Martian Space Stories: Ocean Shoreline Located, Rings Turned to Moons, and Ancient Liquid Water

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Image (Credit): The Red Planet. (NASA/JPL)

Here are some recent stories on Mars.

—Earth.com: “China’s Mars Zhurong Rover Finds an Ocean Shoreline on the Red Planet“

The Chinese Mars rover Zhurong is adding an exciting twist to the story and history of water on Mars. After landing in southern Utopia Planitia on Mars in May 2021, the now-defunct Zhurong rover went to work exploring the Martian surface, and its latest findings might just change the way we think about the Red Planet. Bo Wu and a team of researchers from Hong Kong Polytechnic University believe they’ve found compelling evidence of an ocean shoreline for a massive body of water that once covered Mars’ northern lowlands.

—New York Times: “An Asteroid’s Destruction May Have Given Mars Rings, Then Moons“

Something’s not quite right about the moons of Mars. They are too small — Phobos is 17 miles across, and Deimos is a mere nine miles in length. And they aren’t round, but lumpy, misshaped objects. Frankly, they don’t resemble moons at all…A study published Wednesday in the journal Icarus makes a case that the moons did indeed start out in asteroid form. But it’s not the genesis everyone was expecting. Using supercomputer-powered simulations, scientists describe a situation in which a large-enough asteroid was captured by Mars long ago and torn to shreds by the planet’s gravity, briefly forming a debris cloud — and possibly a ring system — around Mars that ultimately clumped together to form two moons.

—Astrobiology News: “Meteorite Contains Evidence Of Liquid Water On Mars 742 Million Years Ago“

An asteroid struck Mars 11 million years ago and sent pieces of the red planet hurtling through space. One of these chunks of Mars eventually crashed into the Earth somewhere near Purdue and is one of the few meteorites that can be traced directly to Mars. This meteorite was rediscovered in a drawer at Purdue University in 1931 and therefore named the Lafayette Meteorite. During early investigations of the Lafayette Meteorite, scientists discovered that it had interacted with liquid water while on Mars. Scientists have long wondered when that interaction with liquid water took place. An international collaboration of scientists including two from Purdue University’s College of Science have recently determined the age of the minerals in the Lafayette Meteorite that formed when there was liquid water. The team has published its findings in Geochemical Perspective Letters.

Space Stories: Questions About Orion, NASA’s Impact on Economy, and a New Crew for the Chinese Space Station

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Image (Credit): Components of the Orion spacecraft. (NASA)

Here are some recent stories of interest.

—ARSTechnica: “For Some Reason, NASA is Treating Orion’s Heat Shield Problems as a Secret“

For those who follow NASA’s human spaceflight program, when the Orion spacecraft’s heat shield cracked and chipped away during atmospheric reentry on the unpiloted Artemis I test flight in late 2022, what caused it became a burning question. Multiple NASA officials said Monday they now know the answer, but they’re not telling. Instead, agency officials want to wait until more reviews are done to determine what this means for Artemis II, the Orion spacecraft’s first crew mission around the Moon, officially scheduled for launch in September 2025.

—NASA: “New Report Shows NASA’s $75.6 Billion Boost to US Economy“

In its third agencywide economic impact report, NASA highlighted how its Moon to Mars activities, climate change research and technology development, and other projects generated more than $75.6 billion in economic output across all 50 states and Washington, D.C., in fiscal year 2023…Combined, NASA’s missions supported 304,803 jobs nationwide, and generated an estimated $9.5 billion in federal, state, and local taxes throughout the United States.

—ABC News: “China Launches New Crew to its Space Station as it Seeks to Expand Exploration“

China declared a “complete success” after it launched a new three-person crew to its orbiting space station early Wednesday as the country seeks to expand its exploration of outer space with missions to the moon and beyond. The Shenzhou-19 spaceship carrying the trio blasted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China at 4:27 a.m. local time atop a Long March-2F rocket, the backbone of China’s crewed space missions.

Pic of the Week: Spacewalk Outside the Chinese Space Station

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Image (Credit): Extravehicular activity on China’s Tiangong space station this past July. (CMSA)

This week’s image is from the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA). It shows taikonaut Li Cong on a spacewalk outside China’s Tiangong station on July 3, 2024. 

The space station was first launched in April 2021 and has been permanently crewed since June 2022. The current crew, called Shenzhou 18, consists of Commander Ye Guangfu, Operator Li Cong, and System Operator Li Guangsu.

Space Quote: Can China Win the Lunar Race This Time?

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Image (Credit): Image of Apollo 17 astronaut Eugene Cernan on the Moon’s surface. (NASA)

“As the U.S. has flailed, China and its partners have marched forward, notching one success after another. There is no reason to believe they will not be first to send a crewed mission to the lunar south pole, where only a half dozen or so promising regions exist to safely land. Depending on how the currently vague noninterference rules are interpreted and enforced by the Chinese (and others), significant parts of the moon might end up off-limits for anyone else to explore or mine. We do not know for certain how China might behave on the lunar surface—this is part of the conundrum—but terrestrial conflicts in the South China Sea and China’s regular infractions of sovereign airspace give scant rationale for optimism.”

-Quote from an article in Scientific American titled “NASA Needs a ‘Lunar Marathon’ to Match China on the Moon.” The author of the piece is Thomas Zurbuchen, who previously worked at NASA and is now is professor and director of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology’s ETH Zürich | Space. For another take on where the US is with its Artemis lunar program, you can read an ARS Technica article titled “The Politically Incorrect Guide to Saving NASA’s Floundering Artemis Program.”

NASA Cancels VIPER Moon Mission

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Image (Credit): An artist’s rendering of the NASA’s PRIME-1 spacecraft approaching the Moon. The mission will need to accomplish some of the work previously assigned to the VIPER mission. (NASA)

It has not been a great year for NASA so far. While the Chinese brought back samples from the far side of the Moon, we saw two NASA-contracted commercial spacecraft either fail to reach the Moon or critically mess up the landing. Plus we now have a Boeing capsule stranded at the International Space Station (ISS) while SpaceX just flubbed a rocket launch that brings into question manned flights to the ISS.

Am I missing anything? Oh yeah, and NASA has decided to cancel its Moon rover, the Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER) project, after spending $450 million. Cost overruns and multiple delays had made the mission too expensive and too late in the game to be useful.

Nicola Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters in Washington, stated:

We are committed to studying and exploring the Moon for the benefit of humanity through the [Commercial Lunar Payload Services] program…The agency has an array of missions planned to look for ice and other resources on the Moon over the next five years. Our path forward will make maximum use of the technology and work that went into VIPER, while preserving critical funds to support our robust lunar portfolio.

Fortunately, VIPER was one of a number of missions designed to seek water on the lunar surface. For example, NASA has the Polar Resources Ice Mining Experiment-1 (PRIME-1) , which is still scheduled to land at the South Pole later this year.

It has been a rough year for NASA, but the multiple missions planned for the Moon provide more opportunities to get it right, while the ISS issues do not appear insurmountable. NASA just needs a break, and its commercial partners need to prove they can meet the goals that were set for them.

Note: If you were one of the people who added your name to the VIPER mission, maybe NASA will open up another opportunity for your name on the Moon.