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  1. #3826
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    Buckaroo Banzai's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Edmond View Post
    The Tranquillitatis basin is a giant rabbit,
    Looks like a Dodo bird to me

  2. #3827
    Making people dance. :-)
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    Quote Originally Posted by Buckaroo Banzai View Post
    Looks like a Dodo bird to me
    So that's where the fookers went. Extinct, me arse.

  3. #3828
    Thailand Expat OhOh's Avatar
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    China details International Lunar Research Station building plans

    All countries welcome with joint hands: chief lunar project designer

    By Deng Xiaoci in Hefei

    Published: Apr 25, 2023 04:05 PM

    "China plans to work with global partners to construct a basic version of International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) before 2028, an improved version of ILRS earlier than 2040, and a further complete one with application functions by around 2050, Director General of Deep Space Exploration Laboratory Wu Weiren said on Tuesday.
    The basic version of the ILRS to be completed before 2028, is tasked to execute lunar environment exploration and experiments and verifications of the use of lunar resources, said Wu, who is also an academician from the Chinese Academy of Engineering, at the opening event for the First International Deep Space Exploration Conference, or the Tiandu Forum, in Hefei, East China's Anhui Province.

    And with the 2040 improved version of the ILRS, scientists are hoping to carry out Earth-moon space environment exploration and relevant scientific experiments, as well as complete the construction of comprehensive constellation Queqiao satellites which will enhance communication, navigation and remote sensing capabilities, according to Wu.

    Following these developments, the lunar research station will be gradually upgraded into a multi-function, application-oriented moon base, Wu noted.

    As a crucial part of the ILRS basic version construction stage, China will launch the Chang'e-6 moon probe by around 2024, which will be first-ever lunar sample returning mission from the dark side of the satellite for mankind.

    Besides, China's Chang'e-7 probe is expected to be launched around 2026, to explore the lunar south pole in hopes of finding the existence of water; Chang'e-8 will be launched around 2028, aiming to carry out experiments on the use of lunar resources.

    Three international lunar missions will also be launched toward the building of ILRS basic version. And after 2030 and the completion of the ILRS basic version, missions code named ILRS-1/2/3 will be launched toward building of an improved version of the ILRS.

    Wu also disclosed that Chang'e-6 will be carrying lunar probing payload from several other countries including France, Italy, Sweden and Pakistan. As of Chang'e-7 mission, China has received applications from 11 countries and their 18 kinds of payload for similar carry-on cooperation.

    China has carried out cooperation on moon exploration with more than 19 countries and regions around the world and singed 23 international cooperation agreements, ever since the implementation of the country's lunar probe project in 2004, China's space authorities said.

    The ILRS, an international cooperative proposed by China, will comprise five infrastructure systems, including an Earth-lunar transportation system, long-term operation and supplying system on the lunar surface, lunar surface transport and operation system, lunar scientific research facility as well as a ground support and application system.

    The station will be capable of providing energy supplies, communication and navigation, space shuffling, lunar research and ground support services and as well as serving as a command center, the Global Times learned.

    Russia, Pakistan, Argentina and international organizations including the Asia Pacific Space Cooperation Organization have inked agreements to participate in the ILRS, with more than 10 other countries currently negotiating over the agreement.

    It is hopeful that all the participants of the ILRS program will complete the singing of cooperation agreements before the end of June. "We welcome all countries with joint hands in the International Lunar Research Station," Wu said.

    Speaking at the same event, Wu Yanhua, chief designer of China's major deep project on deep space exploration, outlined China's upcoming tasks in the deep space exploration field.

    China plans to launch Tianwen-2 probe by around 2025 via the Long March-3B launcher, and the mission will execute fly-by and sample returning mission with a near-Earth asteroid named 2016HO3 and then by around 2034, another fly-by with a main-belt comet named 311P, Wu Yanhua said.

    Zhang Rongqiao, chief designer of China's interplanetary project, told the media that the launch of Tianwen-2 is expected to be around May 2025 with the research stage work of the prototype almost completed.

    Zhang also revealed to the media that the waking of the Zhurong Mars rover would have to meet two conditions -temperatures inside its cabin are above -15 C and the solar energy it generates reaches 140 watt. The current dormancy of the rover in Mars spring could be caused by impacts of its power generating due to unexpected accumulation of dusts.

    Tianwen-3 will be a Mars sample retuning mission and Tianwen-4 will be about Jupiter system exploration, Wu Yanhua disclosed.

    To protect humans from the common threat of asteroid impact, Wu Yanhua revealed that China will carry out its first demonstration task of such near-Earth asteroid defense capability to crash a 50-meter-level asteroid target and assess the effect of such collision in a direct in-orbit fashion. By 2040, a basic defense capability will be formed in part on the basis of international cooperation, he said.

    Improving a near-Earth asteroid early warning system, verifying the engineering capability to asteroid defense and working international forces to construct a joint responding capability, represent major responsibilities for a space power, Wu Yanhua stressed."

    China details International Lunar Research Station building plans - Global Times
    A tray full of GOLD is not worth a moment in time.

  4. #3829
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    Quote Originally Posted by harrybarracuda View Post
    Chinkystan has lost contact with its Mars rover. Apparently no-one considered that dust might cover up the solar panels.

    Just like the Insight lander of NASA.

    But sure, that rover was a success, but not at the level of Curiosity. A generation behind.

  5. #3830
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    SpaceX released a video on twitter. Stunning footage of the fastest fairing reentry yet at mach 15. It is from the recent Falcon Heavy launch of the ViaSat-3 satellite directly to GEO orbit.

    https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1653509582046769156

    Fairing reentry on the ViaSat-3 mission was the hottest and fastest we've ever attempted. The fairings re-entered the atmosphere greater than 15x the speed of sound, creating a large trail of plasma in its wake

  6. #3831
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    NASA awarded a contract to Blue Origin for a Moon lander. This is the second contract after they had awarded a Moon lander contract to SpaceX earlier. Usually NASA wants at least 2 companies contracted, while Congress wants only one, as long as it is B....g or L....M, or anyone but SpaceX.

    This time NASA awarded only one initially because of lack of funding for more than that, just $2.9 billion. They could barely afford the cheapest offer. The selection of SpaceX caused a lot of indignation at Congress and they awarded more money, to fund a second provider. This time Blue Origin made a much better proposal than last time. Much better technical and also only $3.5 billion compared to almost $10 billion for their first offer. I just doubt that they can meet the contractual timeline. If they make it by 2030, I consider it a success.

    Space News thread-bluemoon_nasa_option_2023-05-19_01-29-31_0-jpg


    A great YouTube video by Scott Manley with a lot of detailed explanation. Don't get annoyed by the intro music.

    Last edited by Takeovers; 23-05-2023 at 02:09 PM.
    "don't attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by incompetence"

  7. #3832
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    Last week I visited the 100m radiotelescope in Effelsberg, Germany. It is now over 50 years old. Besides one other with 102m diameter which was built much later it is still the biggest free moving one dish radiotelescope.

    Space News thread-effelsberg-jpg

    Photo by me at this tour.

    China is planning to build a 110m dish, maybe later a 120m dish. Seems the ~100m size is about the biggest feasible for single dish free movable radiotelescopes.

    Astronomers would like to build a much bigger one on the back side of the Moon. Low gravity would allow for it but it would be very expensive. I think a very large radio telescope at the Earth-Moon Lagrange point 2, behind the Moon is more realistic. But I am quite alone with this. That point would still receive some scattered background noise from terrestrial sources but I guess it would be cheaper by at least a factor of 10 and much less challenging to build.

    This monster has a total weight of 3200t. I could not help but making the comparison with the weight of SpaceX starship which has ~2 times as much weight at launch, more than 6000t.

  8. #3833
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    ^ very cool, thanks!

  9. #3834
    Thailand Expat misskit's Avatar
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    The United Arab Emirates Is Heading for the Asteroid Belt

    Building off the success of its Hope spacecraft, which is still circling and studying Mars, the United Arab Emirates announced on Monday plans for an ambitious follow-up mission: a grand tour of the asteroid belt.


    “The asteroid belt mission was the right amount of challenge,” said Sarah al-Amiri, chairwoman of the United Arab Emirates Space Agency. “Interesting science relevant to the science community, good opportunities for collaboration.”


    The spacecraft, named MBR Explorer after Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai and prime minister of the United Arab Emirates, is scheduled to launch in 2028. In February 2030, the spacecraft will arrive at Westerwald, a 1.4-mile-wide asteroid, zipping past at 20,000 miles per hour on its way to visit six more objects in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.


    “We would get a more detailed look at the surface of the asteroid,” said Hoor al-Mazmi, the science lead for the mission. “And we would understand the interior density and the structure of the asteroid.”


    The seventh asteroid, Justitia, is the most intriguing. About 30 miles wide, Justitia is very reddish, an unusual color for an asteroid. Indeed, it looks more like one of the small icy worlds found in the Kuiper belt, circling the sun beyond the orbit of Neptune.


    That has led planetary scientists to speculate that Justitia formed in the outer reaches of the solar system and then was scattered inward by the shifting orbits of the giant planets, eventually joining the asteroid belt.


    If that is true, a visit to Justitia would provide a close-up study of a Kuiper belt object without the long trip to the solar system’s distant reaches.


    The MBR Explorer is scheduled to sidle up within a few hundred feet of Justitia in October 2034 and spend at least seven months studying it with cameras and spectrometers that will be able to identify the asteroid’s composition, including the presence of water. The reddish color is believed to point to carbon-based molecules that are the building blocks for life. The spacecraft will also drop off a small lander to set down on Justitia’s surface.


    With a mass of over two tons, the MBR Explorer will be bigger than the Emirates’ Hope spacecraft, which went to Mars. For flybys of the first six asteroids, the spacecraft will be traveling quickly, requiring precise navigation to ensure the instruments are pointed at the asteroid.


    “The complexity adds up,” said Mohsen al-Awadhi, the program director of the mission.


    And the spacecraft has to launch within a three-week period in March 2028 to be able to make all the planned flybys. If it cannot get off the ground then, the entire mission has to be replanned, probably with new asteroid destinations.


    To date, NASA, the European Space Agency, China and JAXA, the Japanese space agency, have sent robotic spacecraft to asteroids.


    The United Arab Emirates, an oil-rich country that is a bit smaller in size than the state of Maine, is a newcomer to spaceflight. Two decades ago, it did not have a space program.


    Today it is increasingly active in space, part of a push to jump-start a high-tech industry in the country in preparation for a future when petroleum no longer flows as plentifully. That includes sending astronauts to the International Space Station, with one, Sultan al-Neyadi, currently in orbit.


    In 2009 the Emirates’ first satellite, DubaiSat-1, reached orbit. It was built in South Korea, but Emirati engineers essentially worked as apprentices at the satellite manufacturer. Nine years later, the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center in Dubai built KhalifaSat, an Earth-observing satellite, without foreign help.


    For the Mars mission, its first foray farther into the solar system, the Emirates again recruited foreign help, from the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado Boulder.


    Hope launched in July 2020 and arrived in orbit around Mars seven months later. It continues to study how weather events like dust storms in the lower atmosphere affect the rate at which the thin atmosphere of Mars escapes into space. Recently it captured high-resolution images of Deimos, the smaller of the two Martian moons.


    Emirati space officials discussed ideas of where to head next. “We actually looked at the whole solar system in terms of what happens next after the Emirates Mars mission,” Ms. al-Amiri said.


    Pete Withnell, who served as project manager for the Emirates’ Mars mission, said the Colorado laboratory would have “an even more intense involvement” in the new asteroid mission.


    Some Emiratis who started as aerospace novices building the Hope spacecraft are now among the leaders of the asteroid mission. That includes Mr. al-Awadhi, a former maintenance engineer for the Emirates airline who served as the lead systems engineer on the Mars mission.


    Mr. Withnell said that the new spacecraft might be assembled in Colorado again and that other organizations were also involved. The Italian Space Agency is providing one of the spectrometer instruments, and Malin Space Science Systems of San Diego is building the two cameras.


    But much more will be manufactured in the Emirates this time. Fifty percent of the money spent on the mission must be spent within the country.


    “This is a requirement we did not have” for the Mars mission, Mr. al-Awadhi said, adding, “That’s a big difference.”


    “We are looking at developing our local industry,” Ms. al-Amiri said.


    The variety of asteroids that MBR Explorer visits will offer useful scientific comparisons for similar asteroids that will be visited on other missions, such as Lucy, a NASA mission that launched in 2021.


    “I think it’s a good mission,” Hal Levison, the principal investigator for Lucy, said of the Emirati mission. “It’ll add something unique that NASA is not planning to do.”


    Planetary scientists might be able to figure out whether Justitia really is an interloper from the outer solar system. But other bodies thought to be Kuiper belt objects that have been pushed inward are more grayish-reddish. “The interpretation of that is that the exposure of the sun is burning off some of the red stuff as you get closer,” he said.


    Thus, Justitia, which is as red as a distant Kuiper belt object, seems too red for where it is.


    “It supplies us with a mystery,” Dr. Levison said.

    The United Arab Emirates Is Heading for the Asteroid Belt – DNyuz

  10. #3835
    Thailand Expat misskit's Avatar
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    China Announces Plan to Land Astronauts on Moon by 2030

    China plans to complete a mission to land a person on the moon by 2030, a government official announced on Monday, in the highest-level confirmation of China’s ambitions for a crewed lunar landing.


    Chinese scientists have previously nodded at a 2030 goal in a less formal capacity; for example, the chief designer of China’s lunar exploration program said last month that a 2030 landing would be “no problem.”


    “We can clasp the moon in the ninth heaven,” Lin Xiqiang, the deputy director of China’s Manned Space Agency, said at a news conference on Monday, quoting a Mao Zedong poem.


    Mr. Lin said the moon landing project, part of the country’s broader Lunar Exploration Project — also known as the Chang’e Project, for the Chinese moon goddess — had “recently” been kick-started, though he did not offer specifics. The project would also seek to enable short-term stays on the lunar surface, as well as collect samples and conduct research, he said.


    The Monday announcement came at a news conference to mark the liftoff of three new astronauts on Tuesday to China’s new space station, which was completed late last year.


    A manned lunar landing would be a major milestone for China’s, and the world’s, space exploration: No human has been on the moon since the United States’ Apollo missions in the 1960s and ’70s. And it could mark a significant achievement for China in its burgeoning competition with the United States in space. China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, has said that the country should become a “great space power.”


    NASA has also announced a plan to put people — including the first woman and first person of color — on the moon again, with a target of 2025. But the Artemis program, as the plan is known, has faced delays. Both Beijing and Washington have also laid out goals of building a research station on the moon and landing people on Mars.


    Space has become another arena for U.S.-China tensions, with echoes of the space race between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War. NASA’s administrator, Bill Nelson, has said that the United States should “watch out” for Chinese attempts to dominate the lunar surface and keep Americans out. A Pentagon report last year warned that China could overtake American capabilities in space by 2045.


    China’s space program has developed rapidly in recent years, while America’s has often been bogged down by conflicting priorities and changing administrations. China is the only country to have successfully landed on the moon in the 21st century, and in 2019 it also became the first to land a probe on the moon’s far side.


    While some have hoped that China and the United States could cooperate on space exploration even as geopolitical tensions rise, a provision in the U.S. law that finances NASA bans direct cooperation with the Chinese space agency or Chinese-owned companies. China has signaled that it will cooperate with Russia on space programs.

    China Announces Plan to Land Astronauts on Moon by 2030 – DNyuz

  11. #3836
    Making people dance. :-)
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    Both of those are very interesting missions. Close up study of half a dozen asteroid belt bodies could open up a whole range of future missions and opportunities, depending on the discoveries.


    The second one will get the yanks into gear.

  12. #3837
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    Quote Originally Posted by Edmond View Post
    Both of those are very interesting missions. Close up study of half a dozen asteroid belt bodies could open up a whole range of future missions and opportunities, depending on the discoveries.
    Indeed. Thanks to misskit for posting.


    Quote Originally Posted by Edmond View Post
    The second one will get the yanks into gear.
    The Chinese are really going for it. Though I doubt the time table. They are still struggling with the needed heavy lift rocket. It is very challenging but I have no doubt they will get there. It presently has the name long march 10.


    Quote Originally Posted by Edmond View Post
    The second one will get the yanks into gear.
    I have some doubts. Presently for Congress it is still more important to channel gargantuan amounts of money into Boeing for SLS and Lockheed Martin for the Orion capsule than actually achieving anything worth doing on the Moon.

  13. #3838
    Thailand Expat misskit's Avatar
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    First livestream from the Red Planet

    On Friday, to celebrate the 20th birthday of ESA’s Mars Express, you’ll have the chance to get as close as it’s currently possible get to a live view from Mars. Tune in to be amongst the first to see new pictures roughly every 50 seconds as they’re beamed down directly from the Visual Monitoring Camera on board ESA’s long-lived and still highly productive martian orbiter.


    “This is an old camera, originally planned for engineering purposes, at a distance of almost three million kilometres from Earth – this hasn’t been tried before and to be honest, we’re not 100% certain it’ll work,” explains James Godfrey, Spacecraft Operations Manager at ESA’s mission control centre in Darmstadt, Germany.


    “But I’m pretty optimistic. Normally, we see images from Mars and know that they were taken days before. I’m excited to see Mars as it is now – as close to a martian ‘now’ as we can possibly get!’


  14. #3839
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    That will be pretty cool. I hope I remember it later.


  15. #3840
    Thailand Expat DrWilly's Avatar
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    Live in 11 hours
    3 June at 00:00

  16. #3841
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by DrWilly View Post
    Live in 11 hours
    3 June at 00:00
    That's 12 hours.

  17. #3842
    Thailand Expat DrWilly's Avatar
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    Thanks mr. pedantic, but wrong.

  18. #3843

  19. #3844
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    Quote Originally Posted by harrybarracuda View Post
    Schoolboy error.
    This.

    Or old age error. Everybody who was involved in designing Voyager is now dead or close.

    But there is a chance of recovery. Voyager is designed to occasionally try and contact Earth.

    it was feared it might take until October to re-establish contact, as that's when it's due for an automatic reset.

  20. #3845
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Takeovers View Post
    Or old age error. Everybody who was involved in designing Voyager is now dead or close.
    Good point

  21. #3846
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    Oh dear, the high-heeled war criminal will be upset. Beaten by the Indians.

    Although I think it's stretching it a bit to say it "ceased to exist". Obviously it still exists, just in bits.



    Russia's Luna-25 spacecraft crashes into Moon


    Russia's unmanned Luna-25 spacecraft has crashed into the Moon after spinning out of control, officials say.


    It was Russia's first Moon mission in almost 50 years.


    The craft was due to be the first ever to land on the Moon's south pole, but failed after encountering problems as it moved into its pre-landing orbit.


    It was set to explore a part of the Moon which scientists think could hold frozen water and precious elements.


    Roscosmos, Russia's state space corporation, said on Sunday morning that it had lost contact with the Luna-25 shortly after 14:57pm (11:57 GMT) on Saturday.


    Preliminary findings showed that the 800kg lander had "ceased to exist as a result of a collision with the surface of the Moon", it said in a statement.


    It said a special commission would look into why the mission failed.


    The loss of Luna-25 is a blow to Roscosmos. Russia's civilian space programme has been in decline for several years, as state funding is increasingly directed towards the military.


    Russia was racing to the Moon's south pole against India, whose Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft is scheduled to land there in the coming days and send a rover to explore the rocks and craters, gathering data and images to send back to Earth.


    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66562629
    Last edited by harrybarracuda; 20-08-2023 at 09:27 PM.

  22. #3847
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    On wednesday India will have a second try for a Moon landing. The first one has failed. Here a link to the landing live stream. When clicked it gives the time of live stream start.


  23. #3848
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    The russian lander had an RTG, a nuclear battery as power source. The Indians don't have those. So most likely the life span will be quite short. The russian rover was supposed to operate for at least 6 months.

  24. #3849
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    Quote Originally Posted by Takeovers View Post
    The russian lander had an RTG, a nuclear battery as power source. The Indians don't have those. So most likely the life span will be quite short. The russian rover was supposed to operate for at least 6 months.
    Great, another Russian nuclear reactor spewing radiation everywhere.

  25. #3850
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    Landing live stream for Chandrayaan-3 is active.

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