The Gang of Five
Beyond the Mysterious Beyond => Hobbies and Recreation => Topic started by: gutza1 on November 23, 2022, 03:06:20 PM
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I took a look around the Hobbies board and noticed there was no thread dedicated to ongoing space exploration. As a lifelong follower of it, this obviously must be corrected!
To start, I wanted to discuss the launch of Artemis I, risen like a phoenix from the ashes of the Shuttle and Constellation. I remember following the latter program when I was a kid, only to be hit with disappointment when Constellation was cancelled and the new presidential administration made no concrete plans for manned deep space exploration. However, the renewed interest in the Moon that resulted in the beginning of the Artemis program has granted NASA much-needed direction that it lacked for decades, and I see a bright future ahead. Unless Elon Musk's antics screw it all up, of course, but I'd rather not think about that.
https://twitter.com/NASA/status/1592772202289430528 (https://twitter.com/NASA/status/1592772202289430528)
Last week, NASA took its first concrete step towards returning humans to the Moon with the launch of Artemis I, an unmanned test flight of the superheavy-lift Space Launch System and deep space Orion capsule that has launched the latter towards the Moon. I had the privilege of witnessing the launch in person at Kennedy Space Center, and I can say that it was a childhood dream come true for me.
https://twitter.com/NASA_Orion/status/1594852542097154048 (https://twitter.com/NASA_Orion/status/1594852542097154048)
Presently, Orion has just completed a powered flyby of the Moon and is about to enter a distant retrograde orbit, where it will stay for about two weeks before flying by the lunar surface a second time and returning back to Earth. So far, all systems have performed at or exceeding expectations - a remarkable accomplishment given the surprisingly troubled history of both Apollo and SLS' development. Artemis II, a manned flight to lunar orbit, is scheduled to launch in early 2024, depending on the results of Artemis I. TCombined with the activation of the James Webb Space Telescope last July, 2022 has shaped up to be a big year for space exploration.
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I've always been fascinated with astronomy and space exploration for as long as I can remember. I just never bothered starting any topics here on such a subject because I didn't think anyone around here was seriously interested in talking about it.
While I'm hardly obsessed with following all the latest developments, I did pay close attention to the James Webb Space Telescope for approximately a year now (the last few delays before it was finally launched, the entire deployment process in the months that followed, and finally those spectacular first images that were released last summer and several more that have come out since then). I also occasionally keep up with recent discoveries made by active robotic missions throughout the solar system, such as the rovers on Mars, or the Juno orbiter around Jupiter.
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I've always been fascinated with astronomy and space exploration for as long as I can remember. I just never bothered starting any topics here on such a subject because I didn't think anyone around here was seriously interested in talking about it.
While I'm hardly obsessed with following all the latest developments, I did pay close attention to the James Webb Space Telescope for approximately a year now (the last few delays before it was finally launched, the entire deployment process in the months that followed, and finally those spectacular first images that were released last summer and several more that have come out since then). I also occasionally keep up with recent discoveries made by active robotic missions throughout the solar system, such as the rovers on Mars, or the Juno orbiter around Jupiter.
That's great to hear! Yeah, I loved watching The Universe on History Channel around the same age as I was originally watching LBT. It completely blew my mind and introduced me to a lot of physics concepts I'm interested in writing stories about. You'll definitely see some of that in The Lands Beyond. I think space exploration is one of the few bright spots in our modern world, especially now that we've gotten superheavy-lift rockets coming online that can launch significantly more massive deep space probes on faster trajectories.
In other news, Orion just entered a distant retrograde orbit around the Moon yesterday:
https://twitter.com/NASAArtemis/status/1596290736965574656 (https://twitter.com/NASAArtemis/status/1596290736965574656)
It'll stay in it until Dec. 1, when it will burn to perform another flyby of the Moon on the 5th before splashing down on the 11th.
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It appears things are quiet here. Is this just a niche topic few people here are interested in? Ah, whatever.
https://twitter.com/NASA_Orion/status/1597387686926589972 (https://twitter.com/NASA_Orion/status/1597387686926589972)
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Orion will do a second flyby of the Moon tomorrow before heading back to Earth:
https://twitter.com/NASA_Orion/status/1599483477296021504/photo/1 (https://twitter.com/NASA_Orion/status/1599483477296021504/photo/1)
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https://twitter.com/NASA_Orion/status/1599814673506963457/photo/1
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We have splashdown! Artemis I is complete!
https://twitter.com/NASA/status/1601995737449263104 (https://twitter.com/NASA/status/1601995737449263104)
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The astronauts who will be on the Artemis 2 mission (which will orbit the Moon, currently scheduled to launch sometime in November 2024) will be publicly announced on April 3. All we know for sure at this time is that this crew will consist of three Americans and one Canadian.
https://gizmodo.com/nasa-reveal-crew-flying-moon-artemis-2-houston-april-3-1850213135 (https://gizmodo.com/nasa-reveal-crew-flying-moon-artemis-2-houston-april-3-1850213135)
Also, the new spacesuits the astronauts will wear on the Moon (and for other upcoming space missions) will be officially revealed on March 15.
https://gizmodo.com/nasa-unveil-artemis-moon-suits-next-week-1850207244 (https://gizmodo.com/nasa-unveil-artemis-moon-suits-next-week-1850207244)
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Unfortunately, we probably won't see Artemis II launch until Nov. 2024. However, it does appear that Boeing has figured out how to significantly streamline production of the SLS Core Stage, cutting production costs and also allowing a greater production rate that would enable non-Artemis missions, such as cargo launches or unmanned missions:
https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2022/12/boeing-expanding-cs-prod/ (https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2022/12/boeing-expanding-cs-prod/)
In other rocketry news, ULA has completed its first wet dress rehearsal for the Vulcan-Centaur:
https://twitter.com/ulalaunch/status/1634567912135487488 (https://twitter.com/ulalaunch/status/1634567912135487488)
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The new lunar space suits have been revealed today (though it should be noted the ones that will actually be used on the Moon will be white instead of the black one shown today).
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/this-is-the-spacesuit-nasas-artemis-astronauts-will-wear-on-the-moon-144528407.html (https://finance.yahoo.com/news/this-is-the-spacesuit-nasas-artemis-astronauts-will-wear-on-the-moon-144528407.html)
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/behold-moon-suit-195319175.html (https://finance.yahoo.com/news/behold-moon-suit-195319175.html)
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Honestly I find it concerning that NASA just gave up on their own in-house suit development after spending a lot of money on it. It's part of an overall trend of over-privatization in the American spaceflight industry that I fear might turn NASA into a renter agency if it isn't managed carefully.
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In interesting space news, Relativity Space had its debut flight of the Terran-1, which is both the first majority-3D printed rocket and the first methane-fueled rocket to have flown. Unfortunately, the second stage did not light, but this still demonstrates that 3D-printed rockets are possible:
https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight/status/1638743971840106496 (https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight/status/1638743971840106496)
The methane fuel gives the rocket a distinctive blue exhaust that I find very pretty:
https://twitter.com/johnkrausphotos/status/1638923188439777280 (https://twitter.com/johnkrausphotos/status/1638923188439777280)
Another bit of news is that the JWST has failed to detect any atmosphere on the innermost planet in the Trappist-1 system. It isn't in the habitable zone (but there are three others that might be), so there's still a chance we might find a habitable planet in the Trappist-1 system, but this is still an important demonstration of JWST's capabilities:
https://www.space.com/james-webb-space-telescope-no-atmosphere-trappist-1-exoplanet (https://www.space.com/james-webb-space-telescope-no-atmosphere-trappist-1-exoplanet)
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I'm certainly looking forward to tomorrow, when we will finally know which astronauts will be on the Artemis 2 mission (which will include a Canadian to become the first non-American to fly around the Moon).
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The Artemis II crew has been announced (https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-names-astronauts-to-next-moon-mission-first-crew-under-artemis).
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The European space probe Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) is scheduled for liftoff tomorrow. Its mission of exploring the moons of Jupiter sounds fascinating, so here's hoping tomorrow's launch goes well.
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The European space probe Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) is scheduled for liftoff tomorrow. Its mission of exploring the moons of Jupiter sounds fascinating, so here's hoping tomorrow's launch goes well.
In general I think the outer planets have been severely neglected by most space agencies, though partially that's also due to the fact that for decades we had no good heavy-lift launch vehicles, placing severe limitations on the kind of missions we could run. I'm very excited for JUICE, though I have to admit that Saturn is my favorite planet. Personally, I think we're more likely to find life beneath the surface of Titan than on the Jovian moons, but we never know.
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While JUICE didn't launch on the originally scheduled day due to weather, it did successfully launch the day after and is now in its way to the Jupiter system (via a series of gravity assists from Earth and Venus) and arrive sometime in July 2031.
Earlier today, SpaceX did a test launch of their massive Starship spacecraft. Although it exploded a few minutes after launch where several engines shut down and the stages failed to separate, the test is being regarded as a success because at least it was able to clear the launchpad.
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Today is the 50th anniversary of the launch of Skylab, the first American space station. For those of you who don't know much about it, here's an article I came across yesterday that explains some things about its significance in NASA's history:
https://gizmodo.com/skylab-50-anniversary-first-space-station-nasa-1850408459 (https://gizmodo.com/skylab-50-anniversary-first-space-station-nasa-1850408459)
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SkyLab is very underappreciated in my opinion. I'm actually going to visit the Kenendy Space Center Visitor Center for a special anniversary presentation on SkyLab tomorrow. My NASA internship badge grants me free admission.
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I don't know how often people even bother taking a look at this topic, but I figured one recent accomplishment in space exploration was significant enough to be worth sharing here.
The space probe OSIRIS-REx, which had explored the near-Earth asteroid Bennu for a few years and collected a sample of that asteroid, successfully returned that sample to Earth less than two weeks ago. After taking the time to carefully open the container to without risking any contamination, scientists have finally revealed the contents of that sample earlier today:
https://www.space.com/osiris-rex-bennu-asteroid-sample-carbon-water (https://www.space.com/osiris-rex-bennu-asteroid-sample-carbon-water)
Not much to say after examining the sample for only a few days, but it's already confirmed to contain compounds of water and carbon. And since the quantity of the sample is much bigger than anyone had anticipated, there should be plenty to share with other scientists all over the world.
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Sorry for not keeping this updated. Here's some news on Artemis II:
https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2023/10/aii-core-weld-issues/
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The space probe Lucy recently completed a flyby of a small asteroid in the Asteroid Belt, mainly to make sure its systems are all functioning properly ahead of its primary mission of visiting several Trojan Asteroids near Jupiter over the next several years, but the images from this brief flyby revealed that this small asteroid not only has its own moon, but that moon also turns out to be a contact binary object.
https://www.space.com/nasa-lucy-asteroid-dinky-3-space-rocks-contact-binary (https://www.space.com/nasa-lucy-asteroid-dinky-3-space-rocks-contact-binary)
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On an unrelated note, it appears the US military's top-secret unmanned spaceplane, the X-37B, is preparing to launch aboard a... Falcon Heavy of all things, in order to test out "new orbits."
https://www.space.com/space-force-x-37b-spacex-falcon-heavy-1st-launch-dec-2023
The most obvious idea is that this is a mission to geostationary transfer orbit, which the X-37B's conceptual predeccessor's heat shield was rated for. However, the Falcon Heavy is theoretically capable of launching the X-37B all the way around the Moon, though I don't know if the X-37B's heat shield is rated for reentry on a lunar return trajectory. Whatever the mission is, it's definitely going to be interesting.
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A quite rare kind of exoplanet system has recently been confirmed, consisting of six "sub-Neptune" planets with "mathematically perfect" orbits close to their host star:
https://www.space.com/six-sub-neptunes-found-100-light-years-from-earth (https://www.space.com/six-sub-neptunes-found-100-light-years-from-earth)
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A quite rare kind of exoplanet system has recently been confirmed, consisting of six "sub-Neptune" planets with "mathematically perfect" orbits close to their host star:
https://www.space.com/six-sub-neptunes-found-100-light-years-from-earth (https://www.space.com/six-sub-neptunes-found-100-light-years-from-earth)
Yeah. This appears to have been a configuration left over from the beginning of the system, which is surprising.
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We know about the possibility of finding life on Mars, Jupiter's moon Europa, or Saturn's moons Titan and Enceladus. There's even been educated suggestions of life being possible under the ices of Pluto or even in the less intense upper atmosphere of Venus. But now, perhaps one of the most astonishing possible places to find life in the Solar System could be on Mercury under glaciers made of salt.
https://www.space.com/mercury-salt-glaciers-habitability (https://www.space.com/mercury-salt-glaciers-habitability)
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https://www.space.com/uranus-neptune-similar-shades-of-blue-voyager-2-images (https://www.space.com/uranus-neptune-similar-shades-of-blue-voyager-2-images)
Uranus and Neptune are actually the same shade of blue-green. Apparently, the images that Voyager 2 had sent back in 1989 were artificially enhanced to make Neptune much more blue than would look in true visible light. In addition, it seems that Uranus turns more blue during the equinoxes and more green during the solstices, which might explain why the Voyager 2 images of that planet from 1986 are more green while some of the more recent images by telescopes appear more blue.