Leonard David's INSIDE OUTER SPACE

Psyche spacecraft sidles up to M-type asteroid 16-Psyche Credit: NASA/ASU

Sent skyward earlier this month, NASA’s outbound Psyche spacecraft is making its way to a unique asteroid of the same name. It is supposedly sporting a metal core that some space miners hungrily value at many trillions of dollars. The object is viewed as a mother lode of high iron-nickel metal.

By August 2029, the Psyche spacecraft will begin to orbit the space rock – the only metal-class asteroid ever to be explored.

First of all, there’s some scientific meandering about what the probe will truly find at destination’s end.

Design concept by TransAstra for early asteroid mining would target easy to get to space rocks in highly Earth-like orbits.
Image credit: TransAstra

Prior to its up-close look-see, this Psyche space rock is being eyed by private sector space mining aficionados as a cosmic cash cow, ripe for the picking to score big bucks.

But how real the promise of this asteroid to claim a mega mother lode?

Check out my new Multiverse Media SpaceRef story – “Psyching out Psyche – Gut-Checking the Asteroid Miner’s Paradise” – at:

https://spaceref.com/space-commerce/psyching-out-psyche-gut-checking-asteroid-miners-paradise/