Two
spacecraft are headed for NASA's Florida space center to prepare for their
piggyback mission to the moon.
NASA's
Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite, known as LCROSS, set out from
Northrop Grumman's facility in California this week for the agency's Kennedy
Space Center spaceport in Cape Canaveral Fla. Meanwhile, NASA's Lunar
Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) — which will launch with LCROSS — was also
expected to make the same trip.
The
two unmanned spacecraft are the first in NASA's plan to return
humans to the moon and begin establishing a lunar outpost by 2020. LCROSS
will aim a double
sledgehammer at the moon to search for water ice in a permanently shadowed
crater near one of the lunar poles. LRO will spend at least one year in a low
polar orbit on its primary exploration mission, with the possibility of three
more years to collect additional detailed scientific information about the moon
and its environment.
The
joint LCROSS/LRO mission is currently slated to launch on April 24. This
follows a delay
of its planned launch late last year, in order to give priority to a
military payload for a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket.
"This
is the culmination of four years of hard work by everyone on the LRO Project,"
said Cathy Peddie, LRO deputy project manager at NASA's Goddard Space Flight
Center in Maryland. "LRO now begins its launch site processing, where it
will be prepped for integration with our sister mission LCROSS, and eventually
encapsulated in the Atlas 5 for its journey to the moon."
After
launch, the LCROSS spacecraft and the Centaur upper stage of its Atlas 5 rocket
are designed to fly by the moon and enter into an elongated orbit to position
the spacecraft for impact.
On
final approach, the spacecraft and Centaur will separate, with the Centaur
stage expected to strike a pre-selected
lunar crater, creating a debris plume that should rise above the surface.
Four minutes later, LCROSS would fly through the debris plume, collecting and
relaying data back to Earth before striking the moon's surface and creating a
second debris plume. Scientists will use data from the debris clouds to
determine the presence or absence of water ice.
LCROSS's
sister spacecraft LRO will carry seven instruments to provide scientists with
detailed maps of the lunar surface and enhance understanding of the moon's
topography, lighting conditions, mineralogical composition and natural
resources. Information gleaned from LRO will be used to select safe landing
sites, determine locations for future lunar outposts and help mitigate
radiation dangers to astronauts.
The
polar regions of the moon are the main focus of the mission because continuous
access to sunlight may be possible and water ice may exist in permanently
shadowed areas of the poles.
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