Peregrine lander: Propulsion failure threatens US Moon mission

BBC ^ | 8th January 2024, 01:44 EST | Jonathan Amos

[Afterguard]

It’s a risk being the first time sending a lander to the moon.... What? Oh, wait...

[Boogieman]

"We are currently assessing what alternative mission profiles may be feasible at this time."

Engineer: I know we were aiming for a controlled landing, but, hear me out, an uncontrolled landing is still a landing...

[NorthMountain]

It’s the first time for “Astrobotic” ... and the first time I’ve ever heard of them.

[thegagline]

To think we successfully designed craft to land on the moon using slide rules and computers with the power equivalent to a calculator.

[Navy Patriot]

Darn Electric moon landers, ... well, at least they are environmentally friendly.

[Navy Patriot]

Newsflash: Moon to look like doughnut!

[linMcHlp]

Winding around to:

It’s coming home, but precisely where, is unknown to the public.

[rdl6989]

Those human remains will never make it to the moon.

[DownInFlames]

An electric spacecraft? God how I long for the heady days of mercury and Gemini space programs.

[Red Badger]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astrobotic_Technology

[NorthMountain]

Thanks!

According to that article, they’ve been around for more than a decade, had two projects canceled, and this is their first payload to launch.

[Dacula]

Too much diversity.

[Red Badger]

They did well to get this far. This actually is ‘Rocket Science’!.................

[NorthMountain]

An electric spacecraft?

I'm mildly curious to know what you mean by asking that. Do you think that previous spacecraft did not use electricity? Are you surprised to find that a spacecraft is powered by solar energy?

How do you think that the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo spacecraft powered their various systems?

[NorthMountain]

I know ... rocket science isn’t easy. Neither is rocket engineering. And there have been high profile screwups by players in the game that have earned good reputations. Still ... this is not a good start.

[Red Badger]

At least it didn’t explode on liftoff. If it makes it to the Moon and gets into orbit it can be retrieved by some future mission’s robot................

[NorthMountain]

That speaks to ULA and Blue Origin. Looks like at least we may have a second “large” launch vehicle available.

Not to throw any disrespect at Rocket Lab. Electron is a nice launch vehicle, just definitely in the “small” category.

[Owen]

Space is hard. Even the Russians had a failure on a lunar mission just a few months ago.

[Wilderness Conservative]

They should have have hired more women of color to do the calculations. S/