In April 2019, the Israeli spacecraft Genesis crashed on the lunar surface. A big disappointment on the side of an impressive achievement. The glorious failure is just a reason to continue: the Genesis 2 project is underway!
system Young Galileo
On Thursday, April 11, 2019, an entire country and many in the world sat down to watch how Israel makes history and lands a spacecraft on the moon. After moments of tension, everyone realized that the spaceship Genesis did not make a soft landing but crashed on the lunar surface.
When the Genesis spacecraft was very close to the moon, a few minutes before losing contact with it, it managed to send two last pictures from the near surface of the moon, one of them a "selfie" picture with the Israeli flag and the caption "Small country, big dreams".
Not one spacecraft - but three!
And the big dreams of the small country did not end. At Space IL, it was decided to continue the "Genesis effect" and set off with Genesis 2. After investigation and lessons learned, the Genesis 2 mission was outlined, in which a spacecraft consisting of an array of three spacecraft - an orbiter and two landers - would be launched to the moon.
The landers are expected to land at two different sites on the moon and perform various scientific experiments. At the same time, the orbiter is designed to circle the moon for several years and carry out scientific experiments. The launch to the moon is expected in 2024.
The mission of Genesis 2 is expected to be multinational, led by Israel, and other countries will participate. Students in the partner countries will have access to information coming from the orbiting spacecraft and the possibility to promote research and experiments in space.
Another 100 million dollars
The Spice IL association was founded about a decade ago by three young entrepreneurs - Yonatan Weintraub, Kafir Demari and Yariv Bash - when they submitted a proposal to a competition organized by Google. Google then offered a $20 million reward to the team that would be the first to land a space vehicle on the moon. The deadline for the competition passed without any team being able to meet the goal, and the competition ended without a winner, but the Israeli team decided to continue with the program. He recruited the aerospace industry to carry out the technical side, raised funding from the Israel Space Agency, from capitalists and even from the public through crowdfunding, and succeeded in building the first Israeli spacecraft to the moon - Beresheet.
Also for the leadership of the Genesis 2 project, the Israel Space Agency partners with the Ministry of Science and Technology and the Aerospace Industry, which will head the development, planning and engineering of the system. The amount required for the Genesis 2 project, like Genesis 1, is about 100 million dollars. This sounds like a huge amount, but in the field of space exploration it is quite a low amount. Despite this, those involved in the craft must raise this amount from donations and international collaborations so that the plans will indeed be implemented.
In December 2020, President Reuven Rivlin hosted the launch ceremony of Genesis 2 at the President's House. "Just a year and a half ago, we were here together when the State of Israel held its breath and raised its eyes to the stars. We fearfully accompanied the Genesis probe on its historic journey to the moon. We were disappointed, and realized that we had to start from Genesis," said President Rivlin. "Today we are embarking on a new path, familiar but different, at the end of which we hope that not one, but three spacecraft will reach the moon safely."
What happened to Genesis?
On February 22, 2019, the Israeli spacecraft Beresheet set out in space from the launch site in Cape Canaveral, Florida, United States, on the SpaceX Falcon 9 launcher. In the 49 days after that, it circled the Earth in elliptical orbits, after which it was captured by the Moon's gravity. During her journey, several maneuvers were conducted, in some of which malfunctions arose; The problems were solved, and the spacecraft continued towards the moon.
A few minutes before the planned landing, at an altitude of less than ten kilometers from the moon, there was a disruption in the spacecraft's systems: the main engine stopped working, and the spacecraft began a free fall towards the moon at a higher speed than planned. The engine was then restarted, but it was too late. Communication with the spacecraft was lost, and the spacecraft crashed on the lunar soil.
The initial investigation revealed that there was a malfunction in one of the two units that measure the spacecraft's acceleration. This malfunction apparently caused a reboot of the spacecraft's computer, which is responsible for the stages of the autonomous landing. From this point the spacecraft went out of control and fell to the surface of the moon at a speed of 500-400 kilometers per hour.
Despite the crash, the Genesis spacecraft reached the moon. Thus Spice IL became the first private entity in history to reach the moon (!) and positioned Israel as the fourth country to touch the moon.
how much does she weigh
The weight of the spacecraft in the beginning was 585 kilograms when launched into space. The total weight of Genesis 2 is expected to be about 630 kilograms, with the landing gear, each of which will weigh about 120 kilograms.
From Young Galileo - the monthly for curious children, issue 205 February 2021
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In Israel they speak Hebrew
Those who don't like it should look for another country
Good luck to them.
I would change the name of the project, so that it doesn't end up in shit as happened with the first attempt. I suggested: partach, and not only because of the positive suffix touch.