A Day in Astronomy: Lunar Orbiter 4

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): An artist’s image of NASA’s Lunar Orbiter at the Moon. (NASA)

On this day in 1967, NASA launched Lunar Orbiter 4 to continue a survey of the Moon (also conducted by three previous Lunar Orbiter missions) in preparation of the Apollo Moon missions. While NASA lost contact with the spacecraft on July 17th, the mission was a success. On October 6th, the spacecraft crashed onto the Moon’s surface. A total of five such missions were conducted, which mapped 99 percent of the Moon.

The rest is history with the successful Apollo missions, still the only program to land humans on the Moon. We shall see who follows in our footsteps, though we will be back on the Moon soon enough as part of the Artemis Program.

You can read more about the Lunar Orbiter missions at this NASA history link. The conclusion on the Lunar Orbiter missions states:

On September 2 Homer E. Newello Associate Administrator for Space Science and Applications, certified that the fifth mission was an unqualified success according to prelaunch objectives. Deputy Administrator Robert C. Seamans, Jr., concurred on September 6. Both NASA officials also assessed the whole program as successful; five missions had been flown out of five planned. Indeed the final Orbiter had capped an impressive effort by the Office of Space Science and Applications to bring man closer to stepping down upon the lunar soil and understanding where it was that he would be landing in the near future…

Five Orbiters had enabled the Manned Space Flight Network to train personnel in tracking and to check out equipment and computer programs for the manned lunar missions beginning with Apollo 8 in December 1968 and including Apollo 10 through 17, of which all but Apollo 10 and 13 landed on the Moon. (Apollo 10 tested the complete spacecraft in lunar orbit and Apollo 13 aborted its landing mission because an onboard oxygen tank exploded in cislunar space.) The Office of Manned Space Flight could not have obtained the needed tracking experience at a timely date if NASA had not flown the five Lunar Orbiter spacecraft.

Another Member of the Reusable Rocket Club

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Credit: Rocket Lab

Blue Origin did it, SpaceX did it, and now Rocket Lab wants to do it. The “it” is to successfully retrieve rocket boosters so they can be reused in the future. Back on April 6th, Rocket Lab stated:

For the first time, Rocket Lab will also attempt a mid-air capture of Electron’s first stage as it returns from space after launch, the next major step in the Company’s development program to make Electron a reusable rocket. Rocket Lab will be attempting the catch with a customized Sikorsky S-92, a large twin engine helicopter typically used in offshore oil & gas transport and search and rescue operations.

According to CNN, after a few delays the Rocket Lab mission called “There and Back Again” was successful in grabbing the rocket booster. Time will tell whether the captured booster is in fact reusable. As of this posting, Rocket Lab had yet to post its own press release on the mission.

It seems like a risky approach to use pilots rather than a self-controlled landing, but Rocket Lab has explained that its Electron rocket is too small to carry the amount of fuel necessary to land itself. The CNN article also pointed out that the U.S. retrieved material mid-air in the past when planes were used to capture film canisters dropped from spy satellites.

Rocket Lab has been a quiet player so far in the space race, but its showing steady gains. It’s website stated it has already launched 146 satellites, and another 1,700+ satellites in orbit are using Rocket Lab technology. It is great to have some depth in the commercial space market.

Space Quote: The End of Astronauts?

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Credit: Belknap Press/Harvard University Press

“We should not have publicly funded programmes to send people to the moon, still less to Mars…It’s hugely risky, hugely expensive, and there’s no practical or scientific benefit to sending humans. It’s a pretty bad bargain for the taxpayer.”

-Statement by Lord Martin Rees, co-author of the book The End of Astronauts, speaking to the The Guardian. He argues that private sector humans and government robots are the future of space exploration. In other words, let billionaires die space, while the government avoids this risk. Harvard University Press states:

In The End of Astronauts, Goldsmith and Rees weigh the benefits and risks of human exploration across the solar system. In space humans require air, food, and water, along with protection from potentially deadly radiation and high-energy particles, at a cost of more than ten times that of robotic exploration. Meanwhile, automated explorers have demonstrated the ability to investigate planetary surfaces efficiently and effectively, operating autonomously or under direction from Earth. Although Goldsmith and Rees are alert to the limits of artificial intelligence, they know that our robots steadily improve, while our bodies do not. Today a robot cannot equal a geologist’s expertise, but by the time we land a geologist on Mars, this advantage will diminish significantly.

You can read an excerpt from the book at Slate.

More of Captain Kirk’s “Singing”

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): William Shatner on the stage a few years ago. (Newsweek)

Time for a little more about our friend William Shatner. You may be aware of his various recordings over the decades where he speaks rather than sings the lyrics of the songs. Some of his albums include The Transformed Man and Has Been. One noteworthy song is his version of “Bohemian Rhapsody” from his album Seeking Major Tom. It’s all a lot of fun.

It gets even better with last night’s show in Washington, DC at the Kennedy. He joined singer Ben Folds, his friend and the organizer of the evening, and the National Symphony Orchestra to sing some of his new songs, including one for Earth Day and another about his adventures into space last year aboard a Blue Origin rocket.

In this premiere show, Mr. Shatner was relaxed and playful throughout the performance, which was impressive for this 91-year-old man who never seems to run out of energy or have enough projects. He came back for multiple standing ovations.

Even with all of the fun, he had a serious message about the need to protect this Earth of ours. He pointed out that sometimes you need to see its fragility from space to understand what is at stake.

One last note. Check out Mr. Shatner’s 1978 version of Elton John’s “Rocket Man.” He has been at this for quite some time, and I hope we can see much more of him in the years to come.