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- Lunar footprint: NASA has begun serial launches of vehicles to the Earth's satellite
Lunar footprint: NASA has begun serial launches of vehicles to the Earth's satellite
NASA has launched two research complexes to the Moon for the first time with a single launch vehicle. They will reach the surface of the satellite within a few months. A pair of similar modules are also expected to launch together in February. The missions are being sent as part of a program to prepare for commercial development of the Earth satellite's resources. According to Russian experts, our country should initiate projects to develop the Moon as part of equal international cooperation, and to develop the celestial body by the forces of individual states is inappropriate. Details - in the material "Izvestia".
What missions launched to the Moon
On Wednesday, January 15, for the first time two spacecraft were launched to the Moon by a single launch vehicle. The launch was made using Falcon 9 from the LC-39B pad at Kennedy Space Center (Florida, USA).
Private research complexes went on the trip. These are the Blue Ghost ("Blue Ghost") apparatus from the American company Firefly Aerospace and the Hakuto-R M2 Resilience module ("Resilience"), developed in a Japanese company with international participation Ispace. It is noteworthy that the previous vehicle from this organization, sent to the Moon, crashed on landing in April 2023.
Despite the joint launch, the modules headed to the Moon by different paths. Blue Ghost's flight will take 45 days, while Resilience is expected to land four to five months after liftoff.
According to Firefly Aerospace, Blue Ghost will land in the Sea of Crisis. This is an ancient impact crater on the visible side of the moon that is filled with 2.5-3.3 billion years old basaltic lava.
On board the station is a computer specially designed for a lunar expedition. It is radiation resistant and will help the research station make a soft landing. In addition, the payload consists of ten scientific instruments. In particular, a vacuum cleaner that will collect samples of regolith, and a set of cameras to observe the mysterious glow created by levitating lunar dust particles.
- Interesting experiment to measure the heat flow using a pneumatic drill and thermal sensors, - said "Izvestia" head of the laboratory of geochemistry of the Moon and planets of the Institute of Geochemistry and Analytical Chemistry of the Russian Academy of Sciences named after Vernadsky Evgeny Slyuta. - The Blue Ghost mission will make measurements near an extinct volcano, where the heat flux may be quite high due to the still cooling magma center in the lunar crust and mantle.
Hakuto-R M2 Resilience is expected to land in the Sea of Cold. This crater is located near the lunar North Pole. The spacecraft will also deliver scientific instruments to the Earth's satellite. This includes power generation equipment, a space radiation sensor and a five-kilogram rover called Tenacious. It is equipped with an HD camera and sample collection bucket and is designed to study the vicinity of the landing site.
Commercial development of lunar resources
As envisioned by the mission developers, both spacecraft will operate on the lunar surface for 14 Earth days, which is one lunar day of light. The main tasks are demonstration of technologies that will be used in the further development of the satellite.
As specialists note, both satellites are launched under the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program from NASA. The program is focused on the development of services for the commercial development of lunar resources.
- In 2025 NASA will carry out a number of other missions under the CLPS program with the help of private companies, - explained Eugene Slyuta. - The first of them is the launch in February of Nova-C IM-2 from Intuitive Machines, a landing module with a drill and mass spectrometer for exploration of lunar resources. Along with it will go the Lunar Trailblazer orbital station. It will detect and map the concentration of water particles on the surface from the satellite's orbit.
Then, according to the specialist, the mission Griffin 1 from Astrobotic will go to the Moon. It will deliver several scientific instruments to the satellite. Next will fly landing module Blue Moon Mark 1, developed by Blue Origin. Its payload, in particular, will make stereo cameras to study the impact of rocket exhaust on the lunar soil. Intuitive Machines' fifth mission, IM-3, will deliver four instruments to the Rainer Gamma ray region, an understudied structure on the moon's surface with a lower reflectivity than the surrounding space.
- The Moon will be a site of expansion, cooperation and rivalry in the coming years. In this century, the satellite's resources will be put to work for Earth-based industry. And now it is just being decided who will get the most benefit," Lev Zeleny, academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, scientific director of the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, told Izvestia.
According to him, many technical experiments are needed to develop the Moon. Among other things, it is necessary to learn how to extract water from lunar rocks and use regolith as a building material, to test devices in extreme conditions on the satellite.
The academician noted that since the 1960s our country has participated equally in the lunar race. Now the plans of Russian research do not meet the demands of a country with serious space ambitions. At the same time lunar programs are constantly shifting "to the right", which is fraught with the loss of positions in the future world order, he added.
- It is inexpedient to develop lunar resources by the forces of individual states, since the main goals here are not national, but universal. In terms of strategic priorities, Russia should initiate activities that focus on equitable international cooperation in this area. As well as fair distribution of tasks among the participants," added space expert, Advisor to the Director General of Geoscan Group of Companies Andrei Ionin.
Among other things, he noted, such an approach will allow to reduce the cost of exploration of the Moon and other celestial bodies by several times.
