“Going to the moon is no joke.” That’s what Rocket Lab CEO Peter Beck said just days before the planned launch of CAPSTONE, a confusing mission for both NASA and the private space industry.
The mission is important, though you may not assume so according to CAPSTONE CubeSat statistics alone – it’s the size of a microwave oven and weighs only 55 pounds. But the ultimate goal of the approximately six-month period of the spacecraft in lunar orbit is to chart a favorable trajectory for a manned station that will orbit the Moon. Once established, this platform, called the Gateway, could unlock a whole new chapter in human space exploration.
Think of CAPSTONE (meaning Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment) as the first step into space from NASA’s Artemis program, an ambitious plan to return humans to the Moon in the middle of this decade. The Gateway platform could be used as a transit station for lunar terrifiers, a resupply junction for astronauts exploring the Moon, or even a transfer point for missions to Mars and beyond.
Image credits: NASA
The mission is not just a big issue for the Artemis program and the exploration of public space: in particular, it is the result of a mosaic of collaboration between the private industry and the space agency. The list of partners on the NASA website for the mission includes:
And of course, Rocket Lab for launch services.
CAPSTONE is being launched aboard a Rocket Lab Electron rocket from the company’s site on the remote Māhia Peninsula in New Zealand. “This is the highest mass and the highest performance that the Electron has had to fly by a certain margin,” Beck said. “The vehicle is totally stretched to its limits in terms of performance.”
The story goes on
In addition to launching the mission, Rocket Lab developed a special variant of its Photon spacecraft for this effort, which is called a lunar photon. This spacecraft will perform a series of orbits over a period of about six to eight days, increasing the speed and apogee of the orbit over time. Photon will then perform the final cream, called translunar injection, which will launch it to the moon. About 20 minutes after the injection, Photon and CAPSTONE will separate and the CubeSat will usually perform the remaining maneuvers to reach their target orbit around the Moon.
“The moon is a long way off,” Beck said, referring to the complexity of Photon’s maneuvers. “You’re traveling at high speeds. So you only need a small fraction of an angle error or a speed error, and you only shoot beyond where you need to be.”
“It’s like shooting a bullet for millions of miles, and it has to be in exactly the right place.”
An unusual orbit
The exact orbit that CAPSTONE will explore is called the almost rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO). This necklace-shaped orbit will carry CAPSTONE up to 1,000 miles from the moon’s surface and up to 40,000 miles. Although the shape is strange, it is a very stable orbit, which means greater efficiency and less propellant use. NRHO faced competing orbits, including low lunar orbit and distant retrograde orbit, as the ideal trajectory for Gateway; but as NASA explains, NRHO is a “best of both worlds” option that will provide astronauts with easy access to the lunar surface, a line of continuous vision (and communication with) the Earth, and access to deep space.
Image credits: NASA (opens in new window)
But testing the NRHO orbit is not the only point of the mission. CubeSat will also help NASA understand navigation or how to generate an accurate estimate of Gateway trajectory and station maintenance.
“Because NRHO is marginally stable, Gateway and CAPSTONE will require a soft ‘copy’ about once a week to stay in orbit,” Ethan Kayser, head of design for the CAPSTONE mission at Advanced Space, told Reddit. . “CAPSTONE will use the same strategy to design and execute these station maintenance maneuvers, which occur once each revolution.” The eight propulsion engines built by Stella Exploration will be key to carrying out these maneuvers.
CAPSTONE will reach its lunar orbit on November 13th. After an orbital mission of about six months, NASA plans to crash the spacecraft to the moon at the end of its life. The launch will take place during an instant launch window at 5:55 AM EDT on Tuesday, June 28, so be sure to follow TechCrunch for live coverage and report on the outcome of the mission launch.