Tuesday / 25 March 2025

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Artemis 2: On-Track to Bring Humans Closer to the Moon than We’ve Been in More Than 50 Years

NASA Astronauts Christina Koch, Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen are training meticulously for a million-km, 10-day Moon flyby in Orion spacecraft, 1st crewed flight of the Artemis campaign, Artemis II; set to launch NET April 2026 via Space Launch System (SLS), Orion is now at Kennedy Space Center; also there, SLS now has its 64-meter core stage — largest component of the rocket — joined with stacked solid rocket boosters; crew are testing Orion life support, communications and navigation systems and speaking with its engineers

Credits: CSA, NASA

Friday / 21 March 2025

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Philosophy of Solar System Exploration: Moon and Then Mars

Pioneering thinkers Astronaut Suni Williams, Bhavya Lal of NASA / Rand, Ryan Faith of US House / SpaceNews and Brent Sherwood of AIAA, Blue Origin and NASA agree on fundamentals: Moon is the proving ground for Mars and the start of a multiplanetary legacy, priorities must be sustainability, collaboration, creativity, economic integration and innovations that benefit everyday life; collaboration internationally and public / private makes Moon / Mars and beyond accomplishment a shared human achievement; exploring allows philosophical musing on our purpose, learning how we solve problems of materials, chemicals, technology; Williams is honored by ISRO and her father’s village in India, as well as by friendly dolphins greeting her capsule at splashdown

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Credits: Suni Williams, Bhavya Lal, Ryan Faith, Brent Sherwood, ILOA, NASA, NASA/Don Pettit

Tuesday / 18 March 2025

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ispace Has On-Track Mission, Receives Increased Award from Draper

ispace Hakuto-R Mission 2 aims to accomplish mission milestone 6 of 10 when it completes deep-space orbital maneuvers 24 April, affirming survivability there, ahead of 6 Jun landing at Mare Frigoris ~60°N; ispace business mission is to construct a sustainable Earth-Moon ecosystem implementing space resources; Hakuto-R is a multinational commercial lunar exploration program, includes payload development for lunar orbiting and landing; non-profit R&D company Draper releases US$7.7M additional funding to ispace-U.S. from its US$73M NASA CLPS award, for design of APEX 1.0 lander going NET 2026 H2 to Schrödinger Basin, ~75°S on Moon far side

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Credits: ispace, Draper

Friday / 14 March 2025

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First-ever Commercial Lander View of Earth Eclipsing Sun from Surface of Moon

During upcoming lunar eclipse on Earth, Firefly Aerospace Blue Ghost parked on Moon at Mare Crisium near Apollo 11 Mare Tranquillitatis exploration area is expected to capture the first images by a robotic lander of a total solar eclipse; Earth will mostly block the Sun but leave halo / ring / rim of red around perimeter; Moon surface expected to look red; maximum totality at Firefly Texas control room is 01:18 CDT 14 Mar; eclipse will last 6 hrs 3 mins, with 65 mins of totality; Blue Ghost will rely on batteries rather than solar panels

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Credits: Firefly Aerospace, Stellarium / Bob King

Tuesday / 11 March 2025

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8 of 10 Payload Objectives Met by Firefly Blue Ghost Lander on Moon

Firefly Aerospace Blue Ghost lander completing 8 of 10 CLPS payload objectives since 2 March arrival at Mare Crisium, other 2 expected; LISTER drilling 3 meters to resume after solar noon >120°C air temp; LEXI to attempt imaging Earth magnetosphere; Lunar PlanetVac manipulating regolith; RAC determining regolith accumulation on surfaces; LMS using electrical resistivity to determine rock composition; SCALPSS sending images; RadPC resisting radiation; EDS removing dust; NGLR reflecting laser pulses; LuGRE receiving GPS and satellite signals; Blue Ghost cameras will attempt capture of upcoming eclipse and sunset

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Credits: Firefly Aerospace

Friday / 7 March 2025

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Lunar Outpost Mobile Autonomous Prospecting Platform (MAPP) Now on Moon

Competing for NASA award to provide Artemis III rover, Lunar Outpost sent its MAPP to Moon and is currently awaiting orientation data from Intuitive Machines Athena IM-2 Lander to confirm whether the 45x38x40cm, 15kg MAPP becomes the 1st American rover to operate on the Moon; other firsts expected are lunar economy / commercialization via image of collected regolith sold to NASA for nominal amount US$1 and cellular network via Nokia (Finland) payload; other payloads from MIT (camera, tiny robots), Castrol (robot lubricant), and sports-oriented consortium (Italy and Germany); Lunar Outpost has offices in Colorado, Luxembourg, Australia

Credits: Lunar Outpost, NASA

Tuesday / 4 March 2025

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Moon Landings in Focus at Event 7 March, Astronomy from Mauna Kea in Hawai’i

7 Mar sees Maunakea Moon Viewing with Lecture conducted by International Lunar Observatory Association (ILOA) at The Onizuka Center for International Astronomy Visitor Information Station (VIS) on Mauna Kea; Moon observation focus includes expected 6 Mar landing site of Intuitive Machines IM-2 Athena ~160 km from Moon South Pole and ILOA lunar South Pole-region missions, which include upcoming ILO-1 mission; Maunakea is important in the traditions of Hawai’I, a wahi pana, a place of cultural, spiritual and archaeological significance

Credits: reddit, University of Hawai’i at Hilo

Friday / 28 February 2025

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IM-2 Athena Landing Pods Inscribed with Employees Names: Moon Property Rights Implications?

Now in transit, Athena to land ~160 km from Moon South Pole 6 Mar; 2 of 6 landing feet inscribed with 315 IM employee names; 1 foot has IM logo; 3 have “Intuitive Machines” / “Ad Lunam”: 1 with Grace Hopper / IM-2 mission patches, 1 with Texas outline / Houston star, 1 with Maryland / Glen Burnie and Arizona / Phoenix; IM-1 Odysseus lander had similar feet; There is a clear need to define lunar property rights – frequent public-private missions to Moon surface and start of permanent lunar operations is now; Outer Space Treaty of 1967 and ‘Moon Agreement’ of 1987 likely starting points

Credits: Intuitive Machines/SpaceX/collectSPACE.com

Tuesday / 25 February 2025

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Intuitive Machines IM-2 Launching to Moon on Wednesday 26 Feb

Inaugural occurrence of 3 lunar landers simultaneously enroute to Moon expected with 26 Feb launch of IM-2 Athena, now in fairing of SpaceX Falcon 9, departure from Kennedy Space Center complex 39A window opens 19:17 EST; headed near highest Moon mountain Mons Mouton, ~60 km from South Pole, Athena will search for water with NASA payload Polar Resources Ice Mining Experiment-1 and IM “Grace” hopper; other payload customers are Nokia, Lone Star Data Holdings, Columbia Sportswear, Lunar Outpost, Puli Space, Dymon Co. Ltd., German Aerospace Center

Credits: Intuitive Machines, NASA, SpaceX

Friday / 21 February 2025

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India to the Moon: Update and Focus

ISRO charting innovative course for human Moon landing by 2040, perhaps near Shiv Shakti where Chandrayaan 3 landed; LVM3 rocket being modified into Human-Rated HR-LVM3 ‘Soorya’ with safety systems, tripled liftoff mass capability ~1.8 million kg; higher-capacity lunar lander being built with Earth Departing Stage (EDS); crewed Moon missions to require minimum 2 launches, then in-space docking / assembly; inaugural double launch NET 2025 for Gaganyaan crewed Earth orbit, then Chandrayaan-4 lunar sample return NET 2027 (updated from 2028); IAF GLEX Conference upcoming May 7-9 in New Delhi

Credits: ISRO, NASA/JPL/USGS