What sort of descent engine does this thing use?
https://spacenews.com/peregrine-lunar-lander-ready-for-january-launch/
https://spacenews.com/peregrine-lunar-lander-ready-for-january-launch/
I can't speak authoritatively, but I believe the situation is that it was put on the beginnings of a translunar injection orbit, then lost the ability to do significant maneuvers due to the oxidizer leak and valve issues. I don't believe they have significant ability to change the orbit at this time to effect a crash either on the moon or burnup in Earth's atmosphere. Something I read previously said it was not in an orbit that would take it into the atmosphere anytime soon.They are getting good data from sensors.
It is returning useful information so not a total loss.
I have not seen what the ending to this story will be. if not working it shouldn’t be left as orbiting junk.
Crash into moon?
Burn into earth atmosphere?
That's good news I think. Given remains onboard, somehow I think it's better for them to burn up in atmosphere, rather than drift forever...
The Orlando (FL) Sentinel (1/11) reports, “Power only was also established to commercial Japanese beverage company Pocari Sweat’s Lunar Dream Time Capsule, but communication was not needed. Neither power nor communication was needed for the 10 other payloads, such as the two sets of human remains from a pair of commercial companies that were supposed to become a lunar memorial.” Astrobotic “expects to discuss the mission in an upcoming teleconference, the details of which have yet to be announced.” The Orlando Sentinel adds that while “Astrobotic’s soft moon landing goals will have to wait until at least its Griffin mission, Houston-based company Intuitive Machines is set up to launch in February from Kennedy Space Center atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 aiming for a chance to land as early as Feb. 22 with its Nova-C lander.”There are no human remains on the lander. There was never a plan to land remains on the Moon. The remains were the second deployment of the Centaur upper stage, not aimed at the Moon at all.
Ahhhh, after cremating and either gas sterilization or autoclaving, said remains should not be a harm to anything on the moon in a biological sense.I might be crazy, but I don't think we should be dumping human remains anywhere outside the earth.
It was my understanding that we have tried to sterilize spacecraft as much as possible.
This seems to be a total about-face to that ideal.
Why add the word PROBABLY then????They probably wouldn't be a problem
What could be the problem? 150 years from now some dupe takes a lunar dirt sample and finds some crushed bone dust. Without researching the history of the site, he/she/them/it concludes there was human-like life on the moon a few million years ago. Then he/she/them/it writes a hasty paper in an obscure journal that nobody reads and someone else points out their embarrassing mistake. End of a scientist career. End of problem.Why add the word PROBABLY then????
If not 110% sure, don't do it.
And I'm 100% sure we're not 110% sure.
I think that's Elon's philosophy... let's screw up the Moon, then Mars.We're doing such a good job fouling this nest we need to move on..............
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