S03E89: Gateway to the Moon & Odyssey’s 100,000th Orbit

[00:00:00] Hello again, it's Steve with you for another episode of Astronomy Daily. It's the 1st of July 2024. 20 days of podcast with your host Steve Dunkley.

[00:00:11] Well, can you believe it? It's the first of July right in the middle of the year, well almost, and it's going by so very quickly.

[00:00:20] That's a time thing for all of you time travelers out there. And today we'd like to welcome back Hallie, who's got her voice back. Oh boy. That's good news. Hey, what's going on Hallie? Well, today I'm talking about asteroids. More of your favorite subjects. I like asteroids.

[00:00:36] You're a rock and roll kind of guy aren't you? Oh true. I mean retired but true. Don't give me that. I'll post photos of your guitar and amplifier collection. Oh you'd do that too wouldn't you? The proof is in the lack of space in the lounge room.

[00:00:51] Not that you need any space but okay okay what else have you got for us? Besides all the Stratocaster and Marshals blocking the studio door, we've received a celebratory announcement that another of NASA's little probes has hit a milestone. Oh right. That'd be the Odyssey orbits story.

[00:01:07] That's the one. Hey Hallie, I wonder if anyone out there can guess how many orbits that little bug has made around Mars already? Well, we will find out in a minute. And lastly, I'll tell you about NASA's amazing plans for a lunar orbiting space station.

[00:01:21] Oh wow, that sounds really wild. Very major Tom. I knew you were going to say that. Oh you did not. So what have you got? Okay, I've got a story about something close to home. My home, an Australian Indian joint mission that sounds pretty exciting.

[00:01:34] That's from the Australian Space Agency or as we like to call it down under up there or dude for short. I don't think so. Yeah you don't get a vote Hallie. Really? Really really. Oh.

[00:01:47] And there's also an unfortunate tale about a Chinese mishap that's a launch that went wrong and we'll have a brief look at that. And the big story released this week perhaps to throw smoke over the Boeing Stylarnish Mosul is SpaceX's new contract to destroy the ISS.

[00:02:04] Wow, somebody get Elon a Darth Vader mask already. Yeah I know it sounds like that doesn't it? So are we ready Hallie? I'm ready Jim. Huh? Let's go. NASA and its partners are launching Gateway, a lunar orbiting space station by 2028.

[00:02:28] This station will serve as a hub for deep space exploration, featuring advanced modules for power, habitation and science. It will support the Artemis missions with its sophisticated systems, including the power and propulsion element, halo, and contributions from international agencies like ESA and JAXA.

[00:02:49] NASA in collaboration with international partners will explore the scientific mysteries of deep space with Gateway, humanity's first space station to orbit the moon. Starting with the Artemis 4 mission in 2028, the international teams of astronauts living, conducting science and preparing for missions to the Lunar South Pole region on Gateway

[00:03:10] will be the first humans to make their home in deep space. The Gateway station will include many different elements. Power and propulsion element that will make Gateway the most powerful solar electric spacecraft ever flown. The module will use the sun's energy to power the space station's subsystems

[00:03:28] and ionized xenon gas to produce the thrust that will maintain Gateway's unique polar orbit around the moon. Halo, habitation and logistics outpost, Gateway's command and control nexus provides communications between Earth and the lunar surface with the Lunar Link System provided by ESA, European Space Agency.

[00:03:49] Halo will house life support systems, including exercise equipment and science payload banks. Lunar Ihab provided by ESA with hardware contributions from JAXA, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, will host environmental control and life support systems, sleeping quarters, and a galley among other features.

[00:04:11] Lunar View, provided by ESA, will have refueling capabilities for the power and propulsion element, cargo storage, and large windows. Crew and science airlock, provided by the Muhammad bin Rashid Space Center of the United Arab Emirates, for crew and hardware transfer from Gateway's interior to the vacuum of space.

[00:04:32] Canadarm 3 Advanced External Robotic System Provided by CSA, Canadian Space Agency Deep Space Logistics spacecraft that will transport cargo to Gateway to support Artemis missions. Initial Gateway science payloads will study solar and cosmic radiation, a little understood phenomenon that is a chief concern for people and hardware

[00:04:54] traveling through deep space, including Mars. The payloads visible in this video are ERSA, European Radiation Sensor's Array, provided by ESA, attached to the power and propulsion element, and the Nassalad Hermes, Heliophysics Environmental and Radiation Measurement Experiment Suite, is attached to Halo.

[00:05:14] A third radiation science payload, IDA, internal dosimeter array, provided by ESA and JAXA, will be inside of Halo. Gateway is part of the Artemis architecture to return humans to the lunar surface for scientific discovery and chart a path for human exploration further into the solar system,

[00:05:33] such as to Mars and beyond. NASA's Odyssey spacecraft, the longest running mission at Mars, circled the red planet for the 100,000th time today. It was revealed. To celebrate the milestone, the space agency released an intricate panorama of Olympus Mons, the tallest volcano in the solar system,

[00:06:01] Odyssey, captured the view in March. The volcano's base sprawls 373 miles or 600 kilometers near the Martian equator while it soars 17 miles or 27 kilometers into the planet's thin air. Earlier this month, astronomers discovered ephemeral morning frost coating the volcano's top

[00:06:20] for a few hours every day, offering fresh insights into how ice from the poles circulates throughout the parched world. In Odyssey's latest image of the volcano, the bluish-white band seen grazing Olympus Mons shows the amount of dust floating in the Martian air when the image was taken,

[00:06:37] according to NASA. The thin coat of purple just above likely hints at a mixture of atmospheric dust with bluish water ice clouds. The blue-green layer at the top edge of the world marks where water ice clouds reach up about 30 miles or 48 kilometers into the Martian sky,

[00:06:55] scientists say. To capture the latest panorama, scientists commanded Odyssey to slowly rotate such that its camera pointed toward the Martian horizon, capturing views similar to the kind international space station dwellers take of Earth. Normally we see Olympus Mons in narrow

[00:07:12] strips from above, but by turning the spacecraft toward the horizon we can see in a single image how large it looms over the landscape, Jeffrey Plott, who is Odyssey's project scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, JPL in California, said in the recent news release.

[00:07:29] Not only is the image spectacular, it also provides us with unique science data. By snapping similar images at different times during the year, scientists can study how the Martian atmosphere changes over the planet's four seasons, which last from four to seven

[00:07:45] months each. Yesterday, astronomers and space lovers around the world are collectively marveling at our mercurial presence in the universe, particularly as we drift the cosmos amid large asteroids like the one that supposedly wiped out the dinosaurs 66 million years ago.

[00:08:04] June 30th marks asteroid day, a holiday observed annually to reflect on the prospect of a planet destroying space rock striking Earth and what scientists are doing to mitigate that risk. The day is observed on the anniversary of the 1908 Tunguska event in Russia, when a space rock

[00:08:21] about half the size of a football field broke up in the air over a remote forest in Siberia, the biggest asteroid strike ever witnessed on Earth. With a flash brighter than the sun, followed by a thunder-like noise, the fireball killed herds of reindeer,

[00:08:36] knocked people who were over 40 miles away or 64 kilometers from the impact off their porches and leveled about 80 million trees. The impact dumped so much dust in the air that sunsets were fiery

[00:08:48] red for days, and people who lived as far away as Asia could read newspapers outdoors until midnight. More recently, in February 2013, a 20-meter, 66-foot space rock struck Earth near Chelyabinsk city in Russia, injuring about 1,500 people and shattering over 3,000 windows in apartments

[00:09:09] and commercial buildings. The shockwave generated by the impact was so strong it circled our planet twice, scientists say. Although such devastating space rocks land more often in oceans than they do on land, the 2013 asteroid strike, just a decade ago now, reminded us that these things do

[00:09:29] happen, Nick Moskovitz of the Lowell Observatory in Arizona said in an interview. Asteroids have this strange duality to them in that they probably delivered the ingredients for life to the Earth, but at the same time the wrong impact in the right place could lead

[00:09:43] to significant damage for whoever may be around. Asteroid Day is a global awareness campaign spearheaded by the Asteroid Foundation in Luxembourg and it has been an official day in the United Nations calendar since December of 2016. In previous years, the day has been

[00:10:01] celebrated by dozens of local events and institutions around the world, with talks centering around asteroid science that were topical that year. Last year, for instance, many events focused on NASA's wildly successful DART mission, which smashed a refrigerator-sized spacecraft into

[00:10:18] an asteroid named Dimorphos and nudged the space rock off its orbit by 33 minutes, very likely changing the object's shape as well. DART was humanity's first planetary defense test and proved scientists had the technology necessary to defend Earth if a similar space

[00:10:34] rock were to ever be on a collision course with our planet. Last year, Asteroid Day was very much like DART Fest, said Moskovitz. It's a fun day. And that's all the rock I have for you favorite human, it's your turn to roll.

[00:10:49] Astronomy Daily with Steve and Hallie Space, Space Science and Astronomy. Thank you for joining us for this Monday edition of Astronomy Daily where we offer just a few stories from the now famous Astronomy Daily newsletter which you can receive in your email every day

[00:11:10] just like Hallie and I do. And to do that just visit our URL astronomydaily.io and place your email address in the slot provided just like that. You'll be receiving all the latest news

[00:11:22] about science, space science and astronomy from around the world as it's happening. And not only that you can interact with us by visiting at Astro Daily Pod on X or at our new Facebook page

[00:11:35] which is of course Astronomy Daily on Facebook. See you there. Earlier this year the Australian government announced funding for three collaborative space projects including 8.5 million for Space Matri that's MAITRI. The announced projects were part of the Australian Space Agency's 18 million

[00:12:05] dollar International Space Investment or India ISI Projects program to strengthen the space economy for two partner nations. Head of the Australian Space Agency and Rico Palermo said the agreement is an important step towards enhancing Australia's space heritage and strengthening

[00:12:25] the nation's relationship with India. This formal agreement and mission will leverage our country's respective capabilities and unique strengths to make space activities more sustainable. Like India Australia's commercial space sector is rapidly growing and we are producing innovative

[00:12:42] space technologies that benefit life on earth. The mission will inspire future explorers and further enhance international cooperation in this critical domain he said. The Space Matri mission involves several Australian and Indian partner companies collaborating with Space Machines Company including DeGantra and Anth Technologies, the University of Adelaide,

[00:13:06] the University of Sydney, the University of Technology Sydney, Leo Labs, Advanced Navigation and the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. The Space Matri mission and our collaboration with ENSIL represents a significant leap forward for Australia's space industry by combining our

[00:13:25] innovative spacecraft capabilities with India's proven launch expertise. We are not only strengthening the ties between our nation's space sectors but also demonstrating our shared commitment to sustainable space operations said Rajat Kalshrestia, CEO and co-founder of Space

[00:13:43] Machines Company. India's space sector is the fastest growing in the world and is expected to grow by 47.3 billion by 2032 and we continue to strengthen collaboration between our respective space industries across mutual priority areas. You're listening to Australia Daily, the podcast

[00:14:03] and I don't think I'd want to be around for the fallout after this one it was meant to be a routine static firing of a rocket attached to a test stand on the ground but instead the Tiang Long 3

[00:14:19] first stage booster broke free and blasted off on Sunday. An unintended launch in China's Henan province led to a flight of roughly one minute that ended in a very large explosion in the nearby hills about a mile from the test stand according to witnesses. Footage of the catastrophic

[00:14:39] test result was captured and uploaded to a Chinese social media which I find fascinating. The rocket stage can be seen leaving the ground and climbing into the air under its own power for about 30 seconds before flipping over on its side and beginning to free fall back to the

[00:14:57] surface of the ground. After about a minute into the video a very loud explosion is heard followed by a massive fireball on a nearby hillside. The accident was captured from different angles and nearby settlements. A statement from Chinese commercial space company Space Pioneer which

[00:15:17] conducted the test said that an investigation determined that there had been no casualties. Thank goodness from the accident it said the test site is actually far from nearby Gonggiai city where the explosion was easily and dramatically visible. The company blamed the incident on a

[00:15:42] structural failure where the booster connects to the stand. Oh dear, the tests are part of the build up of to an orbital mission for the Tianglong 3 which is comparable to the SpaceX's Falcon 9. Space junk from Chinese missions and failed launch stages have a bad habit of falling in

[00:16:04] rural Chinese areas. Just last week a rocket was seen dropping toxic chemicals over a populated area. Well that is the worst news I've heard all week, that's terrible anyway. I hope they gather themselves together and get it right. I hate seeing stories like that, it's terrible.

[00:16:24] And look out Darth Vader, SpaceX has won the right to tackle a monumental task, destroying the International Space Station. Wow, did you ever believe that you would ever hear anyone make that announcement? Well I'm the guy who just did that. So wow,

[00:16:44] the demolition will shove the iconic and enormous station down through Earth's atmosphere in a fiery display. I can't believe I'm reading this and if anything goes wrong a cascade of debris could rain down on our planet's surface. Now I don't know should I add Godzilla and I don't

[00:17:03] know. Wow, conceived and built in a post Cold War partnership with Russia the ISS like so many of NASA's major projects has lasted far longer than its initial design life for 15 years. Nothing lasts forever however especially in the harsh environment of outer space, it's not really

[00:17:23] outer space though as it's lower, the ISS is aging and for safety's sake NASA intends to incinerate the immense facility around 2031 to accomplish the job the agency will pay SpaceX up to $843 million according to a statement released recently in June 26. The contract

[00:17:47] covers the development of a unique deorbit vehicle, this is the bit I get excited about to usher the unwieldy ISS to its doom it excludes launch costs. NASA has declined to provide the number of proposals received for the projects currently

[00:18:09] no details about SpaceX's visions use the force look that is what's going through my head for the deal no details about the SpaceX's vision for the deal but vehicle are publicly known scientific American reached out to the company but did not receive any response. What is clear

[00:18:33] is that SpaceX existing Dragon and Starship spacecraft aren't good matches for the deal but mission that means that the company could intend to heavily adapt one of these vehicles or start from scratch and design a custom built spacecraft. Whatever the deorbit vehicle ends up

[00:18:51] looking like SpaceX is taking on a delicate technical challenge the ISS is perhaps the most complex construction project ever executed and certainly the largest and most expensive one in space beginning in 1988 its modules required 42 different launches to blast off earth

[00:19:09] and the orbiting laboratory contains about as much internal space as a six bedroom house spread over an area the size of a football field weighing more than 450 tons or the equivalent of nearly three large blue whales don't you love the way Americans I'm sorry my American listeners but

[00:19:27] I love the way you guys measure things without using official measuring things like that building is as tall as 150 washing machines so this is the equivalent of nearly three large blue whales I'm

[00:19:40] going to use that for everything now the ISS is heavy too safely destroying the space station will arguably be even harder than assembling it you're going to need a space hammer the ISS should

[00:19:53] still have several years of science ahead NASA said it intends to operate the space station through 2030 and that its partner space agencies in Canada Europe and Japan concur with that timeline NASA's Roscosmos which leads the ISS partnership with NASA and operates several key modules of

[00:20:12] the station is currently only committed through at least 2028 but why destroy the station at all because of the ISS's lengthy and continuous tenure the last time the Earth orbit was bereft of human beings was in November 2000 just before the arrival of Expedition 1 when a NASA

[00:20:32] astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts began the station's first residency the iconic orbital outpost is now a potent symbol of the space age and of international collaboration in science that transcends geopolitical squabbles on Earth indeed some ISS fans argue it shouldn't be

[00:20:51] destroyed at all instead they think it should be boosted up to an orbit so high that it would remain in space forever as a testament to the engineering prowess of humans that idea would be wildly impractical and prohibitively expensive NASA says besides the lab is already fragile

[00:21:10] and would become even more fragile the longer it stays aloft sooner or later it will start disintegrating and the more debris it sheds the more likely catastrophic space junk collisions would become a frightening feedback process that could curtail further activity in Earth orbit

[00:21:28] some nostalgic observers want to see parts of the station excised in tack and ferried safely to the Earth's surface bound from museum but that's just as logistically challenging as a permanent ultra high orbit NASA says although the space station was assembled in orbit it

[00:21:45] wasn't designed to be disassembled and no current spacecraft has enough payload capacity to carry ISS modules back to Earth NASA considered other scenarios too repurposing the facility and orbit passing off its operations to private industry or even blowing it to smithereens in space all

[00:22:05] posed even grimmer prospects however so it's a fiery doom unfortunately and the ISS will be sent down all in one piece given the challenges of taking the station apart in theory that's a tidy solution because Earth's atmosphere creates friction that naturally incinerates material

[00:22:23] passing through it larger objects can survive the inferno and fall to earth however damage from plummeting space debris is rare but not unheard of we spoke last week of a family in

[00:22:35] florida that is suing NASA for that very reason because of a two pound piece of space debris that crashed through their roof earlier this year I hope they're doing well the object was the remains of a large battery pallet stuffed with debris that astronauts had jettisoned from

[00:22:50] the space station three years ago for an uncontrolled re-entry NASA determined the home owner is now seeking compensation from the space agency for that incident oh boy still one of my favorite stories when it was discarded the pallet weighed about 5800 pounds according to NASA compare that with

[00:23:12] the station's mass of about 925 335 pounds a range of factors shape density orientation atmospheric conditions and the like determined how much of an object survives re-entry an uncontrolled plunge for something as bulky as the international space station would be a

[00:23:31] nightmare scenario not only would large pieces of the lab likely make it to our planet's surface but the station would also probably tumble and break apart making the process unpredictable and an uncontrolled re-entry would rain debris anywhere along the ISS ISS orbit which passes over about 90 percent of

[00:23:51] the earth's population that's where NASA's contract with SpaceX comes into play the commercial de-orbit vehicle is meant to launch attached to the space station and then pull it down through the earth's atmosphere in a carefully choreographed risk minimizing manoeuvre here's what it would look

[00:24:08] like first the ISS would use a combination of natural drag and if necessary its existing engines to move to a lower orbit from the operation height of about 260 miles to no lower than 205 miles above the earth then SpaceX's de-orbit vehicle would launch about a year before

[00:24:28] the station's planned date with destiny and while astronauts were still aboard during that one year lead time the ISS's attitude would continue to decrease and the last resident astronauts would depart for earth leaving the station human free for the first time in 30 years

[00:24:45] depending on how quickly the laboratory was falling the de-orbit vehicle would conduct a series of burns to tug the lowest point of the station's orbit from about 150 miles to about 90 miles in this region of the atmosphere the thickness of the air would mean that the station would have

[00:25:03] less than a month left even if NASA were to let it fall on its own the ISS's ability to steadily orient itself compared to earth would also degrade by that point the de-orbit vehicle would

[00:25:13] need to exert an iron grip on the station's motion to prevent potential disaster then at last the final push would be made the de-orbit vehicle would fire its engines up for about an hour to shove the ISS through the thickest most dangerous lower layers of the atmosphere

[00:25:29] the burn would be carefully timed to ensure that the station and whatever debris it produced fell across the sparsely populated southern pacific ocean the final resting place for most of humanity's most hazardous orbital refuse and regularly listens to this show would know that

[00:25:47] problem I have with that is that the east coast of Australia is in the southern pacific ocean so yeah i'm not really keen about that whoa there it goes another episode of astronomy daily

[00:26:02] i want to thank you for staying with us and i hope you really enjoyed these stories just a selection from the astronomy daily newsletter and of course thanks to Hallie it was really

[00:26:10] lovely to share their headphones with you again it was so nice to have my own voice back too well Hallie you do sound so much better as yourself thanks oh well you're welcome and on that note

[00:26:21] see you next monday for more astronomy science and space science that's right absolutely and don't forget Anna and charlie are back with you during the week so catch those shows and we will see you next monday bye for now