NASA selects ‘Option B’ for Asteroid Redirect Mission

spaceflightinsider.com ^ | Collin Skocik

[BenLurkin]

NASA has announced that it has selected “Option B” for its Asteroid Redirect Mission (more commonly referred to as ARM), meaning that rather than towing an entire asteroid into lunar orbit, it will instead retrieve a boulder from an asteroid and bring it into a distant retrograde lunar orbit. Using Solar Electric Propulsion (SEP), an uncrewed spacecraft will retrieve a boulder from a yet-to-be-determined asteroid and tow it into lunar orbit, where it will be visited by astronauts on a future Orion / SLS mission.

NASA Associate Administrator Robert Lightfoot said that Option B offers more choices for what object the ARM spacecraft will retrieve.

“The Asteroid Redirect Mission will provide an initial demonstration of several spaceflight capabilities we will need to send astronauts deeper into space, and eventually, to Mars,” Lightfoot said. “The option to retrieve a boulder from an asteroid will have a direct impact on planning for future human missions to deep space and begin a new era of spaceflight.”

[Raycpa]

Do we call the asteroid wormwood?

[mikrofon]

There *is* always the PYHBYL&KYAGB method:

[KoRn]

I know that I’m nowhere NEAR as ‘smart’ as these people, but to me this entire thing sounds like a colossal waste of time and money. Especially when you consider that we’re paying the Russians for trips to space.....

[Eaker]

Why not pluck boulders from space and toss them at your enemies?

Jeff Head did that in his Dragon's Fury series of books back in 2004.