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In Today’s Deep Space Extra… NASA is a day away from announcing its Artemis Human Landing System (HLS) contract selections. More than ever, finding and extracting resources from planetary bodies seems a significant part of future human deep space exploration. Hubble captures the breakup of comet Atlas.
Human Space Exploration
NASA to announce HLS contract winners on April 30
Spacepolicyonline.com (4/28): NASA plans to announce commercial Human Landing System (HLS) contract selections on Thursday, April 30 at 1 p.m. These are the vehicles that are to land astronauts on the surface of the Moon for the first time since NASA’s Apollo era. The White House has directed NASA to land the first woman and next man on the Moon in 2024 under the agency’s Artemis initiative.
Long March 5B rolled out for crewed spacecraft, space station test launch
SpaceNews.com (4/29): China rolled a Long March 5B rocket to a launch pad at the Wenchang Satellite Launch Center early Wednesday for a possible launch around May 5, though an official announcement of the date had not been announced. A low Earth orbit test flight is anticipated, one that could set the stage for the launch of the core module for a Chinese space station in early 2021. The test launch payload is the prototype for a new generation crewed spacecraft. The powerful rocket is also in line for the July/August launch of China’s Tianwen-1 Mars orbiter and rover.
Space Science
Digging up Regolith: Why mining the Moon seems more possible than ever
Popular Mechanics (4/27): As much as ever, locating and exploiting resources on the Moon and other planetary bodies seems a significant part of the equation underlying NASA’s strategy to resume human deep space exploration, starting with a return to the lunar surface in 2024.
SpaceX to test Starlink “sun visor” to reduce brightness
SpaceNews.com (4/27): Starlink’s next orbital launch is to feature changes to the small internet connectivity satellites intended to reduce a glare factor that the global astronomy community has stated interferes with observations. The Visor Sat complex will deploy panels that block the sun. The satellites will turn to a new orientation as they raise their altitudes, altering the orientation of solar panels so as not to reflect sunlight. Starlink chief executive Elon Musk outlined the plan Tuesday in an appearance before a science panel working on an astrophysics decadal survey of future projects having the highest science potential.
Hubble watches comet Atlas disintegrate into more than two dozen pieces
Space Telescope Science Institute (4/28): Imagery from the Hubble Space Telescope reveals the unpredictable nature of comets, in this case Atlas, taken a week ago as the recently discovered comet broke apart on its approach to the sun. Earlier, Atlas was predicted by some as a possible naked eye comet, appearing bright in the night sky during the latter part of May.
A nest of alien asteroids orbits our sun
New York Times (4/28): Brazilian astronomers report the discovery of a class of asteroids whose origins were likely another star. Their numbers total 19 and their unusual out of plane orbital track suggests they were pirated by the sun as the solar system formed 4.5 billion years ago.
Other News
Falcon Heavy set for design validation milestone before late 2020 launch
Coalition Member in the News – Boeing
Spaceflightnow.com (4/27): The U.S. Space Force expects to complete a design validation of the SpaceX Falcon Heavy for national security payloads by July. The validation is planned before a mission with multiple military payloads headed for an orbit more than 20,000 miles above the Earth.
Navy releases three videos that showcase “unidentified” objects
Ars Technica (4/28): Video from three reported encounters dating back to 2004 and 2015 were released by the Department of Defense (DoD) earlier this week. The source of the encounters remain unidentified but the video lacks actual evidence of alien encounters.
NASA is offering free virtual tours of space
Thrillist.com (4/28): NASA has curated a collection of digital space experiences, so you can explore the TRAPPIST-1 star system, International Space Station (ISS), and planets outside of our solar system.