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Peregrine moon lander suffers anomaly after launch
- rileyphone 3y agoAt least this issue seems to be with the lander and not the rocket, which had never launched before. Almost twenty years since the creation of ULA to the point of launching their own design means it would have been a heck of a letdown to see it fail. Aside that, it was cool to see two launches at the Cape yesterday less than 9 hours apart. Recommend to anyone who gets the opportunity to go out there and see one at some point (though the chances that any given launch gets scrubbed is never low).
- capitainenemo 3y ago... well... unless it was some issue with the rocket's delivery that impacted the lander, like damaging a portion of it on release, or shocks on takeoff?
- Rebelgecko 3y agoThey should have the measurements to know if the rocket had any forces that went out of spec during launch
- dylan604 3y agoessentially, Apollo 13
- T-A 3y agoApollo 13's emergency was caused by the spacecraft's service module, not Saturn V: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_13#Investigation_and_response https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_13#Investigation_and_re...
- basementcat 3y agoApollo 13 (and previous flights) did experience "pogo oscillation" from the Saturn vehicle which caused one of the first stage engines to shut down early. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pogo_oscillation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pogo_oscillation
- bewaretheirs 3y agoThe damage to the Apollo 13 service module that caused oxygen tank 2 to rupture almost certainly happened well before launch during ground testing. See https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/ap13acc.html https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/ap13acc.html
- tekla 3y agoSo? It was irrelevant to the issue. The issue was traced back to manufacturing.
- c-linkage 3y agoFun fact (for me, anyway): I live 35 miles from the launch complex, and the ground-shaking launch of the Vulcan Centaur rocket woke me up at 2:19 this morning. I can't imagine how intense it was for people much nearer to Cape Canaveral. That is one hell of a rocket!
- consumer451 3y agoOnce Starship is up and running, I am really curious how the noise will affect the surrounding areas. For example, the HLS version of Starship, for Artemis III, will require something like 16 Starship launches in short order. I am a huge SpaceX fan, but if SpaceX's vision of many Starship launches per day becomes reality, then that will certainly be interesting for anyone within 50 miles of the pad.
- euroderf 3y agoAre launches permitted when prevailing winds would send liftoff exhaust over populated areas ?
- consumer451 3y agoUp to this point, that's not been a factor considered by anyone in a position of authority. Starship uses Methane-Oxygen, which burns way cleaner than Kerosene-Oxygen, which is used by Falcon 9. The thing people should be concerned about are solid rocket boosters, which SpaceX does not use. Solid boosters have polluted every "untouched" alpine lake on the planet. Those have been used by the new Vulcan, Space Shuttle, and a lot of other rockets. Tim Dodd has an excellent video and write-up on this topic: https://everydayastronaut.com/rocket-pollution/ https://everydayastronaut.com/rocket-pollution/
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- senectus1 3y agoprovided it burns yes. any accident that results in the releasing of that amount of methane unburnt would be horribly damaging. luckily, rockets rarely DONT go bang and burn when things go wrong.
- janice1999 3y agoAside from scientific instruments it contains a variety of payloads, including cryptocurrency and human remains packaged by 2 private companies [0] . I think the latter is rather distasteful and turning the moon into a celebrity cemetery should be banned by international agreement. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peregrine_Mission_One https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peregrine_Mission_One
- laweijfmvo 3y agoI'm assuming they're cremated remains? At they distinguishable from any other ash/carbon at that point?
- ars 3y agoCremated remains are not ash/carbon they are ground up bones.
- orbital-decay 3y agoWhy stop at this? Let's internationally ban poor taste and kitsch in general. I'm sure it would go well.
- atticora 3y agoUnfortunately it's very easy to find people who agree with the non-ironic reading of this and are fully aware that it is incompatible with any notion of a limit to democracy or state power.
- jampekka 3y agoLuckily the irony won't be lost on those who prefer oligarchy over democracy.
- rokkitmensch 3y agoIf I could find a tasteful dictator, I'd consider a wholesale replacement of democracy for this reason alone.
- SubiculumCode 3y agoMy sister's art in digital record is aboard. Hoping for the best :( edit: i just assumed its the same one, but not sure. edit: it is.
- alecco 3y agoRelated from 2 days ago: https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/01/with-vulcans-liftoff-imminent-united-launch-alliance-flies-into-uncertain-future/ https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/01/with-vulcans-liftoff-i...
- csours 3y ago> "Failure to maintain a sun-pointing orientation could deprive the spacecraft of the ability to generate power using its solar panels."
- vodou 3y agoI've been in mission control for a satellite when this is going on. It is the worst stress I have experienced in my professional career. Things sorted out in the end (some bias calibrations were just plain wrong). I hope for the best for this team!
- jdiez17 3y agoMy team is about to go through this ;) It's our first pair of satellite with solar panels in only one axis, so attitude control is critical. The satellites will be deployed on Wednesday, wish us luck!
- vodou 3y agoI really do wish you luck!
- shadowgovt 3y ago"Fly safe." o7
- csours 3y agoIs there an equivalent to 'break a leg' in aerospace? Good luck anyway! May I ask what the primary constraint is for not adding a small panel that could at least enable bootstrap functionality? The risk mitigation isn't worth the mass? Too complicated to implement?
- jdiez17 3y agoActually, before we extend the panels we do have do have solar cells on 3 out of 6 faces of the satellite - which should allow us to make sure our attitude control is working as expected. We need to deploy the panels to maximize the solar collection area and thus power for the payloads. And there simply isn't enough space on the other panels to put "backup solar cells" :) Some pictures and more info about the mission here: https://www.tu.berlin/en/about/profile/press-releases-news/nanoff-satellites https://www.tu.berlin/en/about/profile/press-releases-news/n...
- Murrawhip 3y agoFrom space.com's update: > The team's improvised maneuver was successful in reorienting Peregrine's solar array towards the sun. Looks like they fixed it for now. https://www.space.com/private-astrobotic-peregrine-moon-lander-suffers-anomaly https://www.space.com/private-astrobotic-peregrine-moon-land...
- T-A 3y agohttps://www.astrobotic.com/update-4-for-peregrine-mission-one/ https://www.astrobotic.com/update-4-for-peregrine-mission-on... Unfortunately, it appears the failure within the propulsion system is causing a critical loss of propellant. The team is working to try and stabilize this loss, but given the situation, we have prioritized maximizing the science and data we can capture. We are currently assessing what alternative mission profiles may be feasible at this time.
- ramesh31 3y agoThank god. What they proposed to do was an obscene act of pure vandalism.
- bewaretheirs 3y agothere have been bags of astronaut poop on the moon since the Apollo era.
- ramesh31 3y ago>there have been bags of astronaut poop on the moon since the Apollo era. And those bags of poop are part of a collective human heritage, paid for by public funding and driven by a desire to conquer space and explore the unknown. Peregrine was a vanity stunt for ultra rich people. They deserve to get what they paid for.
- DarmokJalad1701 3y ago> Peregrine was a vanity stunt for ultra rich people. They deserve to get what they paid for. That's quite the claim. Peregrine was contracted as part of NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services - which is paid for by public funding. It includes rovers from US and Mexico, and scientific payloads from US and Germany as well as other payloads from six other countries. Of course, someone complaining about "sacred sites" makes the whole thing a vanity stunt.
- 0xffff2 3y ago>Peregrine was a vanity stunt for ultra rich people. They deserve to get what they paid for. I'm not sure why you think that, but I can tell you first hand as a member of the team building NASA's first unmanned lunar rover, which is going to (hopefully) land on the moon on an Astrobotic lander next year, this mission is very much not a "stunt for ultra rich people", but a very important step in NASA's ongoing work to develop cheap commercial access to space.
- shadowgovt 3y agoTwo new updates have dropped. Update 3: They resolved the sunward-pointing issue. That's the good news. https://www.astrobotic.com/update-3-for-peregrine-mission-one/ https://www.astrobotic.com/update-3-for-peregrine-mission-on... Update 4: They're pretty sure they're losing propellant, and may have to come up with a new plan. That's the bad news. https://www.astrobotic.com/update-4-for-peregrine-mission-one/ https://www.astrobotic.com/update-4-for-peregrine-mission-on... "We are currently assessing what alternative mission profiles may be feasible at this time" (which is almost certainly press-release-speak for "You will not go to Moon in February.")
- TheBlight 3y agoCan't have private enterprise find the secret Moon bases. /s
- bookofjoe 3y ago"Space is hard." — Elon Musk
- baegi 3y ago"Just before entering a known period of communication outage, the team developed and executed an improvised maneuver to reorient the solar panels toward the Sun. Shortly after this maneuver, the spaceraft entered an expected period of communication loss." Imagine the pressure when clicking" send" on that maneuver patch