NASA’s small lunar probe failed to perform a critical maneuver as planned on Monday (November 21), but the cubbies may still be able to salvage the water-hunting mission.
The LunaH-Map spacecraft is one of 10 cubes It launched last Wednesday as payloads to be transported (November 16) in NASA Artemis 1 a task.
LunaH-Map is designed to map the distribution and abundance of hydrogen – and thus water ice – near the moon’s south pole. This data is of great interest to NASA Artemis programWhich aims to build a manned research base in this region.
Related: A stunning view of the first appearance of NASA’s Artemis 1 moon rocket (photos)
Live updates: NASA’s Artemis 1 lunar mission
The cubes It was supposed to ignite the engine during Monday’s lunar flyby, but failed to do so, likely due to a stuck valve in the propulsion system, NASA officials said.
But all is not necessarily lost. Other LunaH-Map systems appear to be operating normally, and heating the valve can trigger it, which also brings the propulsion system online.
“If the propulsion system is able to gain traction within the next few months, the mission can still recover some or all of the original LunaH-Map science mission,” NASA officials said in a statement. Tuesday update (Opens in a new tab) (November 22). “Along the spacecraft’s current trajectory, alternative paths are available to reach lunar orbit — including orbits that could allow measurements at lower altitudes of the lunar surface.”
NASA officials explained in the update that LunaH-Map could still find work beyond that if it took longer to resolve the current problem: “Trajectory solutions may exist outside the Earth-Moon system for flying near certain asteroids and characterizing their hydrogen. Contents.”
LunaH-Map, which is being led by researchers at Arizona State University, isn’t the only Artemis 1 cube that has run into trouble after being deployed by the mission. Space launch system Rocket. For example, the Japanese probe OMOTENASHI had communication problems and Failed to drop a small lander on the lunar surface And therefore.
from NASA Near-Earth Asteroid Scouts (NEA) The probe appears to have been quiet since its launch on November 16th, as has citizen scientist Cubesat Team miles. and the LunIR spacecraft You may also encounter problems.
Artemis 1, the first mission of the Artemis program, sends an uncrewed Orion capsule on a roughly 26-day journey to lunar orbit and back.
Orion is expected to slide into a distant retrograde orbit around Earth’s natural satellite on Friday, November 25th. The capsule will spend about a week there and then return to Earth, arriving here on December 11th.
If all goes as planned, Artemis 2 will launch astronauts around the moon in 2024 and Artemis 3 Boots will land near the moon’s south pole in about a year.
Mike Wall is the author of “the least (Opens in a new tab)(Major Major Publishers, 2018; illustrated by Carl Tate), a book about the search for extraterrestrial life. Follow him on Twitter @employee (Opens in a new tab). Follow us on Twitter @employee (Opens in a new tab) where FB (Opens in a new tab).
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