S02E35: Neptune's Mystery, Mars Flights, and Lunar Landings: Space Updates

[00:00:00] Welcome to another episode of Astronomy Daily. I'm Steve Dunkley, your host. It's the 21st of August 2023. And the big news today is all about Lunar 25. Let's find out what's happening there. Chandran 3 is hot on your tail and spy satellites over Australia. Whoops! There goes the neighbourhood.

[00:00:21] The 20th day of the podcast. With your host, Steve Dunkley. And say hello, Hallie. Hi, Hallie. Hello, human. So tell us what's happening in your world, Hallie. Well, I've got a story about Neptunes disappearing clouds. Oh, is that true? Cloudless Neptune?

[00:00:39] Yes. And NASA's Ingenuity Mars helicopter has made its 55th flight. Wow, that little thing just keeps on going, doesn't it? I wish my kitchen appliance was half as reliable. And Steve, a pioneer of the space program, has passed this week.

[00:00:53] That's right. Someone who was effectively fired twice before ever getting a real foothold in the program and then went on to hold an interesting distinction has passed away. I'll tell you more soon. Stay with us for these stories and more, Hallie. Why don't you get us underway?

[00:01:09] Okay. Here are the short takes. On Thursday, August 17th, astronomers announced quite an unexpected update about one of our solar systems ice giants, Neptune. It would appear that the Azure world's clouds have all but disappeared. Basically, after looking at images taken of the planet between the years 1994 and 2022,

[00:01:34] the team noticed a strange pattern beginning in 2019. Around the planet's mid-latitudes, cloud coverage seemed to start fading. Eventually, all evidence of clouds totally vanished.

[00:01:48] Imk De Pater, an emeritus professor of astronomy at the University of California, Berkeley and senior author of a study on the findings said she was surprised how quickly the clouds disappeared. We essentially saw cloud activity drop within a few months, she said. Intrigued.

[00:02:06] She and her colleagues looked for a reason for the cloud's disappearance, and, sure enough, they came up with a rather fascinating explanation. It's likely, the team suggests, that Neptune's clouds are inextricably linked with the way our sun behaves during its 11-year long activity cycle.

[00:02:23] Despite what it looks like, the sun isn't exactly a blazing hot chunk of land. Rather, it's more of a giant, orb-shaped ocean made of charged particles, collectively known as plasma, which means its structure can generally flow around and mold itself over time.

[00:02:39] In conjunction with such movement, the sun's magnetic fields, directly associated with all those charged particles, get tangled up. As these fields get tangled, they exert more and more attention on our host star, so to speak, until the yellow glowing ball can't handle it anymore.

[00:02:57] Then, every 11 years, sort of as a reset, the sun's magnetic fields flip, meaning the North Pole becomes the South Pole and vice versa. From there, the saga repeats itself. Other things happen too.

[00:03:12] For instance, magnetic field knots can lead to an increased number and intensity of solar flares, which are incredibly powerful ejections of radiation out into space, sometimes interfering with satellites and showering the Earth with charged particles that can cause blips in communications.

[00:03:28] But most importantly for the team's Neptune analysis, one phenomenon known to happen during the solar cycle is that the sun emits a bunch of ultraviolet radiation as its magnetic fields transition.

[00:03:40] Considering how utterly massive the sun is, that radiation sort of floods the rest of the solar system as the researchers put it.

[00:03:48] And naturally, it's easy to believe that this whole situation might affect a planet or two, including Neptune, even though the distant, windy planet sits some 2.8 billion miles, 4.5 billion kilometers from our star.

[00:04:02] The 4 pound, 1.8 kilograms, Ingenuity conducted its 55th flight on August 12, covering a fair bit of red planet ground in the process. Ingenuity has now successfully flown on Mars 55 times.

[00:04:17] On its latest flight, the Mars helicopter flew 866 feet 264 meters for 143 seconds at a height of 32.8 feet 10 meters according to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California on Wednesday.

[00:04:34] Those figures aren't records for the rotorcraft, by the way, Ingenuity has reached a maximum altitude of 59 feet 18 meters and it flew a whopping 2,310 feet 704 meters horizontally on one of its sorties.

[00:04:50] Ingenuity has now covered a total of 41,024 feet 12,503 meters of ground and stayed aloft for nearly 98 minutes on its 55 flights, mission team members wrote on the chopper's flight log. Ingenuity landed on the floor of Mars Chisaro crater in February 2020 won along with NASA's Perseverance rover.

[00:05:11] The chopper's main goal was to show that aerial exploration is possible on Mars despite the planet's thin atmosphere. Ingenuity did just that over the course of five flights in April and early May of 2021.

[00:05:25] NASA then granted an extended mission during which the helicopter is serving as a scout for the life hunting, sample caching Perseverance. Here's a story for you Steve. Flying cars could finally actually be on the horizon.

[00:05:40] Anyone who's seen Blade Runner or the Jetsons knows that you can't have the future without flying cars, but despite many people's hopes, these flying personal transports have always seemed to be one step ahead of the present.

[00:05:53] Now, one company is coming out to say that it has the key to making these fantastic fly machines a reality and it has a NASA proven propulsion system at its heart that makes it hard to dismiss as easily.

[00:06:05] The company applied EVTOL concepts presented its plan for the Epiphany transporter this week, a vertical takeoff and landing, VTOL vehicle that the company said is capable of a top speed of 160 miles per hour, 258 kilometers per hour but generates less than 55 decibels of noise at 50 feet 15 meters up, which is somewhere between the volume of a steady rainfall, 50 dB and normal human conversation, 60 dB.

[00:06:34] Do those specs meet with your approval Steve? Well, if they can put it in an attractive package, they just might have me Hallie. So no flying toasters for you? Oh definitely not. I'm more of a, uh, Spinner Man myself. Like your hero Rick Deckard? Spot on Hallie.

[00:06:52] The secret appears to be the duct thrusters along the sides and rear of the Epiphany transporter, which researchers at NASA's Ames Research Center found in 2002 proved to produce a significant amount of thrust, the physical force that powers jet engines and helicopters.

[00:07:07] The duct design also has the added advantage of shielding the spinning blades inside the duct that are generating the thrust and Rob Belaga, the project engineer for the Epiphany transporter at Applied EVTOL concepts was a co-author on the original paper.

[00:07:23] The design has been refined over the two decades since it was first tested at Ames and the founder of Applied EVTOL concepts, Michael Mosier, believes that they have advanced the technology considerably since that initial proof of concept work in NASA's wind tunnel.

[00:07:38] The craft is designed to seat two passengers and their luggage. The company says the Epiphany is about the size of a Tesla Model S and that it could fit in your typical one car garage. There you go Steve, just make room for me in the GPS unit.

[00:07:54] I'll be quite happy. Oh just so that you can lead me astray right? That's for sure. And that's all the short takes for today. Back to you Steve. We're listening to Astronomy Daily. I've got Steve Duncan.

[00:08:08] Oh and jumping straight back into it we've got some hot topics this afternoon. Also some sad news this week, Carol Bobcoe, an astronaut of some note August 18 this year.

[00:08:23] There's only a couple of days ago Carol Bobcoe who was the only NASA astronaut to fly on the first launch of two separate space shuttle orbiters has passed away at the age of 85. Bobcoe's death on Thursday last was confirmed by the Association of Space Explorers.

[00:08:41] That's a professional organization for the world's astronauts and cosmonauts. And he was a distinguished member. Bobcoe previously served as the president of the US chapter of that association. He joined NASA in 1969 with the agency's seventh group of astronauts.

[00:08:59] Unlike the classes that came before and after his selection Bobcoe and his six fellow group seven members were transplants from another astronaut corps. The US Air Force's manned orbiting laboratory. That's the MOL program.

[00:09:17] And when that program was cancelled in June 1969, NASA accepted seven youngest members into the astronaut groups. They didn't have any immediate need for them. And in that first rather frustrating year or so he says they were told that they were fired several times.

[00:09:37] So it's an interesting thing you're going to actually catch up with the early interviews and so on on NASA's side. They have a NASA oral history interview collection that you might like to go and visit and have a listen to.

[00:09:50] And you can see Carol Bobcoe's interview there as well. Here's a pioneer astronaut Carol Bobcoe. 85 years old passed away this week. Well, perhaps the biggest story of the week in space at the moment is Russia's lunar 25 mission which ended in failure after crashing into the moon.

[00:10:11] The space agency Roscosmos has announced a statement posted to the agency's telegram social media channel early on August 20 confirmed that an anomaly during August 20. During August 19 maneuver to lower lunar 25 orbit resulted in the spacecraft impacting the lunar surface. That's called crashing guys.

[00:10:34] The spacecraft was scheduled to attempt a soft lunar landing August 21 near bogus Sileski crater located approximately 70 degrees south latitude in the vicinity of the south polar region.

[00:10:49] And it's got a lot of attention there because of the suspected amount of water that's available or maybe available in that area.

[00:10:56] Roscosmos announced August 19 that at 7 10 a.m. eastern that day, lunar 25 was instructed to fire its engines to send the spacecraft into a pre landing orbit around the moon to plan maneuver was anomalous.

[00:11:11] An emergency situation occurred on board the automatic station which did not allow the maneuver to be performed with the specific parameters according to a translation of the Roscosmos statement. The agency clarified Sunday that contact was lost with the spacecraft around 7 57 a.m.

[00:11:31] A preliminary analysis revealed that a deviation of the actual parameters of the impulse from those calculated resulted in the spacecraft colliding with the lunar surface according to a machine translation of the statement. A specially formed interdepartmental commission will deal with issues of clarifying the reasons for the loss.

[00:11:52] I suspect that it might have something to do with the European Space Agency withdrawing its support from the mission early in the piece. They were to provide some high resolution camera or imaging gear that was to help with the landing of lunar 25 on the surface.

[00:12:12] And as I understand it, it was because of the invasion of Ukraine that that technology was withdrawn. The mission had endured lengthy delays stemming from technical issues and resource constraints.

[00:12:25] It carried a number of science payloads but was mainly a technology demonstrator for future landings later in the decade. The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 could not be tested. The country's previous lunar landing was Lunar 24, a Soviet-era sample return mission in 1976.

[00:12:50] So there's a big, big difference in the technology between then and now. A loss of lunar 25 is a blow to Russia's own plans as well as wider cooperative efforts. The mission was also normally part of the China-led International Lunar Research Station.

[00:13:06] The Lunar 25 launch was attended by a senior official involved in China's deep space exploration projects. The ILRS roadmap unveiled in St. Petersburg, Russia in June 2021 noted that Russia's super heavy lift launch vehicles would share the burden of launching major pieces of infrastructure for the station in the 2030s.

[00:13:29] Observers have expressed doubts on Russia's capabilities to contribute significantly to the project following its occupation of Ukraine. Lunar 25 was being described in the media as being in a race with India's Chandrayaan-3 lander to set down near the Moon's South Polar Region.

[00:13:46] Chandrayaan-3 successfully lowered its lunar orbit August 19, setting it up for a landing attempt at a similar latitude to Lunar 25. Chandrayaan-3's landing is expected around 8.34am Eastern August 23.

[00:14:00] A further mission, the smart lander for investigating Moon SLIM or SLIM by Japan agencies JAXA, is scheduled for launch on an H2A rocket August 25. SLIM is a landing technology demonstrator aiming to make exploration more precise and economical. Meanwhile, the Indians seem to be doing just fine.

[00:14:25] The Chandrayaan-3 mission continues to make significant strides as its lander module has now achieved an orbit of 133x157km around the Moon.

[00:14:37] This crucial development was shared by the Indian Space Research Organisation ISRO with a keen focus on the anticipated soft landing on the Moon's South Polar Region on August 23.

[00:14:50] A second de-boosting, which happened on August 20, the mission's timeline has been a series of crucial maneuvers over the last few days. On August 17, the lander module was successfully separated from the propulsion module, marking a pivotal step in Chandrayaan-3's trajectory.

[00:15:10] Following this separation, the first de-boosting was scheduled on August 18. Earlier, the spacecraft had undergone a series of orbital changes by August 16. Chandrayaan-3 had adjusted its orbit to 153x163km on August 14 during its orbit to decircularisation phase. It had achieved an orbit of 151x179km.

[00:15:35] Additionally, on August 9, a vital maneuver reduced the spacecraft orbit to 174km by 1437km. ISRO has been vigilantly monitoring Chandrayaan-3 since its commencement, with operations led from the Mission Operations Complex at ISRO's telemetry tracking and command network and the Indian Deep Space Network antenna at Bayalu.

[00:16:01] The spacecraft's health remains optimal. Don't you love how they talk about the spacecraft being healthy? Collaborations with the European Space Agency and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory ensure precise deep space tracking.

[00:16:16] Chandrayaan-3's mission at its core aims to validate a successful soft landing on the Moon, distinguishing itself from the Chandrayaan-2. This mission is exclusively outfitted with a lander at a rover.

[00:16:30] The initiative to explore the Moon's South Polar Region stems from its potential reservoirs of water ice, a crucial element for future lunar and possibly deep space missions.

[00:16:40] Reflecting on Chandrayaan-2's endeavours in 2019 provides context to the current mission objectives, while the Vikram lander faced challenges in its descent, resulting in a hard landing. The missions orbiter emerged as a prominent tool granting significant highlights into lunar characteristics.

[00:17:01] These prior experiences have been pivotal in forming Chandrayaan-3's path. Some would call that the School of Hard Knocks. Well, in space you don't want to do that too often. Oh and looky here, something from my own backyard. Something a bit more cloak and dagger.

[00:17:19] Hundreds of Chinese satellites are currently passing over Australia collecting intelligence on military training activities involving the United States and other regional partners.

[00:17:29] Commercial space data obtained by the ABC, which is our major news carrier here in Australia, details the full scale of Beijing surveillance on recently completed exercise talisman sabre,

[00:17:42] as well as the exercise Malabar naval drills now being held off the coast of Sydney in New South Wales, that's the East Coast. In July, Canberra-based defence company EOS Space Systems tracked three Chinese geostationary orbit satellites,

[00:17:58] manoeuvring into position below the equator to monitor the talisman sabre war games across Northern Australia. China's Xi Yan 12-01 satellite was detected drifting westerly over the Northern Australian region,

[00:18:12] while the Xi Yan 17 and Xi Yan 23 satellites were tracked drifting easterly to observe the multiple areas where exercises were being conducted. Since exercise Malabar began on August 10, hundreds of smaller low orbit satellites have been tracked completing thousands of flights

[00:18:31] at much lower altitudes over the Australian continent, focusing on the activity of warships around Sydney Harbour. We've been collecting optical surveillance data on Earth observing Chinese satellites during the talisman sabre and Malabar exercises,

[00:18:47] and what that's showing is quite a lot of activity surveying the ground during those events. James Bennett from EOS Space Systems said, We've seen over 300 satellites surveying ground-based activities and the number of overflights is over 3,000 since the start of the Malabar exercise

[00:19:06] centred around Sydney Harbour Bay area, Dr Bennett added. The exercise Malabar involves joint naval exercises between Australia warships and from the United States, India and Japan. Space is considered an increasingly important domain for modern war fighting operations across the globe,

[00:19:25] with Australia's recent defence strategic review categorising it as a key element of a more integrated force. The data on Chinese recent space activity was collected during telescope station outside Canberra at Learmouth in Western Australia,

[00:19:40] which was then analysed by EOS staff to precisely identify the satellites and their flight paths. And that's it for another day with Astronomy Daily. Thank you from me and thank you from Hallie. Thanks Hallie. Nice to be with you all again.

[00:19:57] And we'll be seeing you again next week when we bring you more stories from space and science and stuff. And as always a quick reminder to check out all the back editions of Astronomy Daily and Space Nuts with Andrew Dunkley and Professor Fred Watson at Bytes.com.

[00:20:16] And don't forget it's Tim Gibbs on Fridays and it's me on Mondays and we'll be looking forward to catching you then. Bye for now. See you next time.