There won't be a moon to land on.
Posted on 01/08/2024 11:05:31 AM PST by JSM_Liberty
The company behind America's latest mission to soft-land on the Moon is battling to save the project.
Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic says its Peregrine spacecraft has a faulty propulsion system, which, unless fixed, will prevent a lunar touch-down.
The problem has already made it difficult for the craft to point its solar panels at the Sun to generate electricity.
Astrobotic is already talking about changing its mission goals. The 1.2-tonne lander was launched early on Monday from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on a Vulcan rocket.
It is aiming to become the first American mission in half a century to make a controlled landing on the Moon and be the first ever commercial endeavour to do so.
The US space agency (Nasa) had purchased capacity on the lander for five instruments to study the lunar surface environment ahead of sending astronauts there later this decade. Peregrine's problems emerged shortly after communications had been established with ground controllers, following its release from the top of the Vulcan.
Engineers noticed the spacecraft was struggling to maintain a stable lock on the Sun, meaning its solar cells were not receiving a constant supply of sunshine to recharge the onboard battery.
Power levels were reported to be reaching operationally low levels.
Astrobotic's engineers eventually identified the root cause as a failure in the propulsion system.
And although they were able to successfully re-point the spacecraft and charge the battery, it was evident, the company said, that Peregrine was losing propellant.
"The team is working to try and stabilise this loss, but given the situation we have prioritised maximising the science and data we can capture," a statement read.
"We are currently assessing what alternative mission profiles may be feasible at this time."...
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
Damn shame, I was rooting for them
There won't be a moon to land on.
“What we have learned from our commercial partners is if we have a high enough cadence, we can relax some of the requirements that make it so costly, and have a higher risk appetite.”
translation from buzzword jargon into vernacular English: technical requirements and testing known to work cost really big bucks, so we’ll try flying a bunch of junk and hope something makes it ... maybe that will be less expensive than doing it right in the first place ... [plus, we can spread the dough around to more places and get more kickbacks and campaign “donations” that way] ...
“And if they fail, the next one is going to learn and succeed.”
IOW, as usual with all rocket “science”, we’ll blow shit up until something finally flies ...
as John Wayne might have said:
Space is hard. It’s even harder when you’re stupid.
Is it too late for them to call Elon Musk to fix the problem?
What is often unrecognized is that launches put their vehicles and payloads through severe vibration and high g-forces that can easily damage spacecraft. A propellant line fitting seems to have weakened or failed.
Should have flown SpaceX.
If you're thinking they plan to descend and land using only electric power, it can't be done.
You have to to have an expanding gas of some sort to have any propulsion in zero (or near zero) atmosphere.
Somebody tell me again about manned missions to Mars......
Sounds like the same guy who made the gameboy Titanic sub.
Why? The launch vehicle worked properly. The payload is having problems.
And THAT, buoys and gulls, is why we do Vibration Testing and Acoustic Testing, at the component, subsystem, and system levels.
And that costs ...
Cut corners on testing, maybe get a "sub-optimal" result.
I don't know that they cut corners. I do know that cutting corners has led to failures in the past.
I think you have a good point.
“IOW, as usual with all rocket “science”, we’ll blow shit up until something finally flies ...”
Real men test in Production.
Can’t have them going there and finding out that the moon landings never happened. /s (sort of)
One big Grift! To the the tune of 19 billion a day.
Oops: Failed U.S. Moon Lander Now Hurtling Back TOWARDS Earth
- Breitbart
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