In this review the important events of the year in the field of space technology. All the summaries were unanimous that the landing of the Philae spacecraft on the comet Churyumov-Gresimenko was the most important event of the year, but many other spacecraft were in the headlines this year
The scientific journals and websites dealing with space summed up the year 2014 in the field of space - and all agreed, the landing on the comet was the most important event in the field of space technologies this year.
The landing of the Philae spacecraft that left Rosetta on the nucleus of a comet - the great achievement of science in the year 2014 of the journal Science. According to the editors of the journal, the most important scientific breakthrough of 2014 was the encounter of the Philae spacecraft that left Rosetta on comet 67P Churyumov-Grasimenko. This is what the editors of the scientific journal Science state.
After leaving Earth in 2004, the Rosetta spacecraft touched down on the comet in August of this year, and three months later when researchers had to quickly choose a landing site, it made a soft landing for the first time ever on a comet. Not entirely soft though, as she made two wild jumps and failed to anchor using the bells. Unfortunately, it landed in the shadow of a cliff and is therefore unable to replenish the energy reserves in the battery due to the hiding of the solar collectors, but the European Space Agency hopes that it will reawaken next year and send more scientific data on the conditions in the comet's nucleus.
The landing on the comet was the first operation of its kind, but every Rosetta mission is a breakthrough. It places the scientists in an excellent vantage point for the period when the comet will heat up, breathe and develop.
As a messenger of the science site I was there, of course not on the comet, but at the control center of the European Space Agency in Darmstadt, Germany. There I interviewed comet discoverer Kalim Churiomov, and senior officials of the project.
Orion's test flight: the first step in returning the US to space
When NASA announced plans to send humans to deep space destinations, they were met with criticism and disbelief. As the Orion spacecraft made its way through the stages of design, planning and systems testing, disbelief continued to haunt it.
Last December, NASA proved the skeptics wrong. Orion passed the first unmanned test flight with perfect success. Launching from Florida, passing through the radiation belt - the Van Allen belt, and landing in the Pacific Ocean. On the one hand, this was a test flight, on the other hand, it is real progress and only a matter of time until the astronauts will fly with it into space - when the goal will be a launch to an asteroid. NASA has proven that it is able to work despite the budget cuts.
The spacecraft took off from the air force base at Cape Canaveral, climbed to an elliptical orbit, and after one lap, its engines were ignited and it climbed to an altitude of about 6,000 km and returned to land in the Pacific Ocean. On the way she crossed the Van Allen Belt twice. The flight engineers turned off as many of her devices as possible during the transit minutes.
Virgin Galactic and Orbital Science spacecraft accidents
One week in October we received a reminder that space flight is still dangerous. This is after two serious accidents - one of them fatal, in which private spaceships crashed - that of Virgin Galactic and that of Orbital Science.
One of the pilots of Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo that crashed in the Mobab desert was killed and the other seriously injured when something went wrong during the test flight. The investigation so far has revealed that the landing system was activated too early, but further details are still being investigated.
In the meantime, Orbital Sciences suffered from the loss of one of its Antares rockets, apparently due to the engines that were designed back in the Soviet Union, but the company is looking for other ways to fulfill its obligations in the contract with NASA to launch payloads to the International Space Station.
- Killed and injured in an accident that happened to the spaceship Spaceship-2 planned to fly space tourists
- A private rocket carrying supplies to the space station crashed during launch in Virginia
Russia successfully carried out the first launch of a new launcher - Angara
Russia has successfully made the first launch of a new launcher named Angara. This is the first launcher developed entirely after the breakup of the Soviet Union and it will be able to replace the Proton and Soyuz series satellite launchers.
Angara is the first launcher developed in the post-Soviet period and is supposed to free Russia from dependence on its neighbors - Ukraine in building the missiles and Kazakhstan in launching them
The American Maven and the Indian MOM have reached their orbits around Mars
Where did the atmosphere of Mars go? Why was it compressed in the past, so that it was possible for water to flow on the ground, and it is now so thin? The common theory is that the sun's pressure on the Martian atmosphere caused the lighter isotopes (such as those of hydrogen) to move away from the planet, leaving behind the heavier isotopes.
NASA is now investigating this theory, and the atmosphere in general, using the MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution) spacecraft, which arrived at the planet last fall.
India is also on Mars - the huge country in South Asia has successfully launched and put into orbit around Mars a spacecraft made by it. Among other things, the spacecraft observed the close encounter between the comet Siding Spring and Mars and took interesting pictures of Mars, such as the largest volcano in the Milky Way and a huge canyon on Mars.
- The Maven spacecraft enters orbit around Mars
- First image from the Indian spacecraft that cost less than a movie
Second phase in the life of the Kepler space telescope
The Kepler space telescope, which has discovered evidence of many planets outside the solar system, lost the second of its four stabilization devices last year, prompting a rethinking of the uses for the retired planet hunter.
The solution was a new mission called Kepler K2 that uses the sun's pressure to maintain the spacecraft's direction, even as it bounces once every 83 days to a new location to avoid the sun's glare. It is no longer as accurate as before, but can still locate planets in other solar systems. The first planet confirmed at this point in the telescope's life is a super-Earth.
Continuation of the discoveries of the Martian vehicles
Methane? organic molecules? water? All of these seem to have existed in abundance in the history of Mars. The robotic vehicle Curiosity, which recently celebrated its two-year (Earth's) landing on Mars, discovered in Gale Crater the first confirmation of the existence of organic matter on the surface of Mars.
His older brother Opportunity is already in the 11th year of his mission and suffers from memory problems, but he is still on the move (he has already traveled 41 kilometers) towards an area that may be full of mud.
- A decade since Spirit and Opportunity landed on Mars
- The discovery that the crater on Mars where Curiosity landed was a lake increases the possibility of extraterrestrial life
The end of the Venus Express
Last month (December 2014) we saw almost the end of the Venus Express mission after it dared to dive into part of the atmosphere to learn more about its properties. The spacecraft survived the aerobraking maneuver but ran out of fuel after several engine flares lifted it up.
It will soon plunge into the atmosphere forever, but it has been a productive mission, with discoveries ranging from the slow rotation of Venus on its axis to a phenomenon known as glories - similar to a rainbow on Earth.
SpaceX is on the way to making space flight cheaper
The company SpaceX intends to advance the technology of the launchers, with the aim of returning the first stage of the launchers to reuse. The company hopes that in this way it will be possible to save on launch expenses in the long run, but more time is needed for technological development.
The first stage of the Falcon 9 launcher managed to land in the ocean, and this was considered a success, even though the force of the landing tore it to pieces. Next, SpaceX intends to place its launchers on launchers in the ocean.
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Comments
I see space travel as a flagship of progress. Two forces are fighting separately in the world today. One is progress and it is easily lost to us. The predictions are that Western culture will decline from its greatness. Chinese culture is more similar in its size to what imperial Japan was in WW2.
The other is the rise of Islam, and the desire for youth and the desire to kill everyone by a victorious minority from Islam.
Therefore, when I see a departure from the status quo, it naively gives me hope that we may not enter the darkness of the Middle Ages for X centuries. Otherwise there is no hope.
Overall we agree in my opinion. The rest is highlights.
Read. The speed of Rosetta relative (! not absolute) to the comet was reduced (by computer control) from 775 m/s to 7.9 m/s. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosetta_(spacecraft). Requires elite self-control technology. By definition an achievement.
Before that, Rosetta's flight speed was 15 km per second. Also important is the difficulty of aiming with an initial accuracy of 100 km distance, for an object that is 24,000,000 km away (I hope the figure in Wikipedia is copied by me correctly) from us
The probe had attachment devices like uncles with a dual function: attachment to the comet, preventing wobble like a ball hitting a surface. Try to aim a rifle bullet at a person who is at such a distance from you and hit. There is no doubt that this is high technology. Even if there was a failure, the many attempts to leave the status quo in the space of repeating the technologies of the sixties, indicates a desire to move something. 2 commercial flights failed and perhaps Philae failed, but at least attempts were made. The many attempts and the introduction of new factors increase the chance that it might succeed. Next time you might succeed in landing a probe on an asteroid. A trip to Mars that was a vision of the 90s was lost in the recession of 2008.
Recently, due to the prosperity of the USA, thanks to Obama, whom I do not like, who received a national debt of 16 trillion dollars and reaches 5.5% growth. Recently, India, China and Russia are also returning to space. And Virgin Galactic and Space-X. A flight into space can be purchased for $250,000. Once it was not possible at all, and then in the millions of dollars.
Joseph
The speed of Philae relative to the comet is close to zero, because it is approximately the relative speed of Rosetta relative to the comet. I have already said that Rosetta's slowing down relative to Comet and entering orbit is a success story. The installation of Philae is a story of failure hidden behind beautiful partitions. Since the demolition cost a billion dollars, it is doubtful whether it would be worthwhile to invest money in it, or whether it would be worthwhile but to be built only by expert engineers (if there are any in Europe or at all).
Apologies for typos. I write from a new tablet with a Damicolo keyboard.
The review is beautiful, and indicates that the author of the article is quick to identify significant scientific and technological trends.
Regarding Philae. If you take into account the relative speeds between Philae and the comet, attaching a probe to it is at least a partial success. A carrier to connect with a bone at a speed of 28000 km/h without crashing. Try to land a spacecraft precisely in front of a comet that is several years' flight away from Earth. After all, the optics of observing a comet are not accurate enough. In fact it is a miniature recreation of the spaceship landing in the sci-fi movie Armageddon. It also has an application, perhaps in the destruction of comets in orbit in front of the Earth. In addition, the privatization of the space program, despite its crash in two cases, is a landmark. In my opinion, dangerous. In terms of control of oligarchs (tycoons in Hebrew), over the country. See Israel where 4 assault ships were purchased to guard as a private fleet the gas rigs of. And there is also a serious case of field security, which, although it can be found online, I refrain from bringing it up here. Our public is a little unwise in what they despise.
The same goes for the constraint of entering an email address, you can type in any fictitious email address you want (which is exactly what I do, I have the right to maintain a bit of privacy and not spread my email address on every site).
So what's the point here?
Father, why do you insist on requiring the commenters here to enter a website address as a condition for sending a response? (Without filling in this field, the response is not sent) Can you understand what logic there is in this annoying constraint? Does everyone have to have a website?
Is the landing of Philae a success story? What a grave joke, Philae's landing failed, Philae fell on its side after its braking devices did not work as required (and maybe for other reasons).
The Philae didn't crash only because the gravity on the comet was minuscule (something like a paper kite being flown on Earth). What other cheezbats will they tell us to justify the loss of a billion dollars (this is the cost of Philah as I imagine).
What really succeeded was bringing Rosetta to the coffee orbit around a comet.