NASA a few years ago mortgaged that commercial companies can take scientific experiences to the moon with a budget lower than the agency.
Last year, this was a bad bet. NASA’s first spacecraft The moon is completely absent. The second fell But he fell.
But this month, robotic land called Blue Ghost, built by Firefly Aerospace of Cedar Park, Texas,, I succeeded from the beginning to the end.
On March 16, the mood in Firefly’s Mission outside Austin was a mixture of happiness and depression. There was no more anxiety, and nothing left – except for watching the company’s spacecraft dies.
A quarter of a million miles away, the sun had already set out on Mary Crisium, Lunar Lava Plain where Blue Ghost collected scientific notes for two weeks.
For a solar powered spacecraft, the remaining hours were numbered and few.
“I think the mood is very light,” said Ray Alinsworth, director of the Firefly spacecraft program. “I think people are only enthusiastic and somewhat also comfortable to know how much the task and some time stop at a moment to enjoy the past few hours with Lander.”
Scientists who suffer from goods have invested in other commercial moon tasks for years of effort and ended up with little or nothing. These NASA appointed in Blue Ghost comes out with a set of new data to work with.
Robert Grimm, a scientist at the Southern West Research Institute in Bulder, Kulorado, who led one of the scientific load, admitted his good fortune. “Better than being a hole,” he said.
A NASA experience collected data as Blue Ghost fell. Four cameras acquired views of different angles of the spacecraft exhaust while kicking the moon dust and carving a small hole.
“This gives us the ability with these cameras to measure 3D shapes,” said Paul Danihi, one of the scientists working in the project known as the Stereo cameras for lunar surface studies, or surface shows.
Engineers want to understand these dynamics to prevent potential disasters when I like a larger and heavier spacecraft Spacex Starship Earth’s space pioneers on the moon. If NASA places a site outside the moon, Spacecraft will return to this site more than once. The rocks that fly up can expel an engine on a normal spacecraft or damage to the nearby structures.
In early looks at photographs, one of the surprises is that the exhaust column of the books began to kick the moon’s dust when the Blue Ghost was still about 50 feet above the surface, which is higher than expected. The same camera system is to record dust cloud from a much larger land, Blue Moon Mark 1any Blue origin, missile company Jeff BezosPlace to send to the moon later this year.
NASA not only you want to understand lunar dust, or Reagole, but also how to get rid of it. It can be particles Sharp and innovativeThis is a danger to machines and astronauts. I used an experiment on a blue ghost called the electric dust shield to clean the dust from the surfaces.
Two experiences have been collected that should highlight the interior of the moon.
The load of Dr. Grimm was the founder of the lunar magnetic, the first of its kind that was published on the surface of another world.
For publication, the uploaded spring bombers have four investigations about the size of soup boxes in four different directions. Connected by cables to Lander, investigations such as voltmeter. A second component, raised over the mast with an eight -feet length, measured by magnetic fields.
These readings together reveal the differences that occur naturally in the electric and magnetic fields that tell how easy the flow of electrical currents in the depth of the earth, which tells something about what is there. Mosul is from cold rocks, for example, less.
Blue Ghost has also published air exercises, using nitrogen gaskets to dig dirt. The needle was measured at the end of the temperature tool and the extent of heat flows easily across the material. Because of the rocks on the road, the exercises fell about three feet, not 10 feet that were hoping.
“You can see the rocks that fly out and sires,” said Chris Zakini, Vice President of Exploration Systems at Honeybee Robotics, who was built in videos.
However, three feet were deep enough for scientific measurements, as Dr. Zakini said. Data from drilling and magnetic antithesis can give hints on how to form a moon and other rocky worlds or why the side of the moon looks completely different from the distant side.
“It is really a basic question about the lunar geology that we are trying to answer.”
Honeybee, which is part of the blue origin, designed a second device called Planetvac to show a simplified technique to collect samples. Use this compressed gas to excite the Reagole in a small hurricane and direct it to a container.
Technology will be used on the Martian Moons Exploration, which will restore samples from Foubos, Mars Moon.
Dr. Zakini said: “The fact that she worked on the surface of the moon gives us confidence that it should work on Foubus as well.”
The Brian Walsh experience on Blue Ghost did not look at the moon but again on Earth.
“It is a really good point,” said Dr. Walsh, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Boston University.
Dr. Walsh is interested in the magnetic bubble that distracts the solar wind particles around the Earth. It recorded the X -ray telescope when the high -speed molecules move from the sun to atoms in the upper atmosphere of the Earth. The border between the Earth’s magnetic field and solar winds are similar to two Sumo wrestlers pushing against each other. Opinion should help scientists know whether these limits are slowly or in sudden leaps.
This is important because it affects the extent of our protection of the Earth’s magnetic field From time to time From the charged molecules that bomb the planet during Solar storms.
Dr. Walsh said: “We are trying to know how to open this gate and how energy is passed.”
Blue Ghost has already left a permanent impression.
Dr. Banks said that when she left the mission operations center every night, she was looking for the moon hanging in the sky.
She said, “It would mainly prevent me in my paths every day.” ))
