A Falcon 9 rocket during launch last July. Photo: SpaceX
South Korea is embarking on its first lunar mission and SpaceX has had the help. You can watch this historic launch live right here.
It’s hard to believe, but the upcoming launch is the first time SpaceX will directly send a payload into a ballistic lunar transfer orbit. And as for South Korea, this is its first mission to the Moon, joining (fingers crossed) a very small list of nations to do so.
The payload of the day is the Korea Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter (KPLO), also known as Danuri, on a mission managed by the Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI). SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled to lift off from Space Launch Complex 40 at the Space Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Florida at 7:08 p.m. ET. Live coverage will begin 15 minutes before launch, which you can watch on SpaceX or on the channel below.
KPLO mission
To be fair, SpaceX has sent an object to the Moon before, namely Israel’s Beresheet lunar lander (which crashed into the lunar surface in 2019), but that was done as part of a routine rideshare mission of the Falcon 9 to a geosynchronous transfer orbit around Earth. . Once in space, Beresheet used its own power to gradually increase its altitude, eventually entering its lunar orbit (and the mission failure had nothing to do with SpaceX). Also, the privately held company has previously sent objects deep into the solar system, including a red Tesla Roadster, but has never sent anything directly to our beloved Moon before.
That has to change today. SpaceX reports an 80% chance of favorable weather. In case the launch needs to be cleaned up, the company will try again tomorrow at 7:00 PM ET.
After stage separation, the first stage will attempt a landing on the Just Read the Instructions dronship, currently stationed in the Atlantic Ocean. This particular booster has already made several successful landings. Once in space and about 34 minutes into the mission, the second stage will perform a restart, with the engine shut down when the mission clock reaches 35:15. Danuri will deploy and begin its journey to the Moon five minutes later.
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Diagram representing the Korea Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter (KPLO). Image: KAVI
The 1,100-pound (500-kilogram) probe will enter a lunar polar orbit in mid-December, where it will operate 60 miles (100 kilometers) above the surface for at least a year. If the mission is extended, KPLO will drop into an orbit 70 km above the Moon. A Teslarati post explains why Danuri will take so long to reach its target orbit:
Instead of launching the satellite as a shared payload into Earth orbit, KPLO … will be the only spacecraft aboard the Falcon 9, and the SpaceX rocket will send it directly into orbit on a type of trajectory translunar injection (TLI) known as a ballistic lunar transfer. A BLT is much slower than some alternative TLI trajectories, but trades speed for exceptional efficiency, making it easier to launch the Falcon 9 and ultimately giving the orbiter more useful time around the Moon, since it requires less propellant to enter orbit.
The main objectives of the mission are to “develop indigenous lunar exploration technologies, demonstrate a ‘space internet’ and conduct scientific investigations of the lunar environment, topography and resources, as well as identify potential landing sites for future missions”, as reported. NASA. The space agency provided a high-sensitivity camera for the mission, with South Korea developing its other four instruments: a lunar terrain imager, a wide-angle polarimetric camera (called PolCam), a magnetometer, and a spectrometer gamma rays Combined, these five devices weigh no more than 88 pounds (40 kg).
A contingent of NASA-sponsored scientists will participate in analyzing data from the incoming mission. Using PolCam, scientists at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado, will study lunar pyroclastic deposits: deposits of ash that formed long ago from violent volcanic eruptions. “These ash deposits may come from deep within the lunar interior and may contain volatile materials, including water,” according to an emailed statement from SSI. “Therefore, they have the potential to provide insight into the nature of the lunar interior and represent a potential resource for future human use of lunar resources.”
We wish South Korea the best of luck in this important mission as another nation seeks to establish a presence around the Moon.
More: These failed moon missions remind us that space is hard.