The arms that grabbed the Starship rocket booster out of midair, with people on top, for scale. You know, in case you were wondering…. O.O
Europa Clipper is on its way
It's a busy week for space enthusiasts (have you spotted Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS?). The long-anticipated Europa Clipper mission is officially underway. The craft launched Monday morning on a Falcon Heavy rocket, bound for that most beguiling of icy Jupiter moons, Europa. It will arrive at its destination in 2030 (!?! We seriously need faster spacecraft engines pronto - or engines that use much less fuel, thus are able to take more fuel and travel faster....)
Once there, Europa Clipper will hunt for organic chemicals on the icy surface, as well as other signs of a habitable environment and evidence for the ingredients of life. It will also characterize Europa's ice shell in detail. This work could identify good spots at which a life-hunting lander could touch down and operate - BUT IT WILL ATTEMPT NO LANDING THERE.
...not yet.
Starship and the Future of Rapidly Reusable Rockets
In an absolutely incredible feat of engineering, SpaceX has caught Starship's Super Heavy booster in the Mechazilla arms on the first try! What a sight.
After a succesful launch and orbit, Starship itself completed a planned soft splashdown in the Indian Ocean as well. All in all, a hugely successful 5th test flight of Starship.
One day soon, this will all be routine. Like we do now with the hundreds of Falcon 9 launches and booster landings, we'll go, "Oh, did Starship launch again today? Another moon trip, maybe?" And I look forward to that day.
But for now, WOW.
Starship Soars
Welcome to the future of spaceflight, everyone! This week, in its third test flight, Starship made it to space, oribiting the planet for around 40 minutes before heading home. No, it didn’t make it all the way to a soft splashdown in the Indian Ocean, but that’s what testing is for, and it traveled so much farther, for so much longer, than ever before. I was a little twitchy after the second explosive test, but I’m now very optimistic for the future of this spacecraft and what it means for our journey to the moon, then onward to Mars and throughout the solar system.
Now enjoy these absolutely stunning photos of the flight:
Odysseus
For the first time in 52 years, an American craft has landed on the moon. And for the first time EVER, it's a private, commercial craft. The company is Intuitive Machines, and the craft is Odysseus.
It was a "spicy" landing, in the words of IM's CEO. As the target landing time neared, they realized that its laser rangefinders weren't working properly. So they implemented a workaround to get the required altitude and velocity data, pressing into service an experimental NASA instrument aboard Odysseus called NDL ("Navigation Doppler Lidar for Precise Velocity and Range Sensing)."
The team delayed the planned touchdown by two hours to make the fix, which required them to beam a software patch to Odysseus from mission control in Houston. That is a heroic effort and an incredible achievement by the engineers at IM.
Now, Odysseus IS somewhat...sideways. See the pic for the adorable reenactment IM performed at the press conference yesterday. But slightly off-kilter or not, the craft is very much alive and doing science. It's solar panels are exposed and drawing power, virtually all of its payloads are accessible, and nothing got crushed. IM expects the craft to operate for several days before it loses that precious sunlight needed to power it.
This mission was part of a NASA initiative called the Commercial Lunar Payload Services Program, or CLPS, in which the space agency is paying private companies to deliver science experiments and other cargo to the lunar surface. (The failed Astrobotic Peregrine mission last month was the first CLPS mission, and there are I think 7 more scheduled over the next 18 months.)
Odysseur landed at the lunar south pole, which is about to be the hottest real estate in space, for one reason: water!
Link to a great article about the mission and the landing: https://www.universetoday.com/165864/odysseus-moon-lander-is-tipped-over-but-still-sending-data/
And a fascinating article out today with a behind-the-scenes look at the people at Intuitive Machines who saved the mission over and over again: https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/02/it-turns-out-that-odysseus-landed-on-the-moon-without-any-altimetry-data/
More on Ingenuity
This is a terrific piece by Ars Technica on the innovation that created Ingenuity and what it means for the future of space exploration: "It turns out NASA’s Mars helicopter was much more revolutionary than we knew": https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/01/now-that-weve-flown-on-mars-what-comes-next-in-aerial-planetary-exploration/
That'll do, Ingenuity. That'll do.
Who's ready to cry over another anthropomorphized space robot? * raises hand *
Ingenuity's incredible Martian mission has come to an end. It was intended as a technology "proof of concept," with a mission span of 30 days and a max of 5 test flights. Many believed the little helicopter wouldn't fly at all in the thin Martian atmosphere.
Instead, it flew 72 missions in 3 years, traversing over 11 miles and reaching as high as 79 feet in the air. It flew in treacherous terrain, dealt with a dead sensor, cleaned itself off after dust storms, operated from 48 different airfields, performed three emergency landings, and survived a frigid Martian winter. Through all that, it wormed its way into our hearts and inspired our imagination.
On January 18th, it sustained rotor damage during landing and lost contact with Perseverance and NASA. Communications were re-established the next day, and imagery revealed damage to one of its blades severe enough to render it unable to take off again.
With such an amazing performance that silenced every doubter, Ingenuity is only the first craft to fly on Mars; it will not be the last.
That'll do, Ingenuity. That'll do.
Learn more here: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/after-three-years-on-mars-nasas-ingenuity-helicopter-mission-ends
Io's Close-Up
On December 30, NASA's Juno spacecraft, which has been orbiting Jupiter for the better part of a decade, made its closest flyby of Io, the innermost moon in the Jovian system.
The spacecraft came to within 930 miles (1,500 km) of the surface of Io, a dense moon that is the fourth largest in the Solar System. Unlike a lot of moons around Jupiter and Saturn, which have surface ice or subsurface water, Io is a very dry world. It is also extremely geologically active. Io has more than 400 active volcanoes and is therefore an object of great interest to astronomers and planetary scientists.
Read more about the flyby here.
The Falcon and the Moon
Incredible photo by John Kraus of this week’s Falcon Heavy launch of Space Force’s X-37B spaceplane.
Sunrise on Mars
Stunning morning clouds over Jezero Crater, captured by the Perseverance rover’s NavCams on March 18 (Sol 738). Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Kevin M. Gill
As Professor of Physics Brian Cox so eloquently said: “A beautiful photograph of clouds in the Martian sky, 200 years after the first photograph was taken and just over a century after the first powered flight. We can do wonderful things when we put our minds to it.”
High-res version: https://flic.kr/p/2onS6xJ
Originally posted on Twitter.
Peregrine One
Astrobotic’s Peregrine Mission One is officially launching to the moon on May 4th (yes, yes, May the Fourth Be With You). This mission is near and dear to my heart, as many of my short stories will be onboard the lander! Along with the works of many other writers, artists and musicians), as part of the Lunar Codex project. I’m very excited.
Originally posted on Twitter.
Auroras From Space
NASA astronaut and current ISS resident caught an absolutely incredible shot of auroras dancing across Earth’s atmosphere from the ISS. Simply breathtaking.
Webb's Pillars of Creation
Webb has captured a lush, highly detailed landscape of the iconic Pillars of Creation using its near-infrared camera.
For comparison, see Hubble's visible-light view of the Pillars. Hubble's view highlights the presence and thickness of dust around the pillars, while Webb's infrared vision peers through that dust to unveil the stars and protostars within the dust.
Learn more and download here: https://esawebb.org/images/weic2216b/.
Hello, Europa
Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Europa. Thank you, JunoCam!
These and many more images from Juno's close flyby of Europa can be found (and downloaded) here: https://www.missionjuno.swri.edu/junocam/processing?ob_from=&ob_to=&phases%5B%5D=PERIJOVE+45&perpage=16
I await your best 2010 memes.
Originally posted on Facebook.
Boom! DART Crashes Into Asteroid
NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirect Test (DART) crashed into the surface of an asteroid called Dimorphos at over 14,000 miles per hour. Researchers are hoping that the collision will change the asteroid’s orbit, speeding it up just a tiny bit (we won’t know how successful it was for a little while).
Neither Dimorphos, nor its larger companion, Didymos, pose any danger to Earth, but the experiment is designed to test whether or not a similar impact could make a difference if scientists ever discovered an asteroid that posed an imminent threat to life on Earth.”
Via https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/26/23371372/watch-nasa-dart-collision-asteroid
And everyone was watching. We’ve got visuals from the LICIACUBE cubesat that went along for the ride with DART, as well as from both Webb and Hubble!
The Light of Jupiter
Webb slays us once again by turning its infrared camera toward the giant of the solar system. We've got auroras, we've got moons, we've got rings! Most of all, we've got enough ethereal beauty to pang the heart and bring tears to the eyes.
“Webb Telescope Sees Jupiter and Its Auroras in a New Light”: https://www.universetoday.com/157261/webb-telescope-sees-jupiter-and-its-auroras-in-a-new-light/
Originally posted on Facebook.
Happy 10th, Curiosity!
Who's the bestest little rover?
10 years ago today, a jetpack lowered NASA’s Curiosity rover onto the Red Planet, beginning the SUV-size explorer’s pursuit of evidence that, billions of years ago, Mars had the conditions needed to support microscopic life.
Since then, Curiosity has driven nearly 18 miles and ascended 2,050 feet as it explores Gale Crater and the foothills of Mount Sharp within it. The rover has analyzed 41 rock and soil samples, relying on a suite of science instruments to learn what they reveal about Earth’s rocky sibling. Curiosity’s mission was recently extended for another three years, allowing it to continue among NASA’s fleet of important astrobiological missions.
This gorgeous poster is courtesy of Justin Van Genderen, and you can download it here: https://mars.nasa.gov/.../curiosity-10-years-of-martian.../
Learn more about Curiosity's 10 years of exploration here: https://mars.nasa.gov/msl/home/
Originally posted on Facebook.
Webb & the Cartwheel Galaxy
Well this is just ridiculous. What an incredibly cool galaxy! This image is dancing with color and verve and motion. There's a party going on in this sector of the universe.
“NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has peered into the chaos of the Cartwheel Galaxy, revealing new details about star formation and the galaxy’s central black hole. Webb’s powerful infrared gaze produced this detailed image of the Cartwheel and two smaller companion galaxies against a backdrop of many other galaxies. This image provides a new view of how the Cartwheel Galaxy has changed over billions of years.
“The Cartwheel Galaxy, located about 500 million light-years away in the Sculptor constellation, is a rare sight. Its appearance, much like that of the wheel of a wagon, is the result of an intense event – a high-speed collision between a large spiral galaxy and a smaller galaxy not visible in this image.” Learn more here: https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2022/webb-captures-stellar-gymnastics-in-the-cartwheel-galaxy
Originally posted on Facebook.
Jupiter's Polar Vortices
“As NASA’s Juno mission completed its 43rd close flyby of Jupiter on July 5, 2022, its JunoCam instrument captured this striking view of vortices — hurricane-like spiral wind patterns — near the planet’s north pole.
“These powerful storms can be over 30 miles (50 kilometers) in height and hundreds of miles across.” Learn more here: https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/jpl/nasa-s-juno-mission-spies-vortices-near-jupiter-s-north-pole
Originally posted on Twitter.
Behold the Power of This Fully Operational Webb Telescope
This first image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is the deepest and sharpest infrared image of the distant universe to date. Known as Webb’s First Deep Field, this image of galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 is overflowing with detail. Thousands of galaxies – including the faintest objects ever observed in the infrared – have appeared in Webb’s view for the first time. This slice of the vast universe covers a patch of sky approximately the size of a grain of sand held at arm’s length by someone on the ground.
The other images released are as follows:
1. The Cosmic Cliffs of Carina (oh, you lovely, wondrous spectacle of a creation!)
2. Stephen's Quintet
3. Southern Ring Nebula
4. Wasp-96 b atmospheric composition
If I posted all their details here this post would get quite long. But, you can go here: https://www.nasa.gov/webbfirstimages to download the high-res images and more. Just click on each image, and you’ll be taken to a page full of details about the target, what the image shows and how Webb captured it. Highly recommended!
