOs are moving out of the shadows and into the light, as NASA pledges to study them scientifically,” explains A NOVA statement.
Investigating the strange objects
“So what does science have to say? Though some are identified as balloons or drones, weather phenomena, or optical illusions, others remain mysterious. Could they be the result of secret new technology developed by other governments – or our own? And what would it take for alien engineers to traverse vast distances to send probes or visit Earth from other solar systems?”
Credit: DOD/U.S. Navy/Inside Outer Space screengrab
The Corporation for Public Broadcasting’s NOVA series is a primetime science series focused on “demystifying the scientific and technological concepts that shape and define our lives, our planet, and our universe.”
What Are UFOs? This television production explores the evidence, as astrophysicists and engineers use new technologies to investigate the strangest objects in our skies.
For this broadcast, go to this free access documentary at:
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/video/what-are-ufos/?
ESA’s LightShip tug promises to open a market of low-cost missions to Mars for a broader community.
Image credit: ESA
The European Space Agency is sparking a new initiative, one that aims at small-scale missions to explore the Red Planet.
An element of the ESA LightShip propulsion tug concept is engaging select groups to independently scope out what a small, low-cost Mars satellite platform looks like as a LightShip passenger.
ESA’s LightShip is a propulsive tug, or interplanetary transfer service. It would provide the propulsive nudge for a passenger spacecraft to transfer to Mars and enter Mars’ orbit.
LightShip would also host the Mars Communication and Navigation Infrastructure (MARCONI) offering a dedicated data relay service.
Image credit: ESA
Potential passengers
The four consortia – led by Argotec, Deimos Space, Politecnico di Milano with SITAEL, and Redwire respectively – will explore the potential of passenger spacecraft platforms that could be delivered to Mars by the LightShip propulsive tug.
Explains Claire Parfitt, Mars Exploration Study Team Lead in ESA’s Directorate of Human and Robotic Exploration and technical officer of the activity: “ESA’s LightShip concept aims to open up access to Mars for a wider community than is usually the case.”
Moreover, Parfitt added, “the nature of LightShip is such that it makes us open to international partnerships as well.”
The Red Planet as seen by Europe’s Mars Express.
Image credit: ESA/D. O’Donnell – CC BY-SA IGO
The LightShip concept kicks off an ESA Explore2040 strategy for future Mars missions. “In 2026, we plan to use the results from this study to investigate full exploration mission concepts. Those concepts could be future passenger candidates for LightShip,” said Parfitt in an ESA statement.
Use cases
In the main LightShip study, “use cases” to support missions to the Moon, asteroids, and other destinations are to be appraised.
According to ESA, further development of the mission will depend on decisions made at the next ESA Council at Ministerial Level in November 2025.
If given the go-ahead, the first LightShip mission is foreseen in 2032, with subsequent launch windows open in 2035 or 2037.
Future LightShip missions will carry different passenger spacecraft to be decided by the science and exploration communities.
Image credit: NASA
Paradigm shifts
ESA’s LightShip initiative would seem compatible with a NASA report issued late last year: Expanding the Horizons of Mars Science – A Plan for a Sustainable Science Program at Mars – Mars Exploration Program 2024-2044.
NASA released the document that calls for programmatic paradigm shifts in further exploration of the Red Planet over the next 20 years. Those paradigm shifts underscored in the document include lower-cost Mars missions.
A range of less-expensive landers, rovers and aerial vehicles are foreseen to help advance a sustainable human presence on Mars.
Image credit: Keck Institute for Space Studies (KISS)/Chuck Carter (Used with permission)
Eric Ianson, then Director of the NASA Mars Exploration Program (now retired) states in that report there’s need to “challenge conventional thinking and look to new and creative solutions for the exploration of Mars.”
This can include “seeking lower-cost science investigations, strengthening our infrastructure around Mars, seeking new enabling technologies, and creating an environment that broadens participation in Mars exploration,” Ianson explains.
Image credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
The trio of crewmembers onboard China’s Tiangong space station will soon begin spacewalking tasks. According to the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA), the Shenzhou-19 crew is moving forward on preparations for their second set of extravehicular activities (EVAs).
According to the CMSA, the three astronauts — Cai Xuzhe, Song Lingdong and Wang Haoze — are “creating optimal conditions for the upcoming spacewalk.”
In a video released on Monday, the crew is shown conducting checks of their spacesuits and practicing mechanical arm operations in orbit.
Image credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Rehearsing spacewalk duties
Two crew members are assigned the spacewalk duties, rehearsing their tasks in their spacesuits inside the space station.
Shenzhou-19 astronauts arrived at Tiangong in late October.
As noted by China Central Television (CCTV), in their first EVAs on December 17, Cai Xuzhe and Song Lingdong set a new world record for the longest single spacewalk, spending nine hours outside the orbital outpost. Tasks included the installation on the space station of protection devices against space debris.
For a video describing their preparations for the upcoming spacewalk, go to:
