Monthly Space News Recap - August 2023
Top 5 of the month's most interesting space updates
NASA reestablishes contact with Voyager 2
Voyager 2 is the 2nd farthest spacecraft from Earth. Launched in 1977 this spacecraft has traveled well past the solar system and is now at a distance of more than 19.9 billion kilometers from the Earth. Surprisingly, despite the massive distance from it to the Earth, it had still been transmitting data toward the Earth. This was until a few days ago when the signals suddenly stopped. This was caused by a series of planned commands sent to the spacecraft. An accidental bug in the commands had caused the antenna of the craft to turn away from the earth. Fortunately, last week scientists used the Deep Space Network (a global network of observatories) to send an extremely powerful signal to the spacecraft which in turn helped it correct the antenna’s orientation
Virgin Galactic completes its first space tourism flight
Last week the privately owned space tourism company Virgin Galactic completed its very first (and much hyped) space tourism flight. The 60-minute flight happened last week on August 11. There were a total of 6 people onboard of which 3 were regular civilians. While there is no exact boundary to where space begins, the Karman line is commonly used for spaceflight. While the Karman line is at an altitude of 100 km, the spaceflight by Virgin Galactic reached only an altitude of 88 km. While this is not exactly in space according to the Karman line, it is very close to it and enough for the passengers to experience weightlessness.
Luna-25 crashes on the moon
Russia’s prestigious Luna-25 moon mission crashed onto the moon's surface today. The signs of disaster were first seen when the experts on Earth lost communications with the spacecraft yesterday. Due to this loss of communication, the craft was unable to enter the necessary orbit and thus crashed onto the moon’s surface. The last time Russia successfully launched a mission to the moon was the Luna 24 mission in 1976.
Chandrayaan 3 lands on the moon
Last week ISRO’s Chandrayaan 3 lander successfully landed on the moon. This is a historical moment for not just India but the entire world. This is a major achievement as this has now put India among the top 4 countries to ever land on the moon. This is also the first time a spacecraft is landing near the south pole of the moon (known for the confirmed presence of water ice). The rover (Pragyan) has also started moving on the lunar surface.
Pragyan finds sulpher near the lunar south pole
Last week, ISRO’s Praggyan rover from the Chandrayaan 3 mission confirmed the presence of sulfur near the south pole of the moon for the first time. Since sulfur is an element commonly found in volcanic areas, this new finding will help us understand more about the moon’s volcanic history.
