Add your name here to have it included on a flash drive that will fly aboard Artemis I.
Artemis I will be the first uncrewed flight test of the Space Launch System rocket and the Orion spacecraft. The flight paves the way toward landing the first woman and the first person of color on the Moon!
And BAM! Just like that you will be issued an Artemis 1 Boarding Pass.
All eyes will be on the historic Launch Complex 39B when Orion and the Space Launch System (SLS) lift off for the first time from NASA’s modernized Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The mission will demonstrate our commitment and capability to extend human existence to the Moon and beyond.
Click the image to be taken to this page on the NASA🚀 website
Artemis I will be the first in a series of increasingly complex missions to build a long-term human presence at the Moon for decades to come.
Editor’s Note:
Images 1 through 4
Image 1) Orion is ready for the crew and habitation. Image 2) The SLS is really an *Upgrade to the Saturn V, and it is facing delays. Image 3) For all it’s power, it is still Space Shuttle technology.
Image 4) In my opinion it is the Artemis Mission itself that is of historic interest. Not because of the inclusive nature of the crew, or humanities return to the closet alien world to us. The real excitement is this will help set up some kind of outpost or training compound for further space exploration. This is where we set ourselves up for success on MARS.
One last thing from your humble narrator. NASA has so many wonderful downloads hidden around their site. From posters which I have a selection of large format printed and framed on my stairwell walls.
To digital boarding passes for many of it’s off world probes. I’ve had my name on MARS on three different missions. With Artemis we have a chance to have our names on the Moon as well.
InsightMars 2020Mission 2026With each mission you also accumulate Frequent Flyer Miles. I wish I could turn them in for airline rewards because I have over 6 billion with my trips to Mars alone. NASA even keeps track of them for you. So make sure you keep going back to the Artemis Mission website to accumulate your Moon Miles start early you never know what it’s all worth.
Editors Note: I’d like to thank you for being there with us for my intermittent postings. This is our 200th post since we started years ago. Please tell your friends and Enjoy.
The Dark Side Of The Moon is only dark to those viewing from the surface. Yet it is just as full of light as it faces the Solar System. With such a view an observatory there makes plenty of sense. NASA’s Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) has captured a view of the moon that is impossible to see from Earth—the “dark side,” illuminated as it passes between our planet and the Sun. The images were made by DSCOVR’s four megapixel Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (EPIC)
Image via: NASA / NOAA
BOULDER, Colorado — Astronomers have always sought out remote and isolated spots from which their precision observations of the surrounding universe can be made. Now, add one more far-flung location – the moon.
But there is growing concern within the international scientific community regarding the need to keep the far side of the moon free from human-made radio-frequency intrusion.
The lunar far side always faces away from Earth. As a result, it is “radio-quiet,” shielded by the moon itself from radio-frequency interference (RFI) crackling through space, pumped out by powerful Earth-based transmitters.
For years, placing a radio telescope on the moon’s far side has been viewed as the location of choice to carry out matchless studies, such as giving an extraordinary ear to listen for signs of extraterrestrial intelligence.
The moon’s far side, ripe for astronomical development? Credit: NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio by Ernie Wright
Shielded zone
A newly established Moon Farside Protection Permanent Committee of the Paris, France-based International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) has started to frame the problem and possible solutions to guard against RFI of the lunar far side, ideal landscape, they say, for a future radio telescope or phased array detector.
Additionally, the International Telecommunication Union, based in Geneva, Switzerland, is engaged in defining and protecting what they label as the Shielded Zone of the moon. However, future moon exploration missions, the ITU warns, could spoil this pristine radio environment through uncontrolled radio emission and even enhance the lunar exosphere, the ultra-wispy layer of gases that acts as an atmosphere.
With the first radio telescope landing on the moon later this year as part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program, radio astronomy from the Moon begins in earnest, said Jack Burns, a space scientist at the University of Colorado, Boulder. That radio astronomy instrument is called ROLSES, he said, a Radio Wave Observations at the Lunar Surface of the photoElectron Sheath. It will fly on the privately-provided Intuitive Machines lander.
“This will be followed by a radio telescope on the lunar far side in 2025 and hopefully arrays of radio dipole antennas later in the decade. So now is the time to begin serious international efforts to protect the lunar far side as a unique radio-quiet preserve for exploration of the early universe,” Burns told SpaceNews.
This illustration depicts a conceptual Lunar Crater Radio Telescope on the far side of Earth’s moon. Credit: JPL/Vladimir Vustyansky
Unique real estate
Claudio Maccone of the Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica in Italy is an astronomer, space scientist and mathematician. As chair of the new IAA committee, he is a leading voice to maintain the moon’s far side as unique real estate for scientific activities.
Future space planners, Maccone argues, “need to think ahead and preserve the precious space resources that still remain unpolluted by humankind.” Unfortunately, the undeclared but quite real “current, new race to the moon” complicates matters terribly, he said.
Maccone is pushing to establish a Protected Antipode Circle, or PAC, a large piece of lunar land about 1,130 miles (1,820 kilometers) in diameter that would become the most shielded area of the moon’s moon far side. He said the United Nations should recognize the PAC as an international protected area — a radio-contamination-free zone.
Furthermore, the center of the moon’s far side, specifically Daedalus Crater, is being advanced; its high rim would block Earth-generated “radio smog” from fouling a future radio telescope planted there or other astronomical gear.
Blinder and blinder
Meanwhile, new ideas about taking advantage of the lunar far side’s special qualities have come to the forefront. For example, the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program has awarded study money for a Lunar Crater Radio Telescope. This proposal centers on using crater wall-climbing robots to deploy wire mesh to form a large parabolic reflector.
Another moon-situated NIAC-supported proposal is FarView – a radio observatory fabricated on the moon. This concept would utilize roughly 100,000 networked dipole antennas spread across hundreds of miles of lunar terrain. FarView science would support a detailed investigation of the unexplored “Cosmic Dark Ages,” the conditions and processes under which the first stars, galaxies, and accreting black holes formed.
“The far side of the moon is a unique place for us in the whole universe,” said Maccone. “It is close to the Earth, but protected from the radio emissions that we ourselves are creating in an ever-increasing amount, and that is making our radio telescopes blinder and blinder.”
EDITOR’s NOTE: I know that we haven’t posted in some time, I e been waiting for something that caught my eye. This is it Artemis 1 is being moved into it’s launching zone. Click the tag or category to see our other posts on the Artemis Program. Getting closer to the Moon everyday.
NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, with the Orion capsule atop, slowly rolled out of the Vehicle Assembly Building at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on March 17, 2022, on its journey to Launch Complex 39B. Carried atop the crawler-transporter 2, NASA’s Moon rocket is venturing out to the launch pad for a wet dress rehearsal ahead of the uncrewed Artemis I launch. The first in an increasingly complex set of missions, Artemis I will test SLS and Orion as an integrated system prior to crewed flights to the Moon. Through Artemis, NASA will land the first woman and the first person of color on the lunar surface, paving the way for a long-term lunar presence and serving as a stepping stone on the way to Mars.
On March 17, 2022, the Artemis I Moon rocket rolled out of the Vehicle Assembly Building at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida and made its way to launch pad 39B in preparation for the wet dress rehearsal – one of the final tests needed before the Artemis I launch. Credit: NASA/Chris Chamberland
NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, with the Orion capsule atop, prepares to roll out of High Bay 3 of the Vehicle Assembly Building at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on March 17, 2022, for its journey to Launch Complex 39B. Carried atop the crawler-transporter 2, NASA’s Moon rocket is venturing out to the launch pad for a wet dress rehearsal ahead of the uncrewed Artemis I launch. Credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett
NASA’s Mega Moon Rocket Begins Rolling to Launch Pad
The Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft for the Artemis I mission are rolling to Launch Complex 39B at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida for the very first time. At about 5:45 p.m. ET, with the integrated SLS and Orion system atop it, the crawler-transporter began the approximately 4-mile, journey from the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) to the launch pad. Once outside the VAB high-bay doors, the Moon rocket will make a planned pause allowing the team to reposition the Crew Access Arm before continuing to the launch pad. The crawler-transporter will move slowly during the trek to the pad with a top cruising speed of .82 mph. The journey is expected to take between six and 12 hours.
After they arrive at the pad, engineers will prepare the integrated rocket and Orion spacecraft for a critical wet dress rehearsal test that includes loading all the propellants.
NASA’s Moon rocket is on the move at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, rolling out of the Vehicle Assembly Building for a 4.2-mile journey to Launch Complex 39B on March 17, 2022. Carried atop the crawler-transporter 2, the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft are venturing to the pad for a wet dress rehearsal ahead of the uncrewed Artemis I launch. Credit: NASA
NASA’s Moon Rocket Revealed Outside Vehicle Assembly Building
The rocket and spacecraft for NASA’s Artemis I mission has fully left Kennedy Space Center’s Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) for the first time on the way to Launch Complex 39B for a wet dress rehearsal test.
The team is in a planned pause outside the building to retract the Crew Access Arm (CAA). The arm interfaces with the Orion spacecraft stacked atop the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket to provide access to the Orion crew module during operations in the VAB and at the launch pad. On crewed Artemis missions beginning with Artemis II, the access arm also will provide entry and exit for astronauts and payloads that will fly aboard. Several days before the rollout began, the arm was moved closer to the rocket to fit through the VAB door. Engineers are extending it to lock it in its travel position.
Once the CAA retraction is complete, the team will continue the four-mile trek to Launch Complex 39B.
NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, with the Orion capsule atop, slowly rolls out of the Vehicle Assembly Building at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on March 17, 2022, on its journey to Launch Complex 39B. Carried atop the crawler-transporter 2, NASA’s Moon rocket is venturing out to the launch pad for a wet dress rehearsal ahead of the uncrewed Artemis I launch. Credit: NASA
NASA’s Moon Rocket Keeps on Rolling to Launch Complex 39B
NASA’s mega-Moon rocket continues its four-mile journey to the launch pad after leaving the Vehicle Assembly Building after a planned stop to adjust the Crew Access Arm. Traveling at a top speed of .82 mph, the crawler-transporter with the Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft atop the mobile launcher is on its way to Launch Complex 39B.
Once at the launch pad, the team will begin final preparations ahead of the wet dress rehearsal test.
And now for a special treat. Ladies and Gentlemen – Eddie Vedder – Invincible
Grammy-award winning artist Eddie Vedder’s “Invincible” video collaboration with NASA is inspired by our Artemis I Moon mission.
Each year, our moon moves distinctly, inexorably farther from Earth—just a tiny bit, about an inch and a half, a nearly imperceptible change. There is no stopping this slow ebbing, no way to turn back the clock. The forces of gravity are invisible and unshakable, and no matter what we do or how we feel about them, they will keep nudging the moon along. Over many millions of years, we’ll continue to grow apart.
Given this rather melodramatic description, you might wonder: Don’t you have better things to think about than the moon? Well no, not really, because I’m a space reporter and it’s my job to contemplate celestial bodies and write about them. And also because a representation of this phenomenon recently played out in China during festivities for the Mid-Autumn Festival, which marks the full moon closest to the fall equinox. A giant balloon designed to resemble the moon, craters and all, broke free and rolled into the street. Video footage of the unscripted moment shows two people running after the massive moon as it tumbles away. Bye!
Can I give you the Moon in a bottle?
The moon used to be closer. When it first formed, about 4.5 billion years ago, molded out of rocky debris that had been floating around Earth, the moon orbited 10 times nearer to the planet than it does today. The debris, scientists believe, had come from a collision between Earth and a mysterious Mars-sized object. Fresh out of the cosmic oven, the moon was hot and molten, glowing red in the night sky. Back then, scientists say, the moon was moving away at a rate of about eight inches per year.
Our planet and its moon were always going to grow apart like this. The gravity of moons, small as they are in comparison, can still tug at their planets, causing the larger worlds to bulge outward a little bit. On an ocean-covered planet like ours, the effect shows up in the shifting tides. The moon pulls at our oceans, but those oceans pull back, making the moon speed up in its orbit. And “if you speed up while orbiting Earth, you are escaping Earth more successfully, so you orbit from a farther distance,” James O’Donoghue, a planetary scientist at JAXA, Japan’s space agency, explained to me. Scientists refer to this phenomenon as “lunar retreat”—a delightful term, as I’d prefer to imagine the moon enjoying itself at a relaxing getaway, bending its rocky body into various yoga poses, rather than slowly ghosting Earth.
Scientists have measured this retreat by beaming lasers at mirrors that the Apollo astronauts left on the moon, using that data, along with other sources, to estimate past movements. The rate of lunar retreat has shifted over the years; spikes have coincided with significant events, such as a bombardment of meteors on the moon and fluctuating ice ages on Earth. The constant retreat has influenced Earth beyond the ebb and flow of its tides. The forces that draw the moon away from us are also slowing down the planet’s rotation, stretching out the length of our days. In the beginning, when the moon was cozying up to us and Earth spun faster, a day lasted just four hours. At the current rate of lunar retreat, it would take a century to tack on an extra two milliseconds or so to the length of the day.
The moon is expected to continue drifting this way for the very scientific measure of forever. And, despite the premise of an upcoming action movie called Moonfall, it’s not going to smack into us either. Someday, about 600 million years from now, the moon will orbit far enough away that humankind will lose one of its oldest cosmic sights: total solar eclipses. The moon won’t be able to block the sun’s light and cast its own shadow onto Earth. But the moon will remain bound to Earth, looking out onto a very different, much hotter version of the planet, as oceans start to evaporate. Of course, a few billion years after that, the sun will derail the moon entirely, and Earth too, when it runs out of fuel, expands, and engulfs the inner solar system in a spectacular act of star death.
This weekend, I looked through a telescope for the first time, into a much calmer solar system. (I know, right? Some space reporter I am!) A neighbor had set one up on my building’s roof, and I tried to pay attention as he explained the different lenses and their amplification capacity, but I was too excited, thinking only, Let me see, let me see. I had seen the moon just as a bright two-dimensional orb in the sky, with dark spots that play tricks on our brains, making us see familiar patterns where none exist. People have interpreted these glyphs in many ways: a human face, the silhouette of a rabbit. What has the moon seen in us? “The moon had been observing the earth close-up longer than anyone,” the Japanese writer Haruki Murakami wrote in his novel 1Q84. “It must have witnessed all of the phenomena occurring—and all of the acts carried out—on this earth.” The moon is still watching. What must it be thinking now, after such a horrid year and a half?
The Moon blocks the Sun in a total Eclipse.
My neighbor swiveled his telescope across the cloudless sky. There was Jupiter and its twisty bands, faint but unmistakable, and three tiny points of light just off to the side—its largest moons. There was Saturn, a perfect ball, its rings sticking out at each side. And then there was the moon: covered in craters and cracks and shadows, so richly textured that the skin of my fingertips prickled at the sight, as if I were rolling the moon around in my hand like a marble, feeling its jagged edges. I decided not to spoil the moment for everyone else on the roof that night by telling them that the moon was, slowly but surely, distancing itself from us. The experience of distance—from our families, from a time of relative normalcy—had already tormented many of us enough. Better to focus on the little image in the lens, on seeing the moon properly for the first time. It may be wishing Earth a very long goodbye, but it was nice to say hello.
Space exploration requires all kinds of interesting solutions to complex problems. There is a branch of NASA designed to support the innovators trying to solve those problems – the Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC). They occasionally hand out grant funding to worthy projects trying to tackle some of these challenges.
The results from one of those grants are now in, and they are intriguing. A team from Masten Space Systems, supported by Honeybee Robotics, Texas A&M, and the University of Central Florida, came up with a way a lunar lander could deposit its own landing pad on the way down.
Lunar dust poses a significant problem to any powered landers on the surface. The retrograde rockets needed to land on the Moon’s surface softly will also kick dust and rock up into the air, potentially damaging the lander itself or any surrounding human infrastructure.
A landing pad would lessen the impact of this dust and provide a more stable place for the landing itself.
Landing with and without the deposition system. (Masten Space Systems)
But constructing such a landing pad the traditional way would be prohibitively expensive. Current estimates put the cost of building a lunar landing pad using traditional materials at approximately US$120 million.
Any such mission also suffers from a chicken and egg problem. How to get the materials to build the landing pad land in place if there is no landing pad to begin with?
The technology Masten has developed is an ingenious solution to both of those problems.
Depositing a landing pad while descending would allow spacefarers to have a landing pad in place before a spacecraft ever touches down there. It would also cost much less to install as all that is needed is a relatively simple additive to the rocket exhaust already being blasted into the surface.
Masten’s general idea is easy enough to understand.
Adding solid pellets into the rocket exhaust would allow that material to partially liquefy and deposit onto the exhaust’s blast zone, potentially hardening it to a point where dust is no longer a factor as it is encapsulated in a hard external shell. Masten believed it could find the right material to add to rocket exhaust to do exactly that.
Success or failure would come down to the physical properties of the additive pellets. Any additive with too much heat tolerance wouldn’t melt appropriately in the rocket exhaust, essentially bombarding the surface with tiny bullets.
On the other hand, any additive with too little heat tolerance could be completely melted by the rocket exhaust and vaporized into a useless cloud.
To find the perfect balance, Masten developed a two-tiered system, with relatively large (0.5 mm) alumina particles used to create a base layer of 1 mm of melted lunar surface combined with alumina.
Process of the FAST particle injector. (Masten Space Systems)
Then, as the lander got closer to the base layer, the additive would switch to a 0.024 mm alumina particle, which would deposit at 650 m/s onto the base layer and create a 6 m diameter landing pad that would cool in 2.5 seconds.
That all sounds like a pretty impressive idea, but it is still early days. Like many federal grants, the NIAC grant focused on developing this depositable landing pad idea takes a phased approach. Most of the Phase I, which has just been completed, focused on proving the idea is feasible, which Masten believes it is.
Feasible is not the same as functional, but that is precisely what NIAC grants are supposed to support – wild ideas that might just fundamentally change some aspect of space exploration.
If Masten is correct and the approach is possible and can be scaled up, landing pads might be seen cropping up all over the lunar surface. And eventually all over Mars as well.
The hefty rocket will launch the Artemis 1 moon mission, but first NASA has to put all the parts together and run a lot of tests.
This patriotic view from Sept. 17 shows an American flag with the SLS rocket under assembly at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.
NASA/Frank Michaux
If you enjoy awe-inspiring feats of design and engineering, then take a moment out of your day to stare deeply into the latest images of NASA’s extremely large Space Launch System rocket. It’s the most powerful rocket NASA has ever built, and it shows in the grand scale of the beast.
SLS is coming together at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida where it will eventually be used to launch the uncrewed Artemis 1 mission to send an Orion spacecraft around the moon. While SLS has been expected to blast off as soon as this year, no one will be surprised if the big event slips into 2022.
SLS has multiple umbilicals that feed power, coolant, fuel and communications to the rocket. When the rocket ignites and lifts off, the umbilical arms swing out of the way. It’s an important bit of launch choreography. The URRT is all about making sure those systems are working correctly.
Artemis 1 will be a key first step to test SLS and the Orion spacecraft. There will be no humans on board, but it will set the stage for future crewed missions aimed at ultimately returning humans to the surface of our lunar neighbor. It’s been decades since people were last there during the Apollo era of the 1960s and 1970s.
The SLS core stage (the center part) stands 212 feet (65 meters) tall and weighs 188,000 pounds (85,275 kilograms). The Orion spacecraft will eventually be added to the top of SLS like a crown. When SLS finally launches, it will signal the beginning of the Artemis era and perhaps make the moon feel a little more in reach for humanity once again.
Path to the Pad: NASA Moon Rocket Comes Together for Artemis
Artemis 1
NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket is on its path to the pad for Artemis I, the first integrated mission of SLS and NASA’s Orion spacecraft through the agency’s Artemis program. Before it launches from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the agency’s Exploration Ground Systems (EGS) and Jacobs teams at the spaceport stack the different elements of the SLS rocket on top of the mobile launcher inside the iconic Vehicle Assembly Building. So large that it’s a Florida Space Coast landmark, the VAB as well as the mobile launcher have been specially outfitted to accommodate SLS and Orion. Once fully assembled, the upgraded crawler-transporter will carry the skyscraper-sized duo to the launch pad for NASA’s next-generation Moon missions.
With the Artemis program, NASA will land the first woman and the first person of color on the Moon and establish sustainable exploration in preparation for missions to Mars. SLS and NASA’s Orion spacecraft, along with the commercial human landing system and the Gateway in orbit around the Moon, are NASA’s backbone for deep space exploration. SLS is the only rocket that can send Orion, astronauts, and supplies to the Moon in a single mission.
Saturn V, SLS, Falcon Heavy, StarShip 1, Falcon 9 all on launch pad 39-A
Blasting off in a rocket is an expensive, difficult and dangerous way to get to the Moon. Colin Stuart looks into another way we could travel there and back.
By Colin Stuart
What do you see when you look at the Moon? Beauty? Craters? Some people see dollar signs. You’ll occasionally see our only natural satellite billed as ‘Earth’s eighth continent’ because it’s full of resources that are hard to ignore. A rare form of helium, helium-3, could be used in fusion power stations here on Earth. Rare elements, such as neodymium, could be extracted and returned home for use in smartphones and other electronics.
But how do we get them here without blowing all the profits on rockets? According to a study published in 2019, a lunar elevator could be the answer. A cable anchored to the lunar surface would stretch most of the 400,000km (250,000 miles) home. It couldn’t be directly attached to the Earth, due to the relative motions of the two objects, but it could terminate high in Earth orbit.
That would have the added benefit of placing it above the bulk of our space junk, a growing problem as we launch ever more satellites. Solar-powered robotic shuttles could move up and down the cable, acting as a conveyor belt to ferry precious resources our way.Advertisement
It may sound like an outlandish prospect, but Zephyr Penoyre and Emily Sandford – the two University of Columbia astronomy PhD candidates behind the study – believe we could pull it off for a few billion US dollars.
To put that into context, Jeff Bezos liquidates $1bn (over £700m) of his Amazon stock every year to fund his Blue Origin space tourism company. NASA’s Artemis programe, which is sending the first female astronaut and first astronaut of colour to the Moon later this decade, is costing $86bn (£60bn). Such is the value of the Moon’s resources, a separate study estimated that a lunar elevator would pay for itself within just 53 trips.
Now you may be wondering how on Earth could we build something like this? And the answer is: really cool physics. In fact, scientists and engineers have developed a couple of theories for the possible construction of the space elevator.
The first involves something called centripetal force. Let’s imagine you have a piece of string with a ball on the end. When you pull on the string to spin the ball in a circle, the string stays taut. It is continuously pulling the ball inward to keep it circling (we call this centripetal force).
The cable, which would be no thicker than a pencil, would weigh 40 tonnes – well within the remit of modern rockets, such as SpaceX’s Starship. Unlike a space elevator that would travel from Earth’s surface into space, a lunar elevator stopping slightly shy of our planet wouldn’t have to contend with huge gravitational forces.
The Moon has no atmosphere either, which simplifies matters. That means the cable could be made from existing materials, such as Kevlar, instead of the yet-to-be-invented super-strong materials needed for an Earth-to-space elevator.
A satellite launched into geostationary orbit provides a counterweight, like the ball on a string. A tether made of strong and flexible carbon nanotubes would be lowered down from the satellite and anchored to the earth near the equator.
We could also combine the two. In April 2021, Chinese state-run media presented the country’s idea for a ‘Sky Ladder’. This would see a spacecraft winched up an elevator from Earth’s surface to a waiting space station, before being flung towards the Moon where it would meet another elevator that would lower it down to the lunar surface.
The idea of space elevators has been around for over a century without much progress. But if enough people – or, more likely, corporations – become enamoured with the chance of making big bucks, we could see the lunar equivalent of a gold rush in the decades ahead. Elevators could well turn out to be a way to keep costs down and profits literally sky-high.
Japan Takes Tiny First Step Toward Space Elevator Two mini-satellites will test elevator motion in space as part of research for an elevator between Earth and low orbit.
This illustration depicts a conceptual Lunar Crater Radio Telescope on the Moon’s far side. The early-stage concept is being studied under grant funding from the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts program but is not a NASA mission.
Credit: Vladimir Vustyansky
The early-stage NASA concept could see robots hang wire mesh in a crater on the Moon’s far side, creating a radio telescope to help probe the dawn of the universe.
After years of development, the Lunar Crater Radio Telescope (LCRT) project has been awarded $500,000 to support additional work as it enters Phase II of NASA’s Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program. While not yet a NASA mission, the LCRT describes a mission concept that could transform humanity’s view of the cosmos.
The LCRT’s primary objective would be to measure the long-wavelength radio waves generated by the cosmic Dark Ages – a period that lasted for a few hundred million years after the Big Bang, but before the first stars blinked into existence. Cosmologists know little about this period, but came the answers to some of science’s biggest mysteries may be locked in the long-wavelength radio emissions generated by the gas that would have filled the universe during that time.
“While there were no stars, there was ample hydrogen during the universe’s Dark Ages – hydrogen that would eventually serve as the raw material for the first stars,” said Joseph Lazio, radio astronomer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California and a member of the LCRT team. “With a sufficiently large radio telescope off Earth, we could track the processes that would lead to the formation of the first stars, maybe even find clues to the nature of dark matter.”
Radio telescopes on Earth can’t probe this mysterious period because the long-wavelength radio waves from that time are reflected by a layer of ions and electrons at the top of our atmosphere, a region called the ionosphere. Random radio emissions from our noisy civilization can interfere with radio astronomy as well, drowning out the faintest signals.
But on the Moon’s far side, there’s no atmosphere to reflect these signals, and the Moon itself would block Earth’s radio chatter. The lunar far side could be prime real estate to carry out unprecedented studies of the early universe.
“Radio telescopes on Earth cannot see cosmic radio waves at about 33 feet [10 meters] or longer because of our ionosphere, so there’s a whole region of the universe that we simply cannot see,” said Saptarshi Bandyopadhyay, a robotics technologist at JPL and the lead researcher on the LCRT project. “But previous ideas of building a radio antenna on the Moon have been very resource intensive and complicated, so we were compelled to come up with something different.”
The conceptual radio telescope could be constructed from a wire mesh dish inside a crater. In this illustration, the receiver can be seen suspended over the dish via a system of cables anchored at the crater’s rim.
Credit: Vladimir Vustyansky
Building Telescopes With Robots
To be sensitive to long radio wavelengths, the LCRT would need to be huge. The idea is to create an antenna over half-a-mile (1 kilometer) wide in a crater over 2 miles (3 kilometers) wide. The biggest single-dish radio telescopes on Earth – like the 1,600-foot (500-meter) Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope (FAST) in China and the now-inoperative 1,000-foot-wide (305-meter-wide) Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico – were built inside natural bowl-like depressions in the landscape to provide a support structure.
This class of radio telescope uses thousands of reflecting panels suspended inside the depression to make the entire dish’s surface reflective to radio waves. The receiver then hangs via a system of cables at a focal point over the dish, anchored by towers at the dish’s perimeter, to measure the radio waves bouncing off the curved surface below. But despite its size and complexity, even FAST is not sensitive to radio wavelengths longer than about 14 feet (4.3 meters).
With his team of engineers, roboticists, and scientists at JPL, Bandyopadhyay condensed this class of radio telescope down to its most basic form. Their concept eliminates the need to transport prohibitively heavy material to the Moon and utilizes robots to automate the construction process. Instead of using thousands of reflective panels to focus incoming radio waves, the LCRT would be made of thin wire mesh in the center of the crater. One spacecraft would deliver the mesh, and a separate lander would deposit DuAxel rovers to build the dish over several days or weeks.
DuAxel, a robotic concept being developed at JPL, is composed of two single-axle rovers (called Axel) that can undock from each other but stay connected via a tether. One half would act as an anchor at the rim of the crater as the other rappels down to do the building.
“DuAxel solves many of the problems associated with suspending such a large antenna inside a lunar crater,” said Patrick Mcgarey, also a robotics technologist at JPL and a team member of the LCRT and DuAxel projects. “Individual Axel rovers can drive into the crater while tethered, connect to the wires, apply tension, and lift the wires to suspend the antenna.”
The Moon’s surface is covered in craters, and one of the natural like depressions could provide a support structure for a radio telescope dish. As shown in this illustration, DuAxel rovers could anchor the wire mesh from the crater’s rim.
Credit: Vladimir Vustyansky
Identifying Challenges
For the team to take the project to the next level, they’ll use NIAC Phase II funding to refine the capabilities of the telescope and the various mission approaches while identifying the challenges along the way.
One of the team’s biggest challenges during this phase is the design of the wire mesh. To maintain its parabolic shape and precise spacing between the wires, the mesh must be both strong and flexible, yet lightweight enough to be transported. The mesh must also be able to withstand the wild temperature changes on the Moon’s surface – from as low as minus 280 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 173 degrees Celsius) to as high as 260 degrees Fahrenheit (127 degrees Celsius) – without warping or failing.
Another challenge is to identify whether the DuAxel rovers should be fully automated or involve a human operator in the decision-making process. Might the construction DuAxels also be complemented by other construction techniques? Firing harpoons into the lunar surface, for example, may better anchor the LCRT’s mesh, requiring fewer robots.
Also, while the lunar far side is “radio quiet” for now, that may change in the future. China’s space agency currently has a mission exploring the lunar far side, after all, and further development of the lunar surface could impact possible radio astronomy projects.
For the next two years, the LCRT team will work to identify other challenges and questions as well. Should they be successful, they may be selected for further development, an iterative process that inspires Bandyopadhyay.
“The development of this concept could produce some significant breakthroughs along the way, particularly for deployment technologies and the use of robots to build gigantic structures off Earth,” he said. “I’m proud to be working with this diverse team of experts who inspire the world to think of big ideas that can make groundbreaking discoveries about the universe we live in.”
In this image you can see the concept of a mesh of wire covering the inside of the crater which would be installed by robots. NASA says putting it on the far side of the Moon allows the Moon itself to shield it from Earth noise.
NIAC is funded by NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, which is responsible for developing the new cross-cutting technologies and capabilities needed by the agency.
News Media Contact
Ian J. O’Neill Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 818-354-2649 ian.j.oneill@jpl.nasa.gov
Clare Skelly NASA Headquarters, Washington 202-358-4273 clare.a.skelly@nasa.gov
What’s Up for May? This month, a rocky planet round-up, and a super blood Moon eclipse!
May 3: The bright planet Saturn will appear to the left of the half-lit Moon.May 4: The Moon forms a large triangle in the east-southeast with the bright planets Saturn and Jupiter.
Mid-May: You’ll have an opportunity to see all four of the rocky, inner planets of our solar system at the same time, with your own eyes.
May 26: Watch for a total lunar eclipse during the second supermoon of 2021.
Beginning mid-May, if you can find a clear view toward the western horizon, you’ll have an opportunity to see all four of the rocky, inner planets of our solar system at the same time, with your own eyes.
See all four inner planets (including Earth!) after sunset, beginning mid-May. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Starting around May 14th, cast your gaze to the west about half an hour after sunset, local time to see if you can spot Mercury, Venus, and Mars. (And well, Earth is kind of hard to miss.)
To see near the horizon, you need an unobstructed view – free of nearby trees and buildings. Some of the best places for this are the shores of lakes or the beach, open plains, or high up on a mountain or tall building.
In addition to the planets, from around the 14th through the 17th, the crescent Moon joins the party for a lovely planetary tableau. Now, Venus will be really low in the sky. (It’ll be easier to observe on its own later in the summer.) But for now, take advantage of this opportunity to observe all of the inner planets in a single view.
The Moon usually appears reddish in color during lunar eclipses because of sunlight filtered through Earth’s atmosphere. Credit: NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio
May 26 brings a total lunar eclipse. Over several hours, the Moon will pass through Earth’s shadow, causing it to darken and usually become reddish in color. The red color comes from sunlight filtering through Earth’s atmosphere – a ring of light created by all the sunrises and sunsets happening around our planet at that time.
Because of the reddish color, a lunar eclipse is often called a “blood moon.” Just how red it will look is hard to predict, but dust in the atmosphere can have an effect. (And keep in mind there have been a couple of prominent volcanic eruptions recently.)
Lunar eclipses take place when the Moon is full, and this full Moon happens when the Moon is also near its closest point to Earth in its orbit, often called a “supermoon.”
Unlike solar eclipses, which you should never look at, it’s safe to view lunar eclipses with your eyes. And unlike solar eclipses, which tend to have a narrower viewing path, lunar eclipses are at least partly visible anywhere on the planet’s night side.
This map shows the global visibility of the May 2021 lunar eclipse. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Now, eclipses happen at the same moment no matter where you are on Earth, but what time your clock reads during the eclipse depends, of course, on your time zone. The best viewing for this eclipse is in the Pacific Rim – that’s the western parts of the Americas, Australia and New Zealand, and Eastern Asia. For the U.S., the best viewing will be in Hawaii, Alaska, and the western states.
The May 2021 lunar eclipse will be best viewed in Hawaii, Alaska, and the western U.S. states. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
For the Eastern U.S., the eclipse begins for you during dawn twilight. You may be able to observe the first part of the eclipse as the Moon just starts to darken, but the Moon will be near or on the horizon as Earth’s shadow begins to cover it.
The farther west you are, the more of the eclipse you’ll be able to see before the Moon sets that morning. Those in the western half of the country will be able to see almost the entire eclipse.
So if you’re in the path of this eclipse, check your local times for the best viewing near you. And if you’re in the U.S., be prepared to get up early if you want to see this rare celestial event: a super blood moon eclipse.
Daily Guide
May 1: May Day Saturday, May 1, 2021, will be May Day. We currently divide the year into four seasons based upon the solstices and equinoxes, with summer starting on the summer solstice in June. This approximates summer as the quarter of the year with the warmest temperatures.
Much of pre-Christian northern Europe celebrated “cross-quarter days” – halfway between the solstices and equinoxes – dividing the seasons on these days. Using this older definition, summer was the quarter of the year with the longest daily periods of daylight, starting on Beltane, traditionally celebrated on May 1st (the middle of our spring). Many of the European May Day traditions trace back to these earlier celebrations of the start of summer.
May 3 Monday morning, May 3, 2021, the planet Saturn will appear to the left of the half-lit Moon. Saturn will appear about 8 degrees to the left of the Moon as the pair rises in the east-southeast at 2:22 a.m. EDT. Saturn will appear about 7 degrees to the upper left of the Moon as morning twilight begins at 5:03 a.m.
Monday afternoon, the waning Moon will appear half-full as it reaches its last quarter at 3:50 p.m. EDT.
May 4 By Tuesday morning, May 4, 2021, the Moon will have shifted to form a large triangle in the east-southeast with the planets Saturn and Jupiter. Saturn will rise first at 2:17 a.m. EDT. The Moon and Jupiter will rise to the lower left of Saturn at about the same time at 3:01 and 3:02 a.m., with Jupiter about 10 degrees farther to the left of the Moon. The Moon will appear about 18 degrees above the southeastern horizon by the time morning twilight begins at 5:02 a.m.
May 5 By Wednesday morning, May 5, 2021, the Moon will appear to have shifted to about 6 degrees below Jupiter, rising in the east-southeast at 3:33 a.m. EDT about 1.5 hours before the start of morning twilight at 5:01 a.m., with Saturn appearing farther to the upper right.
May 11 On Tuesday afternoon, May 11, 2021, at about 1:24 p.m. EDT (2021-May-11 17:24 UTC with 12 minutes uncertainty), Near-Earth Object (2021 GK1), between 33 to 74 feet (10 and 23 meters) across, will pass the Earth at 1.5 lunar distances traveling at 4,500 miles per hour (2.01 kilometers per second).
Tuesday at 3:00 p.m. EDT will be the new Moon, when the Moon passes between the Earth and the Sun and will not be visible from the Earth. Since this New Moon is near when the Moon is farthest from the Earth in its orbit, some have started using the term “micro-moon” to indicate the opposite of a “supermoon.”
Tuesday at 5:54 p.m. EDT, the Moon will be at apogee, its farthest from the Earth for this orbit.
May 11-12 The day of – or the day after – the New Moon marks the start of the new month for most lunisolar calendars. Sundown on May 11, 2021, marks the start of Sivan in the Hebrew calendar. The fourth month of the Chinese calendar starts on May 12, 2021 (at midnight in China’s time zone, which is 12 hours ahead of EDT). In the Islamic calendar, the months start with the first sighting of the waxing crescent Moon after the New Moon. Depending upon whether the crescent Moon is actually seen (for many Muslim communities, seen from the holy city of Mecca), Sundown on Wednesday, May 12, 2021, may mark the start of Shawwal and the end of the holy month of Ramadan. This marks the end of the month-long fast of Ramadan and the start of Eid al-Fitr, a feast that can last up to three days in some countries.
Early on Wednesday evening, May 12, 2021, you might be able to see the very thin, waxing crescent Moon low on the horizon in the west-northwest, appearing to the left of Venus from about 30 minutes after sunset until the pair sets about 5 minutes before evening twilight ends. However, the sky might be too bright and the crescent Moon too thin to see without binoculars or a telescope.
May 13 Early on Thursday evening, May 13, 2021, the planet Mercury will appear about 3 degrees to the right of the thin, waxing crescent Moon. The pair will appear about 8 degrees above the horizon in the west-northwest as evening twilight ends (at 9:19 p.m. EDT) and Mercury will set first about 47 minutes later at 10:06 p.m. with moonset about 6 minutes later.
May 15 Saturday evening, May 15, 2021, will be when the planet Mercury will reach its highest above the horizon as evening twilight ends for this apparition, about 7 degrees above the west-northwestern horizon.
Also on Saturday evening, the waxing crescent Moon will appear in the west-northwest to the lower right of the planet Mars, with the pair setting around midnight.
May 16 By Sunday night, May 16, 2021, the waxing crescent Moon will have shifted to appear to the lower left of the bright star Pollux, with the pair setting about 3.5 hours after evening twilight ends (Monday morning at around 12:49 a.m. EDT)
May 17 Monday morning, May 17, 2021, will be when the planet Mercury reaches its greatest angular separation from the Sun as seen from the Earth for this apparition (called greatest elongation), appearing half-lit through a large enough telescope. Because the angle of the line between the Sun and Mercury and the horizon changes with the seasons, the date when Mercury and the Sun appear farthest apart as seen from the Earth is not the same as when Mercury appears highest above the horizon as evening twilight ends.
May 19 On Wednesday afternoon, May 19, 2021, the Moon will appear half-full as it reaches its first quarter at 3:13 p.m. EDT. Beginning Wednesday evening, the bright planet Venus will join Mercury above the horizon in the west-northwest as evening twilight ends.
May 19-20 On Wednesday night into Thursday morning, May 19 to 20, the waxing half-full Moon will appear above the bright star Regulus, with Regulus setting first early on Thursday morning at around 2:07 a.m. EDT.
May 23-24 On Sunday night into Monday morning, May 23 to 24, the waxing gibbous Moon will appear to the left of the bright star Spica, initially about 7 degrees apart and separating through the night, with Spica setting first on Monday morning at around 3:52 a.m. EDT.
In late May or early June 2021 (2021-May-25 09:26 UTC with 7 days, 17 hours, 11 minutes uncertainty), Near-Earth Object (2013 VO11), between 19 to 43 feet (6 and 13 meters) across, will pass the Earth at between 3.1 and 43.4 lunar distances (nominally 3.4), traveling at 22,800 miles per hour (10.18 kilometers per second).
May 25 Tuesday night, May 25, 2021, at 9:51 p.m. EDT, the Moon will be at perigee, its closest to the Earth for this orbit.
May 26 May 26 brings a total lunar eclipse. Over several hours, the Moon will pass through Earth’s shadow, causing it to darken and usually become reddish in color. The red color comes from sunlight filtering through Earth’s atmosphere – a ring of light created by all the sunrises and sunsets happening around our planet at that time.
The best viewing for this eclipse is in the Pacific Rim – that’s the western parts of the Americas, Australia and New Zealand, and Eastern Asia. For the U.S., the best viewing will be in Hawaii, Alaska, and the western states.
Lunar eclipses take place when the Moon is full, and this full Moon happens when the Moon is also near its closest point to Earth in its orbit, often called a “supermoon.”
This is the second supermoon of 2021 and it occurs at 7:14 a.m. EDT Wednesday. (The first supermoon of the year was on April 26.) The Moon will appear full from Monday evening through Thursday morning.
A sycamore Moon Tree planted at Mississippi State University in 1975 is the parent tree to many second-generation trees called Half-Moon Trees.
Credits: NASA/Will Bryan
The craters, mountains, and plains of the Moon stretched beneath the Apollo 14 Command and Service Module Kitty Hawk in February 1971. While Commander Alan Shepard and Lunar Module Pilot Edgar Mitchell explored the Fra Mauro region of Earth’s celestial neighbor, Command Module Pilot Stuart Roosa conducted observations, experiments, and scientific investigations in lunar orbit.
Flying passively in Roosa’s personal travel kit on Kitty Hawk 50 years ago was a canister of approximately 400-500 loblolly pine, sweet gum, redwood, Douglas fir, and sycamore tree seeds. Upon return, the seeds were germinated and grew into “Moon Trees” found around the U.S. and world.
“The historic voyages of the Apollo program were about bold exploration and incredible scientific discovery,” says acting NASA Chief Historian Brian Odom. “Apollo 14 included the widest range of scientific experiments to that point in the program, but in the case of Roosa’s ‘Moon Trees’, it was what the astronauts took with them on their lunar journey that has left such an indelible mark on the landscape back on Earth.”
A joint effort between NASA and the U.S. Forest Service, the seeds were flown as an experiment to determine the effects of deep space on seeds and also to help raise awareness about the Forest Service and the wildland forest firefighters called smokejumpers. Roosa served as a smokejumper in the 1950s – jumping out of airplanes to combat the blazes – before becoming a military aviator and astronaut.
Ed Cliff, chief of the Forest Service, came up with the Moon Tree concept. Cliff knew of Roosa from Roosa’s time as a smokejumper, and he contacted the astronaut to propose the idea. Stan Krugman, a geneticist at the Forest Service, was placed in charge of the project and selected the seeds that flew into lunar orbit on Apollo 14.
Following the mission, the canister ruptured during decontamination processes, and the seeds were mixed together. The experiment’s environment was compromised, and the seeds were feared to be dead. Nonetheless, they were sent to Forest Service offices in Gulfport, Mississippi, and Placerville, California, to see if any could be germinated and grown into saplings. Some 450 saplings were grown.
Moon Tree saplings were gifted to schools, universities, parks, and government offices, many as part of the U.S. bicentennial celebrations in 1976. Locations were chosen, in part, to ensure proper climate conditions for the respective tree species.
Moon Trees were planted across the U.S. and the world. Known locations of trees can be at the link below.
In a telegram to U.S. Bicentennial Moon Tree planting ceremonies, then-President Gerald Ford said, “This tree which was carried by Astronauts Stuart Roosa, Alan Shepard, and Edgar Mitchell on their mission to the Moon, is a living symbol of our spectacular human and scientific achievements. It is a fitting tribute to our national space program which has brought out the best of American patriotism, dedication, and determination to succeed.”
Some trees were planted beside their Earth-grown counterparts. After decades of growth, no discernable differences can be found between the trees that grew from seeds that traveled to the Moon and those that never left Earth.
A Half-Moon Tree stands sentry outside Building 4708 at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight in Huntsville, Alabama, one of the buildings that helped develop the Saturn V rocket that launched astronauts to Moon in 1968-1972.
Credits: NASA/Brian Odom
Second-generation trees, grown from Moon Tree seeds, are sometimes known as Half-Moon Trees and are also growing around the world. One such Half-Moon Tree calls NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, its home as it stands outside a building that played a key role in development of the Saturn V rocket that launched the Apollo 14 mission.
As NASA and its international, industrial, and academic partners prepare to return humans to the Moon as part of the Artemis program, understanding the effects of deep space on plant growth is critical – a foundation the Apollo 14 mission help lay. Astronauts on the Moon and Mars will be too far from Earth for regular resupply missions carrying fresh food, so they must be able to grow their own.
Experiments on the International Space Station are studying the growth of various plants and crops, which could be used as food for spacefaring astronauts. In November 2020, NASA astronaut Kate Rubins, a member of the Expedition 64 crew, harvested a crop of radishes. Other crops grown on the space station include red romaine lettuce, Mizuna mustard greens, and zinnia flowers.
All crops grown in space have Apollo 14 in their roots. Five decades after the mission that took seeds to the Moon, the trees that grew from the seeds stand as living, leafy testaments to humanity’s first voyages to the Moon, while the crops grown in space since enable the continuation of humanity’s exploration of the cosmos.
Evidence of water in the shadows of craters or locked up in glassy beads like microscopic snow-globes has recently revealed the Moon’s surface is far less desiccated than we ever imagined.
Just where this veneer of ice water came from is a mystery astronomers are currently trying to solve. One surprising possibility emerging is an elemental rain from our own atmosphere, delivered by
Earth’s magnetic field. Water isn’t exactly a rare substance in space. Given suitable places to hide, it can be sloshing around inside asteroids, coating comets, and even clinging precariously to the darkness of Mercury’s craters.
It makes sense at least some of it will splash onto the Moon every now and then. But with the Sun’s scorching heat and lacking protection from the vacuum of space, it’s not expected to last very long. To account for the surprising amount of moisture being found on the lunar surface, researchers have proposed a more dynamic form of production – a constant ‘rain’ of protons driven by the solar wind. These hydrogen ions smack into mineral oxides in the Moon’s dust and rocks, ripping apart chemical bonds and forming a loose, temporary alliance with the oxygen.
It’s a solid hypothesis, one that would be given a boost by observations of the more exposed (and more loosely bound) water molecules quickly succumbing to the vacuum of space whenever the Moon is sheltered from solar wind.
Our own planet happens to be pretty well protected from the constant breeze of ions blown from the Sun, thanks to a bubble of magnetism surrounding it. This force field not only surrounds us, it is blown into a tear-drop shape by the solar onslaught. For a few days each month, the Moon passes through this magnetosphere, receiving a brief respite from the Sun’s proton downpour.
An international team of researchers recently used plasma and magnetic field instruments on the Japanese Kaguya orbiter to pinpoint this precise timing in the Moon’s orbit. Spectral data from Chandrayaan-1’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3) were then used to map the distribution of water across the Moon’s surface at its highest latitudes.
The results weren’t quite what anybody expected. In short, nothing happened. The time-series of the Moon’s watery signature revealed no appreciable difference in the three to five days spent hidden from the Sun’s wind.
These results could mean a few things. One is that the whole solar wind hypothesis is a bust, and other reservoirs are responsible for replenishing the Moon’s surface water.
But another intriguing possibility that doesn’t require us to ditch the solar wind idea is that Earth’s magnetic field simply picks up where the Sun leaves off.
Past research has suggested the sheet of plasma associated with our planet’s magnetosphere could deliver about the same amount of hydrogen ions as the solar wind, especially towards the lunar poles.
It’s not all delivered with quite the same amount of punch, admittedly, but the researchers hypothesise even the occasional heavy-hitting hydrogen ion could potentially create more than its fair share of water. And lower-energy protons might be more easily held in place, therefore less likely to fall apart in the moments after they’re formed.
There’s also every possibility that oxygen from the upper reaches of the atmosphere above our poles is carried across the vast stretch of emptiness to collide with the Moon, especially during periods of enhanced geomagnetic activity.
If this all sounds rather speculative, that’s because it is. Right now, we only have a rather surprising map of water that doesn’t quite align with favoured models. But it points in some exciting new directions for the emerging field of Moon hydrodynamics. Since the researchers only mapped the water distribution at higher latitudes, it’ll be worth looking closer to the equator for the predicted losses in the future. On a practical front, we might need to rely heavily on a replenishing supply of lunar frost for fuel and life support one day, should the Moon become a stepping stone for space exploration.
If nothing else, we’re slowly piecing together an understanding of a water cycle in space that helps us better understand the connections between our planet and its only natural satellite.
This research was published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters.
First there were the Thunderbirds one of the first Gerry Anderson “Supermarionation” future shows for kids where he brought is Space Stations and Rocketships that took us on a patrol of our Luna / Terra system. When he got to his live action shows UFO and Space1999 he showed us how teams might live in space and on the Lunar Surface. Today we get to see what NASA and the ESA have in store for the Satellites and Moon Base habitats for the future.
The First of these Stations will be known as Gateway, and she will be used to be the place were goods, supplies and personal to get ready for trips to the Lunar Surface and then to Mars. | WBJ
By Carten Cordell – Staff Reporter, Washington Business JournalNov 18, 2020, 3:04pm EST
Northrop Grumman Corp. (NYSE: NOC) has completed initial designs on a new craft to help astronauts get to the moon, less than four years before the U.S. plans to resume its lunar exploration program.
Executives with the Falls Church contractor detailed completion Wednesday of a preliminary design review of the Habitation and Logistics Outpost (HALO) spacecraft, a modified version of Northrop’s Cygnus spacecraft that will serve as astronaut living quarters and lunar orbiting outpost that NASA has dubbed Gateway.
You can find this poster at the NASA website.
Tthe design takes the Cygnus spacecraft — which is currently used to deliver “supplies, equipment and experiments to the International Space Station” — and adds command and control systems, environmental control and life support systems, Northrop executives said in a release Wednesday.
HALO
“By basing the HALO module on Cygnus, we are able to deliver an affordable and reliable flight-proven product on an accelerated timeline,” Steve Krein, Northrop’s vice president of civil and commercial satellites, said in a statement. “Maturing HALO through its preliminary design marks a major milestone in the module’s production.”
HALO will serve as both an orbiting habitat and rendezvous point for astronauts descending to and returning from the moon’s surface.
HALO is designed to support four astronauts for 30 days when docked with NASA’s Orion spacecraft, which will transport the astronauts from Earth on a series of new lunar missions projected to start in 2024.
Northrop secured a $187 million contract from the space agency in June for preliminary designs of the HALO spacecraft.
Colorado-based Maxar Technologies (NYSE: MAXR) is building the Power and Propulsion Element (PPE), a 60-kilowatt solar propulsion spacecraft that will provide “power, high-rate communications, attitude control and orbital transfer capabilities” to Gateway in combination with HALO.
Both HALO and the PPE are projected to launch in 2023. Northrop is also partnering with Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) founder Jeff Bezos’s space company Blue Origin LLC and Lockheed Martin Corp. (NYSE: LMT) to design a new lunar lander system.
HERMES
HERMES, short for Heliophysics Environmental and Radiation Measurement Experiment Suite, will glimpse what’s happening deep in the magnetotail, allowing NASA to compare its observations to two of the five THEMIS spacecraft, a pair of Moon-orbiters that carry some similar instruments as HERMES. The ability to collect data simultaneously from the three instrument suites in different locations will provide a rare opportunity to reconstruct solar wind behavior as it changes over time.
HERMES will measure lower energy radiation that will be considered for astronaut safety where applicable, but its primary goal is scientific.
“The deep space environment is harsh, but by understanding space weather and solar activity we can properly mitigate risks to our astronauts and hardware,” said Jacob Bleacher, chief exploration scientist in the Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate at NASA headquarters in Washington. “HERMES and ERSA are a perfect example of the synergy between science and exploration.”
HERMES is led by NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, in Greenbelt, Maryland. It consists of four instruments mounted together on a platform: A magnetometer, which measures the magnetic fields around Gateway, the Miniaturized Electron pRoton Telescope, or MERiT, which measures ions and electrons; the Electron Electrostatic Analyzer, or EEA, which measures the lower energy electrons that make up most of the solar wind, and the Solar Probe Analyzer for Ions, or SPAN-I, which measures protons and ions including oxygen. The magnetometer, MERiT and EEA are provided by Goddard; SPAN-I is built at the University of California, Berkeley
Northrop Grumman executives said the company has completed a initial preliminary design review on the new Habitation and Logistics Outpost (HALO) spacecraft, which will orbit the moon and serve as an outpost to service NASA’s future lunar missions in 2024.
ERSA
ERSA, or European Radiation Sensors Array, will study the solar wind’s effects on astronauts and their equipment. Equipped with five instruments, ERSA measures energetic particles from the Sun, galactic cosmic rays, neutrons, ions, and magnetic fields around the Gateway. Measuring these particles can tell us about the physics of radiation in the solar system, and understand the risks posed by radiation to human spacefarers and their hardware.
“Understanding the changing radiation environment around the Moon and at the Gateway is important if we are to understand the potential dangers astronauts will face and how to address them. It also helps us to understand and predict space weather across the Earth-Moon system,” said James Carpenter, ESA’s Exploration Science Coordinator.
When Artemis III, the first crewed Artemis mission, finally touches down on the lunar surface, that moment is going to be like Apollo 11 all over again…but then what?
NASA has finally released a rundown of the ultracool science objectives for Artemis III, including field geology, sample collection and return, and experiments that will be flown to the Moon from Earth to see how they will turn out in a lunar environment. The science done on this mission has the potential to shed more light on the evolution of the Moon and its interactions with the Sun, Earth and other celestial bodies. It could even demystify more about how the Moon really formed or how water and other volatiles (substances that can easily vaporize) landed there. While Artemis III might not find out everything, it will definitely shine more light on the Moon.
“We wanted to bring together what was most compelling to the science community at the Moon with what astronauts can do on the lunar surface and how the two can mutually reinforce each other,” said Renee Weber, Artemis III Science Definition Team co-chair and chief scientist at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, who led the official report of what will take scientific priority for Artemis astronauts. “The team’s hard work will ensure we’re able to take advantage of the potential of the Artemis III mission to help us learn from the Moon as a gateway to the rest of the solar system.”
The space agency has seven objectives that are meant to take lunar science to the next level. While robotic missions have beamed back some amazing finds, adding the human element can only take the discoveries of those missions further. NASA’s first objective is to understand the geophysical processes that happened and are still happening on the Moon. This could illuminate more about phenomena such as ancient volcanic eruptions. Objective two will delve into lunar volatiles at the poles, primarily water ice, as a way of peering back in time to their origin. The third objective is to interpret the history of impacts between the Earth and the Moon—this could potentially be the last word on whether the Moon was once a piece of our planet or a planetoid that was captured by Earth’s gravity.
What could the Moon have crashed into when the universe was young and temperamental? Artemis III science could tell us. Credit: NASA
Seeing the Sun from a lunar point of view is also an advantage for the fourth objective, which is to look billions of years into the past, when our star was young and the solar system was temperamental. Things were crashing into each other all the time back then. This could relate to some of the previous objectives because asteroids or comets carrying water or other volatiles probably smacked into the Moon as objects continued to fly around in utter chaos for eons. The fifth objective also uses the unique POV to observe our cosmic surroundings from somewhere else; imagine flipping locations and gazing up at Earth every night instead of the Moon.
As a different take on that, the sixth objective is to pull off science experiments on the Moon to see what would happen as opposed to results on the home planet.
Objective six could also help with the seventh objective, which is figuring out how to explore with the least risk possible. That is really going to take some experimentation. Moon dust is so abrasive that Apollo astronauts often complained about how it would wear away at their boots and the lower legs of their space suits, never mind that accidentally breathing it gave some of them a cough like no other. Moon dust also poses a risk to hypersensitive instruments that could accomplish some of the other objectives so long as they are not damaged. Because the moon has no wind or flowing water to erode particles of its soil like Earth does, they remain razor-sharp pieces of metal mixed with shards of glass that were the by-product of volcanic activity or melting from asteroid collisions.
At least lunar regolith is hiding oxygen that astronauts, whether on Artemis III or future Artemis missions, can possibly extract on site and use for both breathing and rocket fuel. Processes like this could be integral to Mars missions and deep space travel if they can be proven to work consistently on the Moon. While the Lunar Gateway still has a few years until it’s up and running, NASA considers the Moon itself a gateway to the final frontier.
Though that glowing orb in the night sky appears otherworldly (which it literally is) and mystical, who knows what secrets it might be hiding.
Today marked a big step on the way toward NASA’s next giant leap, as the space agency gave the public its first-ever look at the members of its Artemis lunar team — a team that aims to rocket humans, including the first female in history — to the lunar surface for the first time in more than 50 years.
At a meeting of the National Space Council at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, Vice President Mike Pence welcomed each member of the Artemis astronaut team one by one onto the stage, following up with a live Q&A session that served up more details about each team member (NASA’s Artemis team page also has been updated to include full biographical details about each astronaut.) The agency didn’t reveal specific mission assignments — including the lunar landing crew — from among the 18-member team. But the group includes 9 female astronauts, at least one of whom will be among the smaller crew slated to touch down on the moon’s surface.
NASA’s official video above introduces the full Artemis team, which (in alphabetical order) includes Joe Acaba, Kayla Barron, Raja Chari, Matthew Dominick, Victor Glover, Woody Hoburg, Jonny Kim, Christina Koch, Kjell Lindgren, Nicole Mann, Anne McClain, Jessica Meir, Jasmin Moghbeli, Kate Rubins, Frank Rubio, Scott Tingle, Jessica Watkins, and Stephanie Wilson. Via Space.com, the team consists of members of “five astronaut classes selected between 1996 and 2017.”
“It is really amazing to think that the next man and the first woman on the moon are among the names that we just read, and they may be standing in the room right now,” Pence said in his introduction. “I give you the heroes of the future who will carry us back to the moon and beyond.”
The most recent class of astronaut graduates includes six women – five from Nasa and one from the Canadian Space Agency
The “and beyond” portion of Pence’s remarks refers to the Artemis program’s stated goal of using its lunar ambitions as a jumping-off point for future crewed spaceflight that could one day transport the first humans to Mars. NASA is working with private commercial partners to develop the lunar Gateway vehicle as an in-orbit waypoint for future crewed space trips, as well as the Orion landing capsule intended to transport astronauts between the Gateway and the moon’s surface.
If the Artemis program remains on schedule, it’s expected to launch its first crewed flight to the moon by 2024, after two preparatory, exploratory missions. The second of those flights will carry astronauts into lunar orbit — but will rely on robotic exploration of the lunar surface. The third mission, dubbed Artemis III, aims to land a pair of astronauts, including the first woman in history, on the moon.
What will the second leg of the Artemis Program entail? Here is a closer look at the Artemis II mission, input final part of our repost series.
NASA’s First Flight With Crew Important Step on Long-term Return to the Moon, Missions to Mars
Astronauts on their first flight aboard NASA’s Orion spacecraft will travel farther into the solar system than humanity has ever traveled before. Their mission will be to confirm all of the spacecraft’s systems operate as designed with crew aboard in the actual environment of deep space. The Artemis II flight test will be NASA’s first mission with crew and will pave the way to land the first woman and next man on the Moon on Artemis III. Building on those early missions, NASA’s Artemis program will return humans to the Moon for long-term exploration and future missions to worlds beyond, including Mars.
“The unique Artemis II mission profile will build upon the uncrewed Artemis I flight test by demonstrating a broad range of SLS and Orion capabilities needed on deep space missions,” said Mike Sarafin, Artemis mission manager. “This mission will prove Orion’s critical life support systems are ready to sustain our astronauts on longer duration missions ahead and allow the crew to practice operations essential to the success of Artemis III.”
Leaving Earth
The mission will launch a crew of four astronauts from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida in 2023 on a Block 1 configuration of the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket. The flight profile is called a hybrid free return trajectory. Orion will perform multiple maneuvers to raise its orbit around Earth and eventually place the crew on a lunar free return trajectory in which Earth’s gravity will naturally pull Orion back home after flying by the Moon.
The initial launch will be similar to Artemis I as SLS lofts Orion into space, and then jettisons the boosters, service module panels, and launch abort system, before the core stage engines shut down and the core stage separates from the upper stage and the spacecraft. With crew aboard this mission, Orion and the upper stage, called the interim cryogenic propulsion stage (ICPS), will then orbit Earth twice to ensure Orion’s systems are working as expected while still close to home. The spacecraft will first reach an initial orbit, flying in the shape of an ellipse, at an altitude of about 115 by 1,800 miles. The orbit will last a little over 90 minutes and will include the first firing of the ICPS to maintain Orion’s path. After the first orbit, the ICPS will raise Orion to a high-Earth orbit. This maneuver will enable the spacecraft to build up enough speed for the eventual push toward the Moon. The second, larger orbit will take approximately 42 hours with Orion flying in an ellipse between about 235 and 68,000 miles above Earth. For perspective, the International Space Station flies a nearly circular Earth orbit about 250 miles above our planet.
After the burn to enter high-Earth orbit, Orion will separate from the ICPS. The expended stage will have one final use before it is disposed through Earth’s atmosphere—the crew will use it as a target for a proximity operations demonstration. During the demonstration, mission controllers at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston will monitor Orion as the astronauts transition the spacecraft to manual mode and pilot Orion’s flight path and orientation. The crew will use Orion’s onboard cameras and the view from the spacecraft’s windows to line up with the ICPS as they approach and back away from the stage to assess Orion’s handling qualities and related hardware and software. This demonstration will provide performance data and operational experience that cannot be readily gained on the ground in preparation for critical rendezvous, proximity operations and docking, as well as undocking operations in lunar orbit beginning on Artemis III.
The Artemis II mission map shows the planned flight path and test objectives for the flight. (Click graphic for larger version.) Credits: NASA
Checking Critical Systems
Following the proximity operations demonstration, the crew will turn control of Orion back to mission controllers at Johnson and spend the remainder of the orbit verifying spacecraft system performance in the space environment. They will remove the Orion Crew Survival System suit they wear for launch and spend the remainder of the in-space mission in plain clothes, until they don their suits again to prepare for reentry into Earth’s atmosphere and recovery from the ocean.
While still close to Earth, the crew will assess the performance of the life support systems necessary to generate breathable air and remove the carbon dioxide and water vapor produced when the astronauts breathe, talk, or exercise. The long orbital period around Earth provides an opportunity to test the systems during exercise periods, where the crew’s metabolic rate is the highest, and a sleep period, where the crew’s metabolic rate is the lowest. A change between the suit mode and cabin mode in the life support system, as well as performance of the system during exercise and sleep periods, will confirm the full range of life support system capabilities and ensure readiness for the lunar flyby portion of the mission.
Orion will also checkout the communication and navigation systems to confirm they are ready for the trip to the Moon. While still in the elliptical orbit around Earth, Orion will briefly fly beyond the range of GPS satellites and the Tracking and Data Relay Satellites of NASA’s Space Network to allow an early checkout of agency’s Deep Space Network communication and navigation capabilities. When Orion travels out to and around the Moon, mission control will depend on the Deep Space Network to communicate with the astronauts, send imagery to Earth, and command the spacecraft.
After completing checkout procedures, Orion will perform the next propulsion move, called the translunar injection (TLI) burn. With the ICPS having done most of the work to put Orion into a high-Earth orbit, the service module will provide the last push needed to put Orion on a path toward the Moon. The TLI burn will send crew on an outbound trip of about four days and around the backside of the moon where they will ultimately create a figure eight extending over 230,000 miles from Earth before Orion returns home.
To the Moon and “Free” ride home
On the remainder of the trip, astronauts will continue to evaluate the spacecraft’s systems, including including demonstrating Earth departure and return operations, practicing emergency procedures, and testing the radiation shelter, among other activities.
The Artemis II crew will travel 4,600 miles beyond the far side of the Moon. From this vantage point, they will be able to see the Earth and the Moon from Orion’s windows, with the Moon close in the foreground and the Earth nearly a quarter-million miles in the background.
With a return trip of about four days, the mission is expected to last just over 10 days. Instead of requiring propulsion on the return, this fuel-efficient trajectory harnesses the Earth-Moon gravity field, ensuring that—after its trip around the far side of the Moon—Orion will be pulled back naturally by Earth’s gravity for the free return portion of the mission.
Two missions, two different trajectories
Following these first two test flights, Orion and a crew of four will once again travel to the Moon, this time to make history with the first woman and next man to walk on its surface. Beginning with Artemis III, NASA intends to launch crewed missions about once per year, with initial missions focused on establishing surface capabilities and building the Gateway in orbit around the Moon.
“Together, these test flights will demonstrate the capabilities we need to land the first woman and next man on the Moon by 2024 and enable sustainable missions for decades to come,” said Sarafin. “We will take the experience gained exploring the Moon to prepare for the next giant leap to Mars.”
NASA is leading a return to the Moon through an innovative and sustainable program of exploration with commercial and international partners to enable human expansion across the solar system and to bring back to Earth new knowledge and opportunities. SLS and Orion are critical backbone capabilities, along with the Gateway in lunar orbit and a modern human landing system, that will enable human missions of increasing complexity in deep space.
The Gateway will be our home base for astronaut expeditions on the Moon, and future human missions to Mars. Even before our first trip to Mars, astronauts will use the Gateway to train for life far away from Earth, and we will use it to practice moving a spaceship in different orbits in deep space.
The Gateway will be an outpost orbiting the Moon that provides vital support for a sustainable, long-term human return to the lunar surface, as well as a staging point for deep space exploration. It is a critical component of NASA’s Artemis program.
Illustration of the Gateway. Built with commercial and international partners, the Gateway is critical to sustainable lunar exploration and will serve as a model for future missions to Mars.
The Gateway is a vital part of NASA’s deep space exploration plans, along with the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, Orion spacecraft, and human landing system that will send astronauts to the Moon. Gaining new experiences on and around the Moon will prepare NASA to send the first humans to Mars in the coming years, and the Gateway will play a vital role in this process. It is a destination for astronaut expeditions and science investigations, as well as a port for deep space transportation such as landers en route to the lunar surface or spacecraft embarking to destinations beyond the Moon.
NASA has focused Gateway development on the initial critical elements required to support the 2024 landing – the Power and Propulsion Element, the Habitation and Logistics Outpost (HALO) and logistics capabilities.
The modules and how they fit together.
Power and Propulsion Element
The Power and Propulsion Element (PPE) is a high-power, 60-kilowatt solar electric propulsion spacecraft that will provide power, high-rate communications, attitude control, and orbital transfer capabilities for the Gateway.
In May 2019, NASA selected Maxar Technologies of Westminster, Colorado, to develop, build, and support an in-space demonstration of the element.
The Habitation and Logistics Outpost will be the initial crew cabin for astronauts visiting the Gateway. Its primary purpose is to provide basic life support needs for the visiting astronauts after they arrive in the Orion and prepare for their trip to the lunar surface. It will provide command, control, and data handling capabilities, energy storage and power distribution, thermal control, communications and tracking capabilities, as well as environmental control and life support systems to augment the Orion spacecraft and support crew members. It also will have several docking ports for visiting vehicles and future modules, as well as space for science and stowage.
How Gateway is supposed to help mankind get to Mars.
Logistics Capabilities
As astronauts prepare for missions to the lunar surface, they will need deliveries of critical pressurized and unpressurized cargo, science experiments and supplies, such as sample collection materials and other items. In March 2020, NASA announced SpaceX as the first U.S. commercial provider under the Gateway Logistics Services contract to deliver cargo and other supplies to the Gateway. One logistics services delivery is anticipated for each crewed Artemis mission to the Gateway.
In the future, our current ISS partners will provide important contributions to Gateway, comprising advanced external robotics, additional habitation and possibly other enhancements. Canada announced in February 2019 its intention to participate in the Gateway and contribute advanced external robotics. In June 2020, the Canadian Space Agency announced its intention to award a contract to MDA to build the Canadarm3 for Artemis deep space missions. In October 2019, Japan announced plans to join the United States on the Gateway with contributions of habitation components and logistics resupply. In November 2019, the European Space Agency (ESA) received authorization and funding to support its planned contributions to the Gateway including habitation and refueling. In October 2020, ESA signed an agreement with NASA to contribute habitation and refueling modules and enhanced lunar communications to the Gateway. ESA also provides two additional European Service Modules (ESMs) for NASA’s Orion spacecraft. Russia has also expressed interest in cooperating on the Gateway.
Space Suits serve different purposes, What you see here is much different than the suit SpaceX has for the Falcon Heavy taking crew to the ISS. These suits we have been talking about lately are for the Orion Crews that will be landing on the Lunar Surface. These suits are meant to be seen in an emergency or to preform tasks on a Low-G and no air environment of the Moon. 🌕
By Elizabeth Howell
NASA released its science definition report for Artemis 3 to prioritize its work for the first crewed lunar surface mission, set for 2024.
For the first time in nearly 50 years, NASA is getting ready to do science on the moon with astronauts, who can grasp complex tools, make decisions on the spot and operate with other capabilities robots can’t touch yet.
Under NASA’s Artemis program, the Artemis 3 mission is expected return astronauts to the moon no earlier than 2024 for a surface stay of up to six and a half days. A new report from NASA defines the science the agency hopes to accomplish in this first human landing mission since Apollo 17 in 1972.
The high-level science report, released Monday (Dec. 7), will be used to shape the mission plans and the training details for the Artemis 3 crew, which will be selected around 2022 or 2023, according to information provided during a NASA teleconference on Monday.
Bringing humans back on the moon will be a game-changer for science collection, NASA says. (Image credit: NASA)
After decades of interplanetary space exploration using only robots, adding a human dimension to the moon again will allow for more subtle investigations that a machine cannot perform, Sarah Noble, lunar program scientist in NASA’s science mission directorate, said during the phone call.
“We have opposable thumbs, which makes it easier to do more complicated things like drilling cores and digging trenches,” she said. Astronauts will also be able to react more quickly to discoveries on the surface than controllers back on Earth, with no communications delays, Noble added. Geology training on Earth will enhance the performance of astronauts on the lunar surface, too.
While the first landing mission is currently targeted for 2024, Ken Bowersox, deputy associate administrator of NASA’s human exploration and operations mission directorate, said the agency will be satisfied with progressing towards a later landing if the incoming Joe Biden presidential administration delays the landing date.
NASA astronauts test new spacesuit in pool, plant flag.
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NASA astronauts Drew Feustel and Don Pettit tested the new Artemis program spacesuit in the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory at the Johnson Space Center. The spacesuit, destined for use on the moon, provides more mobility than the Apollo-era spacesuits. Credit: NASA
“I’ve learned it’s not very productive to argue which date [we will land], and to make continuous progress,” said Bowersox, a former space shuttle astronaut who repaired the Hubble Space Telescope twice in orbit.
That said, the human moon landing does have bipartisan support, he added, and Bowersox’s division will move at a pace dictated by the money Congress allocates in NASA’s budgets. (Funding for the 2021 fiscal year, which began on Oct. 1, is still under consideration.)
NASA’s outline for lunar exploration. (Image credit: NASA)
The top Artemis 3 science goals outlined in the report include the following:
Understanding planetary processes, since the moon can be used as an analog for other “airless” worlds such as asteroids;
Conducting experimental science in the lunar environment, with details to be further determined once NASA figures out what experiments it will bring to the surface;
Investigating and mitigating exploration risks, which NASA hopes to inform a human mission to Mars in the 2030s.
The report also has numerous references to the capabilities humans still have over robots. NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter and other missions have been examining the surface from above in recent decades, while China accomplished the ambitious Chang’e-5 lunar landing a few days ago for sample return as part of its growing robotic lunar program. But getting human eyes in situ will still be an advancement over growing capabilities in robot artificial intelligence and imaging capabilities, the NASA report said.
NASA Explains Moon Return Plans in Stunning Animated Short
05:31 NASA intends to return to the moon to stay. The infrastructure needed to make it possible is explained. Narrated by ‘Star Wars’ actress Kelly Marie Tran.
Key among the preliminary science work will be getting astronauts involved in geology expeditions and training similar to what the Apollo astronauts did in the 1960s and 1970s. This practice gave the moonwalkers advanced university-level training in identifying rocks for their geologic value, making their collection efforts on the surface more precise.
“The optimal sample-return program is built upon geologic-context observations made by well-trained astronauts, aided by modern tools and real-time communication with scientists on Earth,” NASA officials wrote in the new report, echoing the procedures Apollo astronauts made selecting their own samples decades ago.
“Astronauts should be trained and equipped to collect a variety of surface and sub-surface samples,” another of NASA’s training recommendations said, calling for crews to collect rocks and regolith from “geographically diverse locations” to ultimately return even more pounds (or kilograms) of material than previous missions. For context, the Apollo astronauts returned a total of 842 lb. (382 kg) of material during six landing missions between 1969 and 1972, according to NASA.
The new generation of astronauts will have robotic assistants for their work, however, from future missions still being defined under the Commercial Lunar Payload Services Program (CLPS). A few of the preliminary missions have been selected, but NASA has yet to define what these robots will be doing directly alongside the first astronauts. The agency assured reporters that more details on the first mission will come as soon as they are determined.
It appears the first Artemis human landing mission won’t be equipped with a vehicle, meaning the Artemis 3 astronauts will work on foot, just like the Apollo 11 astronauts who first walked on the moon in 1969. Missions starting with Artemis 4, however, will include an unpressurized rover to “expand the exploration range and allow a more diverse sampling of regional surface and subsurface specimens,” NASA said in the science report.
If NASA’s plans come to fruition, Artemis 3 will kick off a series of human landing missions that will culminate in a permanent field station known as the Artemis Base Camp, the report said. The base camp will include a habitat, power systems (which will likely use solar power or batteries) and mobility systems. “As more surface infrastructure is added, future expeditions could last multiple lunar days or longer,” NASA officials stated in the report. (One lunar day lasts about 14 Earth days.)
Bowersox noted that several engineering milestones are underway or coming soon for the Artemis program, including testing lunar spacesuits “in the coming years,” an ongoing “green run test series” for the core stage of the Artemis 1 rocket, imminent testing for the Orion vehicle for Artemis 1 in a vacuum environment, and in 2021, downselecting the number of companies contracted to provide human landing systems. Artemis 1 is also targeted to fly next year on an uncrewed round trip to the moon.
While planning is ongoing, much will depend on how much money the agency receives for moon planning in the coming years. For example, NASA requested $3.2 billion for human landing systems in fiscal year 2021, but the Senate version of the budget bill allocates only $1 billion and the House version $600 million, either of which could put the 2024 moon-landing timeline in jeopardy, according to Space News.
Follow Elizabeth Howell on Twitter @howellspace. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.
View at 10:11:35 to watch the launch. Don’t forget that you get to watch the unmanned landing. Every launch teaches us something there is a lot to learn about this successful test.
When astronauts are hours away from launching on Artemis missions to the Moon, they’ll put on a brightly colored orange spacesuit called the Orion Crew Survival System (OCSS) suit. It is designed for a custom fit and equipped with safety technology and mobility features to help protect astronauts on launch day, in emergency situations, high-risk parts of missions near the Moon, and during the high-speed return to Earth.
NASA is building the Orion Crew Survival System spacesuit to protect astronauts during launch, reentry and emergency situations during Artemis missions.
Many missions require two spacesuits – one worn outside a spacecraft during spacewalks that is designed as a self-contained personal spaceship, and another worn inside a spacecraft during high-risk parts of a mission, such as inside Orion during launch and reentry through Earth’s atmosphere. NASA is building both for Artemis missions. Drawing on six decades of spaceflight experience, NASA is developing its Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit, or xEMU, for moonwalks, and has reengineered elements of the crew survival suit worn on the space shuttle to enhance range of motion and improve safety for the astronauts who will wear it to get to the Moon and back to Earth.
The Orion suit, sometimes called a flight suit or a launch and entry suit, has been enhanced from head to toe with improvements to the suit worn on shuttle missions. Starting at the top, a number of features on the helmet allow for improved comfort and function. The helmet is lighter, stronger, comes in more than one size, helps reduce noise and is easier to connect to the communications system needed to talk to other crew members and mission control.
Now, the women and men of the Artemis mission will have more freedom to move with NASA’s new design.
The outer cover layer, which is orange to make crew members easily recognizable in the ocean should they ever need to exit Orion without the assistance of recovery personnel, includes shoulder enhancements for better reach and is fire resistant. The suit is a pressure garment that includes a restraint layer to control the shape and ease astronauts’ movements. A reengineered zipper also allows astronauts to quickly put the suit on and has increased strength. New adaptable interfaces supply air and remove exhaled carbon-dioxide. The suit has an improved thermal management that will help keep astronauts cool and dry. A liquid cooling garment is worn underneath the suit, a bit like thermal underwear with embedded cooling tubes, was revamped to be more breathable and easier to build.
While shuttle-era spacesuits came in off-the-shelf sizes like small, medium and large, the Orion suits will be custom fit for each crew member and accommodate astronauts of all sizes. The patterns of the suit now minimize the spots of discomfort common during the shuttle era when worn pressurized for long periods of time. The suits’ gloves, the part of a spacesuit that receives the most wear and tear, are more durable and touch-screen compatible, and improvements to the boots provide protection in the case of fire, fit better, and help an astronaut move more nimbly.
Each suit will also come with a pair of gloves that provide finger movement, which was demonstrated in the reveal.
And the gear was developed to withstand the freezing temperatures on the moon.
Even though it’s primarily designed for launch and reentry, the Orion suit can keep astronauts alive if Orion were to lose cabin pressure during the journey out to the Moon, while adjusting orbits in Gateway, or on the way back home. Astronauts could survive inside the suit for up to six days as they make their way back to Earth. The suits are also equipped with a suite of survival gear in the event they have to exit Orion after splashdown before recovery personnel arrive. Each suit will carry its own life preserver that contains a personal locator beacon, a rescue knife, and a signaling kit with a mirror, strobe light, flashlight, whistle, and light sticks.
Through extensive design and engineering enhancements, the Orion suit will help provide an additional layer of protection for astronauts who embark on Artemis missions to the Moon and prepare for future missions to Mars.
Astronauts will be able to actually walk, not bunny hop like their predecessors, and gives them the ability to bend down and pick things up over their head.
NASA’s Orion spacecraft will carry astronauts from Earth on their journeys to the Moon. To ensure crew get there safely during Artemis missions, Orion’s design team is considering every detail about living and working inside the spacecraft.
Building Orion to support crew during multi-week missions requires engineers to think through countless details, from making room for exercise to blocking enough light out of the cabin for crew to sleep.
To do it, the team is capitalizing on data from current and past missions, like International Space Station expeditions and the Apollo Program, and bringing in a variety of experts from diverse backgrounds. Deep space presents greater challenges for spacecraft than low-Earth orbit and an array of expertise is needed to build the safest human exploration spacecraft.
“We’ve consulted with acoustics specialists on how loud it will actually get in the cabin from the equipment running, a bag designer on how to store items contaminated by fire, and seamstresses and sewers to create sleeping bags and window shades for when Orion crew end their day,” said Jason Hutt, lead engineer for Orion crew systems integration at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. “We also worked with a special effects studio to create waves in a controlled space to test out the crew life raft.”
These window shades and sleeping bags aren’t quite what one would find at a camping outfitter. Not only do the shades block out sunlight when the cabin and crew are in sleep configuration, they have a built-in shroud that allows crew to take pictures while in deep space without glare from the cabin lights. The sleeping bags have been streamlined to reduce the mass that Orion will need to carry up during launch and can be hung in several different places through the cabin to maximize space for the crew. They also have arm holes so crew can use their tablets before they go to sleep.
Because astronauts of different sizes will be sent to the Moon in Orion, the display panels and chairs need to work for 99 percent of people – from a 4’ 10”, 94 pound female to a 6’ 5”, 243 pound male. That means making the bottom panels of the seats adjustable and arranging panels so that the smallest or largest of astronauts can reach all the controls.
Even the alarm signals for emergencies were considered carefully. Orion’s human engineering team found that if they used too shocking of an alarm, they were more likely to startle, rather than alert, crew members. To avoid that, designers found a new alarm tone that could ramp up the crew to action as quickly as possible in the event of an emergency.
One of these emergencies is a fire in the cabin. An electrical short in the cabin’s equipment could catch fire and, in the oxygen-rich cabin atmosphere, quickly become dangerous.
Orion’s engineers take an end-to-end approach to emergency procedures. After the team determines that a water-based fire extinguisher is best for a lithium ion battery fire, they still have to test which filters can scrub the atmosphere of smoke, make sure they won’t be clogged by the steam from putting out the fire, and find a “fire bag” specifically for storing those filters once the cabin’s air is breathable again.
An even more complex problem is a potential puncture in Orion’s hull from a collision with orbital debris or another spacecraft. This could lead to loss of air or cabin pressure. The crew would have to get into their launch and entry spacesuits immediately and return to Earth.
“We had to figure out, if there’s a hole in the spacecraft, how do we keep the crew safe long enough to get them home—which takes roughly four to five days,” Hutt said. “We had to design a suit that the crew could live in for up to six days, which means thinking of every biological accommodation.”
Those biological accommodations include specialized food to reduce human waste, a delivery system for pills and medicine to the crew in the suits, and hardware for compartmentalizing waste.
“Living in the suit for so long would probably be the most uncomfortable thing they’ve ever experienced, but it would keep the crew alive until they got home,” Hutt said.
Testing the new designs and protocols takes many forms. Those include exposing the crew’s computer tablets to radiation to determine when they are likely to fail, measuring the space available in a shelter from large solar radiation spikes within the cabin, and running emergency drills in a mockup of the cabin’s inner layout.
Before calling a plan complete, design teams from NASA and Lockheed Martin, the prime contractor for Orion, walk through the scenarios with Flight Operations and Exploration Ground Systems to make sure their ideas will solve the problems. From there, the plans can be fully refined, until designers don’t find any gaps in the solution.
“We can never fully predict what reality is going to be,” Hutt said. “Instead, we try to make our designs flexible enough that whatever the real situation, the crew has the tools to adapt to it and get home.”
Orion, along with the human landing system, Space Launch System, and Gateway, makes up the foundation of NASA’s Artemis program to explore deep space. Engineers at Kennedy Space Center in Florida are completing final testing of the spacecraft for the Artemis I mission planned for next year, and making progress on the Orion spacecraft that will first carry crew to space on Artemis II in 2023. Orion will carry the first woman and next man to lunar orbit where they will embark on an expedition to the surface of the Moon in 2024.
In a mockup of Orion’s crew capsule, astronauts and ground crew test procedures to get them out of the capsule in under two minutes in case of an emergency before launch.
The Science Probe 