You may have already noticed that I’m in Florida to cover the successful overnight launch of “Demo-1,” the first flight of the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule that’s meant to return manned launches to US launch sites. That flight certainly is dominating space news this week—you know you’re on a big story, when on your drive home the BBC News overnight breaks with the same event you just witnessed—but it wasn’t the only thing happening overhead this week. So while I am going to toss in more images and more information from the launch, there are other stories.
Before the launch, NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine lead a Q & A session in which questions were divided about 50/50 between Bridenstineand the first four astronauts slated to fly in the SpaceX-built capsule. A lot of emphasis was placed on the way Crew Dragon has moved through the Commercial Crew program at NASA and how excited everyone was to see it so close to carrying humans. Then following the launch, Elon Musk joined Bridenstineand two of the astronauts for a session that was, somewhat hilariously, 99.9 percent questions directed at Musk until he became so obviously sleepy that Bridenstinetook over.
- Asked whether he wished he could be flying on the Demo-1 mission, astronaut Mike Hopkins surprised some in the gung-ho audience by saying “No.” Both he and Victor Glover backed up the idea that, yeah, they were test pilots, and yeah, they wanted to get into space. That means taking risks. It doesn’t mean taking unnecessary risks.
- Experienced Shuttle pilot Doug Hurley fielded a question on how he liked the slick, on-glass interface of the highly automated Crew Dragon vs. the controls of the Shuttle. Despite what’s seen as relative simplicity meant to make the craft all but foolproof, both Hurley and fellow Shuttle pilot Bob Behnken declared they preferred the Tesla-like interface of the Dragon. “When there are 2,000 toggle switches, it’s really easy to flip the wrong one — and that can ruin your whole day,” said Hurley.
- In both sessions Bridenstine emphasized that space was an issue that cut across parties and generated enthusiasm across the political spectrum. He explained that he went to Congress to defend a boost in NASA’s budget, only to have a bipartisan committee give NASA about an 80 percent greater increase than he asked for. The enthusiasm for space, in both the public and Congress, is at a level not seen since Apollo.
- Musk reported that there’s not just a still camera in the capsule with test-dummy “Ripley,” but video that should record what it was like inside the capsule. Emphasis so far has been getting down the data to show how the heavily-instrumented capsule, and Ripley, handled the launch, but soon we’ll get to see that video.
Don’t forget — docking of the Crew Dragon is on Sunday morning at around 6AM ET. This will be the first time an American capsule has tried to dock automatically with the station, as previous launches from SpaceX and others have been directed in using the robotic arm. Completing that docking is another important step in certifying the Dragon for manned flight.
Okay, let’s go to other space stories.
Japan’s Hayabusa 2 probe touches down on an asteroid—and shoots it.
For months, Japan’s Hayabusa 2 has been slowly maneuvering around the small asteroid Ryugu. With a maximum diameter under a kilometer Ryugu creates a surface gravity about 80,000 times weaker than that of Earth, so orbiting the small mountain of space rock is a delicate operation. So is landing. Between February 20 and 22, Hayabusa conducted a slow approach to Ryugu, eventually touching down—but only briefly. As soon as it made contact with the asteroid, the JAXA probe fired a “microbullet” into the asteroid and moved away. The purpose of the action was to create a spray of debris which Hayabusa could collect and bring back to Earth.
Reports from the Japanese agency indicate that everything went well. They’ve now released a highly detailed image take about one minute after the initial touchdown. It shows the rock-strewn surface of the asteroid, the shadow of Hayabusa 2 hanging over the strange landscape, and a dark smudge on the surface surrounding the site of the “shot.”
The image was taken from approximately 25 meters above the surface. The rocks in the image range from pebbles up to around a meter across. The visible spray from the impact makes it likely that Hayabusa was successful in capturing some debris, but no one will know for sure until the collection device is returned to Earth.
Canada commits to a 24 year Moon-focused space union with the US
On Friday, NASA and the Canadian Space Agency announced a 24-year partnership to develop the Moon-orbiting Gateway Station and to work together on systems for returning humans to the moon. This is the first of several international partnerships that NASA needs to build to make Gateway possible, and to spread both the cost and technical demands of developing a extensive Lunar architecture.
In the Q&A session following the launch of Crew Dragon, SpaceX founder Elon Musk expressed his opinion that America needed to return to the Moon and to build a permanent presence there, which seems something of a departure from SpaceX’s previous focus on getting to Mars in the next decade. Following Musk’s statement, NASA administrator Jim Bidenstine jumped quickly on that idea, and tied it into the Canadian announcement to show that NASA is building the governmental and corporate relationships it needs to make its lunar plans possible. Bidenstine repeated on several occasions that “back to the Moon to stay” is the primary focus of his leadership at NASA.
On Saturday, the Canadian Space Agency celebrated its 30th anniversary, which encouraged a ceremony in the NASA press facility with Canadian officials being handed a decorative birthday cake. Please note that that this one time, it’s okay for people in Florida to be celebrating the CSA.