Space News thread

[Takeovers]

Actually that deserves its own thread, as it continues to develop and actually happen.

Maybe its own thread but it would be idle for quite a while until more precise schedule comes up, maybe in a year or so. I do expect the schedule to slip into 2019.

[Luigi]

Actually that deserves its own thread, as it continues to develop and actually happen.

Maybe its own thread but it would be idle for quite a while until more precise schedule comes up, maybe in a year or so. I do expect the schedule to slip into 2019.

Cool.

Any info on when info about the astronauts, the lucky feckers, will be released?

I think the rocket to be used is set to make its virgin flight later this year.

[Takeovers]

Any info on when info about the astronauts, the lucky feckers, will be released?

The lucky billionaires.

Best guess $80-120million each. They are two, they know each other, they wanted privacy, no pilot along. Sounds like first sex behind the moon coming up.

Maybe when the names are released that would be a good time to start their own thread.

[Luigi]

They are two, they know each other, they wanted privacy, no pilot along. Sounds like first sex behind the moon coming up.

I was thinking that.


Do you know what sort of altitude (is that the correct term?) they'll be from the lunar surface?

And how many orbits will they do?

[David48atTD]

No Mate ... he nicked the image and quote from Slicks thread.

Luigi have you changed your name to Patrick Moore you put out a lot of info ,



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

Seven Earth-sized terrestrial planets have been discovered orbiting an ultra-cool dwarf star. They’re the most promising target yet in the search for life outside our solar system. 40 light years away, the planets are—like Earth—terrestrial rocky worlds that could support life under the right atmospheric conditions. “The seven planets are temperate. This means that they could have some liquid water and maybe, by extension, life on the surface,” said lead author Michaël Gillon.

When planets pass in front of a small star, in this case TRAPPIST-1, they cast a shadow that allows scientists to make them out and determine their size and orbit. A handful of these “transits” allowed the researchers to identify three initial planets in the system from a ground telescope last year. After conducting further observations, including 20 days of continuous observation from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope, they have now witnessed 34 clear transits and attributed them to seven different planets.


The next step in the search for life on these planets is to determine the composition of their atmospheres. The planets are likely tidally locked, meaning one side always faces the star, and the other is always dark. An atmosphere would mitigate extreme temperatures on both sides and preserve habitability.

Some atmospheric compositions would themselves be signs of life, such as methane, oxygen, and carbon dioxide in the right relative concentrations. “There is one combination of molecules, with some relative abundances, that would tell us there is life with 99 percent confidence,” said Gillon. “Oxygen itself is not enough.”

The researchers will soon know much more about the planets’ atmospheres and any potential signs of life. “With current facilities (the Hubble and Spitzer telescopes), we can obtain the very first insights into the atmospheres of these planets, find out if they have a large and clear atmosphere, and possibly detect molecules such as water and methane,” co-author Julien de Witt told us. “Once the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) launches in 2018, we will be able to go one step further in our research. Assuming the planets have an atmosphere, JWST will provide us with more detailed information about their composition, temperature, and pressure. This will help us assess their habitability within five to ten years.”


Imagine standing on the surface of the exoplanet TRAPPIST-1f. This artist's concept is one interpretation of what it could look like. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

The researchers already know a bit about conditions on the surface of the planets based on their proximity to the star. The sides of the planets facing the star are dimly lit, like a sunset on Earth, and feel warm from infrared energy. “The spectacle would be beautiful, because every now and then, you would see another planet about twice as big as the moon in the sky,” said co-author Amaury Triaud.

Prior to this discovery, the only terrestrial planets known to be well-suited to life were those in our solar system. “Now we have seven more we can study in detail. And not in a few decades—we are doing this now,” said Gillon. “This story is just beginning.”

Featured image: This artist's conception shows what the TRAPPIST-1 planetary system may look like, based on available data about their diameters, masses and distances from the host star. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

https://www.researchgate.net/blog/po...d-support-life

[Luigi]

I think you'll find that they (my image and his image) come from different places.
Quote? This is the only comment I made: "With those orbital periods any aliens are going to be 1000's of years old."

Not that it makes a blind bit of difference....

No need for you to spam this fine thread with your boring, over-sized fucking nonsense. Thanks.

[snakeeyes]

SpaceX to fly 2 paying customers to the moon next year,
Automated spaceship


Two private citizens could be headed on a trip around the moon in 2018, according to Elon Musk of SpaceX. USA TODAY NETWORK

SpaceX founder Elon Musk said he's planning a private space mission, using a SpaceX rocket to transport two paying passengers around the moon.

"I think this will be a very exciting mission," Musk said Monday, during a teleconference with journalists.

Musk said SpaceX was approached by "two private individuals" who know one another, but whom he did not identify.
They would be launched from the historic Launch Complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center late next year on SpaceX's Dragon 2 vehicle on a Falcon Heavy rocket. That's the same launch pad used by NASA for Apollo missions to the moon, as well as many space shuttle missions, including the last one. SpaceX flew its Falcon 9 from the KSC pad for the first time earlier this month.

"They are entering this with their eyes open, knowing there is some risk," Musk said.

Cuban: Trump can't stop rise of the robots and their effect on U.S. jobs
SpaceX launches rocket from historic NASA launchpad
Musk said the flight would be on an autonomous spacecraft that needs no specially trained astronauts onboard, although the two paying travelers would undergo "extensive training before going on the mission."

"Dragon is designed to be an autonomous vehicle," Musk said, noting that other versions of Dragon currently do cargo missions to the International Space Station with no one aboard.

Dale Ketcham, chief of strategic alliances for Space Florida, said Musk's announcement was somewhat of a surprise in the space community.

"I do think most of us didn't see it coming, but maybe we should have," Ketcham said, referring to Musk's reputation for out-of-the-box thinking and actions.

Ketcham called Musk's announcement "very exciting," and said it will help drive competition among NASA and commercial space companies that could lead to an accelerated timeline for space exploration.

Ketcham compared this to the competition between the United States and the then-Soviet Union to land humans on the moon, which NASA accomplished in 1969, with Apollo 11.

NASA to study flying crew on first flight of big rocket
Musk would not discuss what the passengers would be paying for the around-the-moon flight, saying only that this mission would cost more than a SpaceX resupply mission to the space station.

Musk said the weeklong mission around the moon would involve a trip of 300,000 to 400,000 miles.

He described the flight path as taking “a long loop around the moon,” and getting close to the lunar surface, but not landing, before returning to Earth.

“It would skim the surface of the moon,” is how Musk described it.

Musk, who is chief executive officer of SpaceX, said the mission would need to be licensed by the Federal Aviation Administration.

He said the communications system of the Dragon spacecraft would need to be modified to accommodate deep-space communications.

SpaceX provided additional details on its website, noting that the two passengers "have already paid a significant deposit to do a moon mission. Like the Apollo astronauts before them, these individuals will travel into space carrying the hopes and dreams of all humankind, driven by the universal human spirit of exploration."

SpaceX said it plans "to conduct health and fitness tests, as well as begin initial training later this year" for the space travelers.

"Other flight teams have also expressed strong interest, and we expect more to follow," SpaceX said. "Additional information will be released about the flight teams, contingent upon their approval and confirmation of the health and fitness test results."

SpaceX said this mission "presents an opportunity for humans to return to deep space for the first time in 45 years, and they will travel faster and farther into the solar system than any before them."

Space X did not quantify those statements. NASA's Apollo program astronauts also orbited the moon in the late-1960s and early-1970s.

Ketcham said he believes SpaceX may have been referring to a flight path that would take the travelers farther past the moon than the Apollo astronauts, before returning to Earth.

Musk would not release more information on the prospective space travelers, including their genders. All he would say is that "it's nobody from Hollywood."

Musk said this won't be a one-time event.

"We would expect to do more than one mission" of this type, Musk said, potentially one or two a year, and they could be "a driver of revenue" for SpaceX.

"By also flying privately crewed missions, which NASA has encouraged, long-term costs to the government decline and more flight reliability history is gained, benefiting both government and private missions," SpaceX said in its statement.

Musk emphasized, however, that "NASA would have priority" if it decided to do a lunar orbit mission with astronauts first.

NASA issues a statement late Monday in response to Musk's announcement that said in part: “NASA commends its industry partners for reaching higher. For more than a decade, NASA has invested in private industry to develop capabilities for the American people and seed commercial innovation to advance humanity's future in space."

In its statement, SpaceX said: "We would like to thank NASA, without whom this would not be possible. NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, which provided most of the funding for Dragon 2 development, is a key enabler for this mission. In addition, this will make use of the Falcon Heavy rocket, which was developed with internal SpaceX funding."

Falcon Heavy is scheduled to launch its first test flight this summer. It would be the second-most-powerful vehicle to reach orbit after the Saturn V moon rocket. At 5 million pounds of liftoff thrust, Falcon Heavy is two-thirds the thrust of Saturn V and more than double the thrust of the next largest launch vehicle currently flying, SpaceX said.

Later this year, as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, SpaceX said it plans to launch its Dragon 2 or "Crew Dragon" spacecraft to the International Space Station.

The first demonstration mission will be in "automatic mode," without people on board, SpaceX said.

A subsequent mission with crew is targeting the second quarter of 2018. The company is currently contracted to perform an average of our Dragon missions a year to the station, three carrying cargo and one crew.

SpaceX said the upcoming missions will represent "an important milestone as we work towards our ultimate goal of transporting humans to Mars."

Musk's announcement came after about 18 hours of speculation on social media about what he would say, after he tweeted on Sunday night to look for a "SpaceX announcement" on Monday afternoon. He followed that up after his teleconference with a Twitter message saying: "Fly me to the moon ... OK" and a link to the SpaceX announcement.


SpaceX to fly 2 paying customers to the moon next year

[Sumbitch]

^ Green owed.

[Takeovers]

Do you know what sort of altitude (is that the correct term?) they'll be from the lunar surface?

And how many orbits will they do?

I don't know the altitude. I guess they will not cut it too close. They also stated that these people will be the farthest away from earth ever. Which should mean they have higher altitude than the Apollo 13 crew who hold that record now.

They will very likely not get into any orbit, they just do a sling around the moon and the moons gravity will send them right back to earth without any active maneuver except small course corrections. Dragon may not have enough delta-v (capacity to accelerate) to enter orbit. I believe it has but most who see themselves as experts don't agree with me. But sure not a low circular orbit like Apollo did for the moon landings. Only a highly elliptic orbit. For more they would have to build in capacity for more acceleration. Doable but not trivial. As SpaceX is not really interested in the moon they would only do it if they get very well paid for it.

[BaitongBoy]

Fascinating stuff...Hope it ends better than Challenger in 1986...

One always has to "assume" a catastrophic failure...Like "saying yer prayers" before surgery...

But what a trip...We're on our way...

Can you imagine 100 years from now?...

[Takeovers]

Hope it ends better than Challenger in 1986...

There is always a risk, especially if you keep improving your rocket instead of building it exactly the same way for a decade or longer. But Dragon has a very advanced abort system that should be able to get the capsule to safety if anything happens to the launch vehicle at any stage of the launch. During flight the reliability of the Dragon capsule itself is required. By the time they launch the capsule will be certified by NASA. That certification is only valid for LEO, low earth orbit but guarantees a high standard of all systems.

See the LES in action.



BTW it looks like it almost hit the beach but that is just the long lens, it was a safe distance out.

[Takeovers]

A video of the chinese mission to the moon bringing back rock samples to earth. Very likely a test mission for future manned moon missions. I say if NASA and Congress don't get their act together and get moving again, in 5-8 years they will be left in the dust by China. Presently I don't see any forward move by US government space, they have totally lost direction. Barreling pork to Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Aerojet Rocketdyne is much more important than actually doing manned spaceflight. I am waiting for them destroying the marvelous program with rovers and probes NASA has been doing, as well as manned flight.

That is not counting what I expect from private SpaceX.

[Stinky]

This one makes you feel little insignificant

[CaptainNemo]

Luxemburger Wort - Luxembourg and lunar robotic company ispace shoot for the moon

Space Mining

Luxembourg and lunar robotic company ispace shoot for the moon



Photo: AFP


201
18
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Published on Thursday, 2 March, 2017 at 18:05

(sth/T.L.) – Luxembourg's government and Tokyo-based space lunar robotic exploration company ispace Inc. on Thursday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in the context of the SpaceResources.lu initiative with focus on developing miniaturized technology to discover, map, and utilize resources on the Moon.
Japanese start-up ispace was created by Hakuto, a finalist team of Google's prestigious innovation competition Google Lunar XPRIZE. The company already works together with the Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology (LIST) and will continue to do so.
Within the framework of this MoU, ispace intends to focus, through its new European office based in Luxembourg, on business development, R&D and on several key technical services, including payload development, engineering and integration.
Five or six engineers in Luxembourg

The start-up employs 20 engineers in Japan and is planning to hire five or six in Luxembourg.
For its part, Luxembourg contributes by providing funding through national R&D grants or programs of the European Space Agency (ESA) to co-fund relevant research and development activities such as the ispace “roving spectrometer”.

ispace is hoping to win the Google Lunar XPRIZE with this rover designed for exploration missions on the moon.
Source: Hakuto

This project aims to bring an innovative mass spectrometer developed by LIST to the surface of the Moon to explore elemental compositions of the lunar ice and regolith.

Dr. Tom Wirtz, who heads the Advanced Instrumentation for Ion Nano-Analytics (AINA) group at LIST said: "we have a mass spectrometry technology that is of major interest for space applications, and ispace has unique means to deploy this technology to space."
The company ispace Europe SA will be hosted in Luxembourg City within the facilities of Paul Wurth InCub which offers, in cooperation with the national business incubator Technoport, a dedicated support program for innovative and technology-driven companies.

“Moon as a strategic stepping stone”


Luxembourg Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Economy, Étienne Schneider, stated: “With ispace from Japan, we welcome another foreign company which chose our country as a European hub for developing highly advanced technologies and capabilities like robotics for exploring and mining resources in space.”

More videos can be found on our video page
"It is a great honour to collaborate with Luxembourg and to be the first space resource company to be recognized for our focus on the Moon. We see the Moon as a strategic stepping stone to further spur human activity in space", said Takeshi Hakamada, CEO of ispace.

"With strong technological, legal and financial support, we are convinced that Luxembourg is the best place for us to begin our European operations," he said.

The governmental SpaceResources.lu initiative aims to promote and support the commercial use of resources gathered from celestial bodies such as asteroids or from the Moon.

[BaitongBoy]

Next, there'll be a coffee shop...Tim Hortons on the moon...

[Latindancer]

NASA Considers Magnetic Shield to Help Mars Grow Its Atmosphere.

NASA Planetary Science Division Director, Jim Green, says launching a magnetic shield could help warm Mars and possibly allow it to become habitable.

NASA Considers Magnetic Shield to Help Mars Grow an Atmosphere

[Takeovers]

NASA Considers Magnetic Shield to Help Mars Grow Its Atmosphere.

This is a seriously weird one. Of course it has been widely discussed.

The claims made are not documented and not consistent with reality. The shield may work and may even be doable. But nobody understands how it would lead to a thicker atmosphere in any way and the proposal does not give any pointer beside the claim itself. I say it is bogus or at least totally misleading.

There is one thing this shield could do. It could make terraforming of Mars by other means more durable. Without a magnetic shield any terraforming effort would be blown away in as short as maybe 100 million years.

[David48atTD]

Preface ...

This has a strong bias to the Southern Skies.



Testing your knowledge of the stunning southern sky? Do you know your Scorpius from your Saucepan?

Stargazing quiz ... test yourself here

[harrybarracuda]

Mars astronaut radiation shield set for moon mission trial
By Reuters
Published Tuesday, March 07, 2017



A vest designed to shield astronauts from deadly solar particles in deep space is set for trials on a lunar mission ready for deployment on any manned mission to Mars, its developers said.

The AstroRad Radiation Shield has been devised by Tel Aviv-based StemRad, which has already produced and marketed a belt to protect rescue workers from harmful gamma ray radiation emitted in nuclear disasters, such as Chernobyl and Fukushima.

The vest will protect vital human tissue, particularly stem cells, which could be devastated by solar radiation in deep space or on Mars, whose sparse atmosphere offers no protection, StemRad's CEO Oren Milstein said.

U.S. space agency NASA has said it hopes to send astronauts to Mars in the mid-2030s.

The vest is made of layers that look like a contoured map and will be tailor-made for each astronaut. Non-metallic protective materials will be positioned on each shield to cover the organs of each astronaut.

"This product will enable human deep space exploration. Our breakthrough has come in creating the architecture of the multi-layered shield to accurately cover the most important organs," Milstein said.

StemRad say it has proven the concept in the laboratory and in simulations, but testing will also take place on the Orion spacecraft, a joint project of Lockheed Martin, NASA and the European Space Agency.

Orion is set to orbit the moon unmanned during the debut flight of NASA's heavy-lift Space Launch System rocket, scheduled for late 2018 but it is also assessing the feasibility of flying two astronauts on that mission.

During the lunar flyby mission, the vest will be strapped to a "phantom" torso dummy, a device used to monitor radiation absorption. Another phantom will fly unprotected and the two will be analyzed after they return to Earth.

NASA had no immediate comment on how the test could be affected if the agency decided to put astronauts on Orion.

Stemrad's chief technologist, Gideon Waterman, said the vest needed to combine density with flexibility to protect astronauts while enabling them to move about as freely as possible.

Mock-ups have been made, and the first protective vest is expected to be produced by the end of the year, Milstein said.

"Based on our simulations, we're sure it works but to be 100 percent sure, we're sending it up on EM-1," he said, referring to NASA's Exploration Mission-1, the first flight of the combined Space Launch System rocket and the Orion capsule.

The Orion will have its own small shelter for solar storms or flares that have dangerous bursts of radiation, and the vest, Milstein said, will offer the same degree of protection so astronauts can keep safe in other parts of the spacecraft.

Astronauts in Earth's orbit, such as those on the International Space Station, do not face the same risk because they are protected by the planet's magnetic field which acts as a shield, he added.

[Takeovers]

Blue Origin is presenting their own launch vehicle with a reusable first stage.



The BE-4 methane oxygen engine.





They are planning to land on a moving ship, unlike SpaceX who land on a stationary platform or back on land. They are building the factory in Florida and will complete it by the end of this year. The engine is a test design that will go on a test stand soon. From test engine to operational may be 2 years if everything goes well. So maybe 2019 or 2020 they can fly.

It is going to be a powerful launch vehicle, near the SpaceX Falcon Heavy that we hope will fly this year. Good we will have two companies working on at least reusing the first stage. None of the big players have even started to work in that direction. ULA, ESA's Ariane, China, Russia have nothing in work yet.

ULA is planning to buy the BE-4 engine for their new Vulcan launch vehicle but with only 2 engines and no plans for reuse. Vulcan will replace the Atlas V with their russian designed and built RD-180 RP-1 (kerosene) engine.

[bobo746]

Saturn's tiny moon, Pan, viewed on March 7, 2017, by NASA's Cassini spacecraft. Pan is about 21 miles wide, orbiting in a gap in Saturn's rings. This view, the closest and most detailed yet, shows its pronounced equatorial ridge, made up of particles from the rings that have accumulated on Pan's equator over centuries

[BaitongBoy]

^ Wild stuff...

[harrybarracuda]

Europa Clipper: the official name of NASA's mission to Europa



One of the most intriguing missions to a celestial body in our Solar System, is one that will study whether the salty liquid water under Europa’s icy crust is habitable or not. The mission, which has been talked about for some time, now has a formal name: Europa Clipper.

NASA has long had Europa in its sights, as the prospect of liquid water, coupled with specific chemical ingredients in its seas, could provide the right conditions for life to prosper if it also possessed an energy source to give biology the kick start it needs for even the simplest organisms to form.

The name Europa Clipper is a reference to the clipper ships – three-masted streamlined sailing vessels renowned for their grace and swiftness – that sailed across the oceans of Earth in the 19th century. Following the grand tradition of these ships, which rapidly shuttled tea and other goods back and forth across the Atlantic Ocean and around the globe, the Europa Clipper spacecraft is expected to speedily sail past the icy moon possibly every two weeks in order to investigate the moon up close as often as possible.

At present, it is anticipated that the solar-powered spacecraft will be put into a long, looping orbit around its parent planet Jupiter to perform around 45 flybys of its moon at altitudes ranging from 25 kilometres to 2,700 kilometres (16 miles to 1,700 miles) over a three-year period.

"During each orbit, the spacecraft spends only a short time within the challenging radiation environment near Europa. It speeds past, gathers a huge amount of science data, then sails on out of there," said Robert Pappalardo, Europa Clipper project scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

The mission concept has already completed its first major review by the agency and is now entering the development phase known as formulation. A number of science instruments have already been selected for the craft, such as cameras and spectrometers to produce high-resolution images of Europa’s surface to determine its composition, along with a magnetometer to measure the strength and direction of the moon’s magnetic field; this will allow scientists to determine the depth and salinity of its ocean.

NASA’s mission had already been informally called Europa Clipper during its conceptual phase, but now that name has stuck and with all systems go, the newly named spacecraft is likely to blast off from Earth in the 2020s.

https://room.eu.com/news/europa-clip...sion-to-europa

[Luigi]

What they really need to do is fly through and sample the newly discovered water plumes that erupt there.

[Takeovers]

What they really need to do is fly through and sample the newly discovered water plumes that erupt there.

I am sure they will try to do that. But they need luck because they don't know when one will happen.

They are working on a lander too.

https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/eal/indepth

Europa Lander Concept Study Report, https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/europa/2012study.cfm

Understanding Europa's habitability is intimately tied to understanding the three "ingredients" for life: water, chemistry, and energy. These astrobiological themes could be well addressed by a landed mission to Europa. Measurements obtained from the moon's surface could allow for direct analysis of the satellite's chemistry and mineralogy through in-situ investigations and measurements that are not possible to achieve remotely:

• A properly equipped lander could allow for sampling beneath the radiation-processed uppermost portion of Europa's icy shell, providing insights about its native composition and implications for life.
• A lander is an excellent platform from which to perform geophysical measurements to probe Europa's ice shell and subsurface ocean.
• A landed mission could permit detailed analyses of local surface geology.

Notional science objectives for this mission concept:
Europa's Composition: Understand the habitability of Europa's ocean through composition and chemistry.
Europa's Ocean and Ice Shell: Characterize the local thickness, heterogeneity, and dynamics of any ice and water layers.
Europa's Geology: Characterize a locality of high scientific interest to understand the formation and evolution of the surface at local scales.
The planning payload selected for the Europa Lander study consists of a notional set of instruments including a mass spectrometer, magnetometer, multiband seismometer package, site imaging system, Raman spectrometer, and a microscopic imager. If a Europa Lander mission is chosen for implementation at some future time, NASA would ultimately select the payload through a formal Announcement of Opportunity (AO) process.