by A small asteroid explorer launched on NASA’s lunar mission last week still hasn’t called home.
Near-Earth Asteroid (NEA) Scout was one of 10 cubesats hitchhiking into space on NASA’s artemis 1 mission, which launched on November 16. The spacecraft is designed to run on sunlight to fly past a small space asteroid called GE in a year 2020. But something seems to have gone wrong after the cubesat was deployed.
After NASA’s successful separation and deployment Space Launch System (SLS) As of Nov. 16, the Near-Earth Asteroid Scout (NEA Scout) project team has not yet established communications with the spacecraft,” NASA officials wrote in an emailed statement. “Teams continue to work to establish contact. with NEA Scout.”
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In particular, NEA Scout personnel hope that the spacecraft’s unusual propulsion strategy can help them track down the cubesat. Packed into the tiny satellite was a reflective, silvery solar sail that expands to 924 square feet (86 square meters) — larger than a racquetball court, according to NASA.
If all had gone smoothly, NEA Scout planned to deploy its sail in early December, according to a NASA spokesperson, and then use solar radiation to reach the asteroid. Instead, despite not hearing from the spacecraft, NASA personnel sent out a command for “an emergency solar sail deployment” twice on Monday (Nov. find cubesat.
“If the spacecraft listens and successfully opens its sail, it can be seen by telescopes on Earth,” NASA officials wrote. “Various ground-based observatories are attempting to locate NEA Scout and share data, which will be invaluable in determining the status of the spacecraft.”
NEA Scout isn’t the only cubesat from last week’s Artemis 1 launch that’s struggling. For example OMOTENASHI, a small Japanese lunar lander, missed his date with the moon and another NASA cubesat, LunaH-Map, missed a crucial engine fire as it flew past the moon on Monday. The agency added the cubesats to Artemis 1, knowing that the small missions involved greater risk than larger spacecraft with more redundancy and durability built into the design.
Other cubesats launched last week appear to be Do better. An Italian cubesat called ArgoMoon is successful send beautiful pictures home from the Moon and Earth, and a second Japanese mission, named EQUALEUS, reported that they safely made its first lunar flight.
If NEA Scout recovers, it will be NASA’s first solar sail to leave Earth’s orbit; if the asteroid reaches 2020 GE safely, the spacecraft will likely be the slowest asteroid to date, and the asteroid will become the smallest ever visited by a spacecraft, according to NASA.
Email Meghan Bartels at [email protected] or follow her on Twitter @meghanbartels. follow us on Twitter @spacedot com and further Facebook.
