NASA's Psyche mission to an unexplored metal world comes to a halt
NASA's Psyche mission to an unexplored metal world comes to a halt
NASA's first spacecraft designed to study a metallic asteroid won't be launching this year as planned, according to an announcement made by the agency on June 24. (Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty Images via CNN)
NASA's first spacecraft designed to study a metallic asteroid won't be launching this year as planned, according to an announcement made by the agency on Friday.
The Psyche mission's 2022 launch window, which opened on August 1 and closes on Oct. 11, will come to an end before the spacecraft's flight software is ready. A delay in delivering the software and its testing equipment has prevented the Psyche team from having enough time for testing prior to launch.
Engineers want to be absolutely sure that the software will function as expected once the spacecraft is in flight.
Used to control the spacecraft's orientation as it flies through space, guidance and navigation software help point its antenna toward Earth for communications and relaying data. The software also provides the spacecraft's propulsion system with trajectory information.
During testing at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, engineers discovered a compatibility issue in the software's test bed simulators. The issue has since been corrected, but there isn't enough time for a full checkout and launch in 2022.
The space agency will form an independent assessment team to review the mission and determine a path forward, including estimated costs and potential launch opportunities in 2023 and 2024. The Psyche spacecraft is currently housed at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
"Flying to a distant metal-rich asteroid, using Mars for a gravity assist on the way there, takes incredible precision. We must get it right. Hundreds of people have put remarkable effort into Psyche during this pandemic, and the work will continue as the complex flight software is thoroughly tested and assessed," said JPL Director Laurie Leshin. "The decision to delay the launch wasn't easy, but it is the right one."
Timing for the mission makes things difficult moving forward. A 2022 launch would have delivered the spacecraft to the asteroid, also known as Psyche, by 2026. But launch periods in the coming years mean that the spacecraft would arrive much later due to different orbital positions, such as 2029 or 2030.
"Our amazing team has overcome almost all of the incredible challenges of building a spacecraft during Covid," said Lindy Elkins-Tanton, Psyche's principal investigator and foundation and regents professor at Arizona State University's School of Earth and Space Exploration.
"We have conquered numerous hardware and software challenges, and we've been stopped in the end by this one last problem. We just need a little more time and will get this one licked, too. The team is ready to move forward, and I'm so grateful for their excellence."
The delay will also halt two projects that were set to ride along with Psyche on the same SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket at launch.
The first is NASA's Janus mission, which was designed to study twin binary asteroid systems, and the second is the Deep Space Optical Communications technology demonstration. This demo is designed to test high-data-rate laser communications that could change the way ground teams communicate with spacecraft across deep space.
The spacecraft also has a number of innovations, like ion propulsion rather than traditional rocket fuel.
If the decision is made to launch Psyche in the coming years, the spacecraft will embark on a 280 million-mile (450 million-kilometre) journey. The Psyche asteroid is so metal-rich, some scientists believe it's the exposed core of a planetesimal, or a planet in the making that separated into layers.
Collisions with other celestial objects over time might have stripped away the outer layers, exposing the remaining metallic core. If Psyche truly is a core, studying it would be like peering inside the very heart of a planet like Earth.
The potato-shaped asteroid only appears as a fuzzy blur to ground- and space-based telescopes. The unusual object could also be a piece of primordial material that never melted, according to NASA.
The results from the assessment team will determine if this mission launches in the coming years or becomes grounded.
"I want to stress that NASA remains fully committed to scientific discovery and exploration of small bodies," said Lori Glaze, director of NASA's Planetary Science Division.
"This is exemplified by our existing missions OSIRIS-REx, Lucy and DART. We are anxiously anticipating the review of Psyche tests to better understand what that path forward will look like."
Statistics Canada says the year-over-year inflation rate slowed to 7.6 per cent in July as economists widely expected the pace of price increases to slow that month.
The next time the Bank of Canada raises interest rates on the scheduled date of September 7, 2022, it could potentially trigger a recession. Although there may be a chance that we don’t enter into a recession and the BoC is still hoping for a soft landing, it’s best to be prepared. Contributor Christopher Liew explains how.
Massive explosions and fires hit a military depot in Russia-annexed Crimea on Tuesday, forcing the evacuation of more than 3,000 people, the second time in recent days that the Ukraine war's focus has turned to the peninsula.
One-quarter of front line employees surveyed at Canada's border agency said they had directly witnessed a colleague discriminate against a traveller in the previous two years.
Minister of Families, Children and Social Development of Canada Karina Gould is discouraging people from making fake travel plans just to skip the line of those waiting for passports.
Some energy experts warn a deal to sell Canadian hydrogen to Germany will serve as only a small, far-off and expensive part of the solution to Europe's energy crisis.
While many Canadians don’t support moving away from the metric system of measurement, many continue to use imperial measurements in their daily lives, according to a recent online poll.
Two of the people behind an accusation of political interference in the investigation of the April 2020 mass shooting in Nova Scotia will be before a House of Commons committee Tuesday.
The fatal film-set shooting of a cinematographer by actor Alec Baldwin last year was an accident, according to a determination made by New Mexico's Office of the Medical Investigator following the completion of an autopsy and a review of law enforcement reports. The medical investigator's report was made public Monday by the Santa Fe County Sheriff's Office along with numerous reports from the FBI on the revolver and ammunition that were collected following the shooting.
Statistics Canada says the year-over-year inflation rate slowed to 7.6 per cent in July as economists widely expected the pace of price increases to slow that month.
Two of the people behind an accusation of political interference in the investigation of the April 2020 mass shooting in Nova Scotia will be before a House of Commons committee Tuesday.
The next time the Bank of Canada raises interest rates on the scheduled date of September 7, 2022, it could potentially trigger a recession. Although there may be a chance that we don’t enter into a recession and the BoC is still hoping for a soft landing, it’s best to be prepared. Contributor Christopher Liew explains how.
Canada's average resale home price fell 4.5% from a year ago in July and was down 5.4% on the month as buyers continued to sit on the sidelines amid rising borrowing costs.
For the second time in less than a month, a resident of Ashcroft, B.C., died while waiting for health care after having a heart attack mere metres from a local ambulance station.
Massive explosions and fires hit a military depot in Russia-annexed Crimea on Tuesday, forcing the evacuation of more than 3,000 people, the second time in recent days that the Ukraine war's focus has turned to the peninsula.
The international community needs to step up to hold the Taliban accountable for human rights abuses in Afghanistan, a year after the militant Islamist group took control of the country and limited the rights of women and girls, according to Heather Barr, associate director of the Women's Rights Division of Human Rights Watch.
A Chinese navy vessel arrived at a Beijing-built port in southern Sri Lanka on Tuesday, after its port call was earlier delayed due to apparent security concerns raised by India.
Kenya was calm on Tuesday, a day after Deputy President William Ruto was declared the winner of the narrow presidential election over longtime opposition figure Raila Odinga -- a vote closely watched in the East African country that has been crucial to regional stability.
The United States and South Korea will begin their biggest combined military training in years next week in the face of an increasingly aggressive North Korea, which has been ramping up weapons tests and threats of nuclear conflict against Seoul and Washington, the South Korean military said Tuesday.
One-quarter of front line employees surveyed at Canada's border agency said they had directly witnessed a colleague discriminate against a traveller in the previous two years.
The German government on Friday issued a statement confirming the agreement will be signed Aug. 23 in Stephenville, where a Newfoundland based company plans to build a zero-emission plant that will use wind energy to produce hydrogen for export.
British drug regulators have become the first in the world to authorize an updated version of Moderna's coronavirus vaccine that aims to protect against the original virus and the omicron variant.
For the second time in less than a month, a resident of Ashcroft, B.C., died while waiting for health care after having a heart attack mere metres from a local ambulance station.
Bill Gates on Tuesday called for South Korea to become more involved in international efforts to prevent infectious diseases like COVID-19 as he stressed the need for the world to be better prepared for the next pandemic.
Last month was the Earth’s sixth-warmest July on record in 143 years, according to the U.S. federal agency that studies oceans, the atmosphere, and coastal areas.
The fatal film-set shooting of a cinematographer by actor Alec Baldwin last year was an accident, according to a determination made by New Mexico's Office of the Medical Investigator following the completion of an autopsy and a review of law enforcement reports. The medical investigator's report was made public Monday by the Santa Fe County Sheriff's Office along with numerous reports from the FBI on the revolver and ammunition that were collected following the shooting.
The next time the Bank of Canada raises interest rates on the scheduled date of September 7, 2022, it could potentially trigger a recession. Although there may be a chance that we don’t enter into a recession and the BoC is still hoping for a soft landing, it’s best to be prepared. Contributor Christopher Liew explains how.
Statistics Canada says the year-over-year inflation rate slowed to 7.6 per cent in July as economists widely expected the pace of price increases to slow that month.
Wall Street nearly recouped overnight losses and was inching toward gains Tuesday after some bell-weather retailers reported strong second-quarter earnings, suggesting that Americans have continued to spend despite the worst inflation in 40 years.
Amid high inflation and rising cost of living, a person's relationship status can impact their finances. There are five ways in which flying solo can put you at a financial disadvantage and a few ways to mitigate them.
Since being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, Peter Foran takes his wife Janice for romantic rides on his wheelchair. They travel along Vancouver's bike lanes and waterfront paths, with her sitting sideways across his lap.
Montreal's Eugenie Bouchard returns to the hardcourt this week following a 17-month layoff. The former fifth ranked player in the world is taking part in the Odlum Brown Vancouver Open WTA 125 event.
A test car with autonomous steering capability veered into oncoming traffic in Germany, killing one person and seriously injuring nine others, police said Tuesday.
The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's Office of Defects Investigation has opened a query into seat belt pretensioners on certain 2020-2022 Kia/Hyundai vehicles, saying that they may rupture or explode.
A cleaning service employee who was working at a General Motors plant in Michigan was killed Thursday during an altercation with a co-worker, authorities said.
NASA's first spacecraft designed to study a metallic asteroid won't be launching this year as planned, according to an announcement made by the agency on June 24. (Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty Images via CNN)
