We can say it that way or say that a little news is also good news. Whichever you prefer we got an update on Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost lunar lander that was launched two weeks ago this morning (if you're reading this on Jan. 29). A read of the mission profile graphic in that post will show you it's silly to be expecting big news when the lander is at day 14 of its 25 day Earth orbit, primarily spent raising the apogee of its orbit. In other words, if we got big news, it would probably be a Bad Thing.
Instead we get this picture as a data point on how well the mission is
going. That bright circle just above the centerline of the picture is
the moon as seen from the lander.
Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost lunar lander snapped this selfie with the moon in the background from Earth orbit. Firefly posted the image on X on Jan. 27, 2025. (Image credit: Firefly Aerospace)
"While Blue Ghost is in Earth orbit, we'll continue to keep an eye on our final destination! To the moon!" Firefly said in a Monday X post that shared the two images.
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Everything seems to be going well for Blue Ghost so far. The lander remains healthy in orbit and has completed two engine burns on schedule, according to Firefly. In about 10 days, the spacecraft will conduct its most important engine firing yet — a translunar injection burn, which will set it on course for the moon.
The trip to the moon will take about four days, after which the Blue Ghost
will spend 16 days in lunar orbit calibrating itself and lowering its orbit
gradually. Once pronounced
ready, they will attempt to land the probe in Mare Crisium (the "Sea of
Crises") on the eastern limb of the Earth-facing side of the moon. That shows up as 45 days after launch, or around the end of February. The New Moon is February 27 and the exact landing time is probably to be around sunrise at the Mare Crisium landing site - to maximize the lander's time. That sounds like the landing will be in the first days of March.
Firefly has released other pictures from the probe in the last week. There's a video from when the lander witnessed a solar eclipse and has captured beautiful "blue marble" views of Earth.
The other probe, launched on the same Falcon 9 as Blue Ghost was Resilience from ispace in Japan, and Resilience is also doing well, according to the company. ispace is gearing up for a lunar flyby that will take place around Feb. 15, but that's almost a tease.
Resilience is taking a longer, more circuitous route to the moon than Blue Ghost is; the Japanese lander won't reach lunar orbit until about four months after launch. It will attempt a touchdown about two weeks after that.
Four months after launch will be around May 15 and two weeks after that implies the new moon in May is the targeted landing time.
Man, I hate these slow transfers. But really hoping both landers actually land properly and break the lunar lander curse.
ReplyDeleteSeems they are experimenting with various orbital routes, making use of gravitational conditions, for future use, say for cargo out of and back into earth's gravity well. Minimum fuel use orbital insertions, use of both bodies as slingshots and or braking maneuvers maybe? Additionally, what effectson their vehicles dystems, in regards to deep cold soak's while in either bodies shadows, verses the other extremes of effects of traveling in direct solar exposure?
ReplyDeleteMy guess is that the real test is your first one, getting there as cheaply as possible. Both Rocket Lab and Blue Origin (and I'm sure I'm forgetting more) sell "separation systems" that a payload is mounted on to do the long, slow changes in orbit required. Rocket Lab, whose Electron's payloads are even smaller than the 1 ton limit they call small payloads at 660 lbs, has talked about doing a demo getting a satellite to leave Earth orbit and go to Venus one of their separation systems.
DeleteTo me, another way of thinking of this is the previous 60 years of direct flights have demonstrated that the hardware is pretty much going to survive. They know how to make Class S electronics parts. So if a college or some low budget company has a choice of a rideshare they can afford that takes a long time to get where they want it vs one they can't possibly afford, you know which way they're going.
It seems to me less fuel = more cargo space.
DeleteIf a colony is to be built, the material has to be there. Pre-position material before mobilizing labor force. All this talk about off world building puts a premium on staging material and equipment. That puts a premium on most supplies, least cost.
These current missions are proof of concept, more or less.
Think Rick hit it exactly; "proof of concept", with some extras along for the ride.
DeleteNoticed mention of maintaining a load of fuel over ling durations seems its an issue being carefully looked into. And thats something thats tickled my curiosity, what with Spacex's ultimate goal of getting to mars sustainably. Far as I personally understand it, even if they keep the fuel down to sub temps that limits boil off, the sun is always shining, how much loss I guess is the question from boil off they can live with over the long time duration of reaching mars orbit?
DeleteOne job I had at a time, we where building tube sets for the C-17 back at its first run, some sharp engineer developed a system where end fittings for a rigid tube where kept soaking in liquid nitrogen flasks, looked similar to milk jugs, rather thick vacuum insulation, parts suspended in baskets hooked to the insulated cover. In order to be able to quickly handle the fittings without them warming up, we drew liquid nitrogen from tall vacuum flasks, into a regular picknick cooler, dump the fittings into that and grab them with insulated gloves, very quickly sliding the fittings into the tube ends. We always had a surplus if liquid nitrogen, they where lined up beside my weld booth, very rarely did the bleed-off valve go off. That was of course at ambient temps out of direct sunlight.
(we used to goof off with the left over nitrogen in the coolers, started to soak boxes of tungsten welding electrodes in it, leaving for a week, they worked way better, the arc was extremely steady, the points lasted far linger before needing resharpening, my boss let me soak one of my race engines, because i had learned NASCAR engine and driveline mechanics where cold soaking their engines and driveline parts, they claimed up to 25 more hp on the engine dynos, my little 750cc V Twin showed 6 extra hp just from a week of soaking in nitrogen.
Soaked a bottle if Stoli vodka for a few hours, it came out still liquid, it had a very thick viscosity though, like warm honey, left i in all day, it would not freeze. Tasted pretty darn good too, let it warm up a bit though.
Imagine a steady stream of cargo ships coming and going between earf and some place out there.
ReplyDeleteAfter launch, the cargo ship is detached from booster then attached to space transporter. Reusable booster returns for next launch.
On return run, cargo ship is detached from space transporter then attached to booster for deorbit burn.
There's a group of guys who haven't been earthside for fourteen months. Their work takes place in a 75,000 mile long portion of the transit corridor. They are looking forward to the end of their shift.
Longspaceshoremen?
DeleteEnter the realm of Space-based Conex systems. A family of shipping containers, from the space version of 10', 20' and 40' long.
DeleteIt's gonna happen.
Aldrin Mars Cycler, y'all...
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_cycler