Astronomy and space exploration

^M^ said:
Special landing operation went exactly as planned
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Pretty sure it was actually special military operation to denazify moon (everyone knows they live on the dark side of the moon), but this was as close as vatnik accuracy gets them.
 
hothardware.com

India’s Chandrayaan-3 Lunar Lander Fails To Respond To ISRO Wake-Up Call

The ISRO says that the failure to respond is 'not the end of the story for Chandrayaan-3 mission.'
hothardware.com hothardware.com
Chandrayaan-3 launched on July 14, 2023, from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India. The mission comprises a lunar lander, a propulsion module, and a rover. On August 23, 2023, India became only the fourth country in the world to successfully land on the lunar surface, following the United States, Russia, and China. However, ISRO has reported that it has been unable to establish communication with the Vikram lander and Pragyan rover during a wake-up call on September 22, 2023.

ISRO tweeted that no signals have been received from Vikram and Pragyan, but efforts were still underway to try and reestablish communication with them.
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www.bbc.com

What does spending more than a year in space do to the human body?

Nasa astronaut Frank Rubio has just returned from a record-breaking 371 days in space onboard the ISS, but the trip might have taken a toll on his health.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
Nasa astronaut Frank Rubio has just returned from a record-breaking 371 days in space onboard the ISS, but the trip may have altered his muscles, brain and even the bacteria living in his gut.
...
It is information that will prove vital as humans set their sights on sending crews on missions to explore deeper into the Solar System. A return journey to Mars, for example, is expected to take around 1,100 days (just over three years) under current plans. The spacecraft they will travel in will be far smaller than the ISS, meaning smaller lightweight exercise devices will be needed.
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www.space.com

NASA's interstellar Voyager probes get software updates beamed from 12 billion miles away

"This far into the mission, the engineering team is being faced with a lot of challenges for which we just don’t have a playbook."
www.space.com www.space.com
About 46 years after NASA's Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 launched on an epic journey to explore space, the probes’ antique hardware continues to receive tweaks from afar.

One update, a software fix, ought to tend to the corrupted data that Voyager 1 began transmitting last year, and another set aims to prevent gunk from building up in both spacecraft's thrusters. Together, these updates intend to keep the spacecraft in contact with Earth for as long as possible.

"This far into the mission, the engineering team is being faced with a lot of challenges for which we just don’t have a playbook," Linda Spilker, project scientist for the mission at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said in a statement. "But they continue to come up with creative solutions."
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The world should really know more about the absolute engineering GigaChads who made the Voyagers :yes:
Also big props to NASA for taking advantage of the spectacular success & actually keeping the program going like that (y)

Also as well: this was a really interesting video about the history & legacy of the famous Voyager animations done by a hit list of CGI GigaChads
 
R.I.P Ken Mattingly
Ken Mattingly: Apollo astronaut who helped save crew of Apollo 13, dies at 87. Ken Mattingly also orbited the moon as Command Module Pilot of Apollo 16, and flew the Space Shuttle.

ps: He was the one played by Gary Sinise in the movie “Apollo 13.”
 
Starship didn't completely wreck their launch pad or their engines (initially), made it to successful staging but then the booster had issues with relighting for burn back & blew up, the 2nd stage got up to 150km & near orbital speed before also blowing up.
Still a very very long way from being safe for actual payloads let alone people. Sub-orbital passenger flights probably coming around the time of Star Citizen Gold release :runaway:
Among other things (like blowing up 🔥 ), the 2nd Stage was shedding thermal tiles all over the place. The fact they keep losing tiles just moving it around indicates they really need a better attachment method.
Some might even call it incredibly irresponsible & unreasonably dangerous to be blowing up such big stuff at those kinds of altitude & speeds.

Scott Manley has a pretty good summary eg noticed that 2nd stage Oxygen/Hydrogen ratio was well off leading up to the explosion

And Everyday Astronaut a great compilation of videos from various angles
 
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hoom said:
Some might even call it incredibly irresponsible & unreasonably dangerous to be blowing up such big stuff at those kinds of altitude & speeds.
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In what way is it unreasonably dangerous? The test flights are deliberately sub orbital until stage 2 proves itself. It's intended to reach orbital velocities but not altitude. There's no risk of space junk with these flights. Once they're over the ocean, the probability of debris hitting anything other than water is essential zero.
 
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You don't think a Methane/Oxygen explosion of a big rocket at 150km altitude & 24,124km/h is going to kick at least some debris upwards & a few hundred km/h extra velocity? :-|
 
cheapchips said:
I assumed not. Or at least nothing would stay in a meaningful orbit for very long. Am I wrong there?
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I don't think so. A few hundred km/h on top of 24k is still around about sub-orbital. The atmosphere is quite thick at 150km (relative to true orbital altitudes) so the orbital decay will be rapid and much of the small bits of debris will burn up I would say.
 

Confirmation of ancient lake on Mars builds excitement for Perseverance rover's samples​

Findings reveal eons of environmental changes and offer hope that the rover's soil and rock samples hold traces of life​

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www.sciencedaily.com

Confirmation of ancient lake on Mars builds excitement for Perseverance rover's samples

Ground-penetrating radar on board NASA's Mars Perseverance rover has confirmed that the Jezero Crater, formed by an ancient meteor impact just north of the Martian equator, once harbored a vast lake and river delta. Over eons, sediment deposition and erosion within the crater shaped the geologic...
www.sciencedaily.com
 
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