In a few hours, Astrobotic has gone from euphoria to anguish. The company in charge of the Peregrine ship has faced dramatic moments trying to save what would have been the United States’ return to the Moon after more than 50 years. But the company confirmed this Tuesday that there is nothing more to do.
The unmanned module in question has “no chance” of making a soft landing, Astrobotic explained in a release. The firm, a NASA partner in this project, thus confirmed the severity of the propellant leak reported yesterday, Monday.
During the night, the team faced another orientation problem for the Peregrine spacecraft: it began to move away from the Sun and reduced its solar energy generation capacity. According to the mission team’s estimates, the propulsion will run out in less than 40 hours.
The Peregrine spacecraft was scheduled to land on the moon on February 23. NASA had agreed that the Astrobotic module would include five instruments to study the lunar environment, radiation levels, and surface and subsurface water ice. It would also carry five small lunar rovers. All this would help collect new data and prepare the conditions for humans to return to the Moon, after more than half a century.
The goal now is take the Peregrine ship as close as possible to the Moon, before it loses its power. “We continue to receive valuable data and demonstrate spaceflight operations for components and software related to our next lunar landing mission, Griffin,” the company explained. If it manages to get close enough, chances are that sooner or later the unmanned vehicle will end up crashing into the lunar surface.
The Peregrine spacecraft will not be able to land on the moon due to technical failures
The 1.2-ton module was launched on the first flight of the Vulcan rocket, developed over a decade by United Launch Alliance (ULA), the alliance at Boeing and Lockheed Martin. The Peregrine spacecraft mission would not only allow the United States to return to the Moon for the first time since 1972. It also aspired to become the first to be successfully completed by a private company. Something that, certainly, will not materialize.
But the attempts will be repeated several times this year, despite the failure of the Peregrine ship. Astrobotic plans to launch the Griffin mission at the end of 2024. Its objective is to take the VIPER robotic vehicle to the south pole of the Moon. Last year, India made history by becoming the first country to land an unmanned mission on the moon in this region of our natural satellite.
Astrobotic is just one of three American companies that aim to send unmanned vehicles to the lunar surface this year. The other two are Intuitive Machines and Firefly. NASA promoted these agreements to, among other things, reduce costs.
NASA said Monday that it was working with Astrobotic to determine the impact of the failure of the Peregrine spacecraft mission. These types of projects “are new to the agency, and with something new, there is a higher risk,” said Joel Kearns, deputy associate administrator for exploration in NASA’s Science Mission Directorate.
Artemis schedule delay
The impossibility of carrying out a soft landing on the moon with the Peregrine spacecraft is not the only problem facing the United States space program. NASA hoped to return humans to the Moon by the end of 2025, with its Artemis III mission. However, several problems with flight tests, the development of the lunar landing module that will carry the astronauts and the spacesuits have affected the schedule.
The agency has finally begun to review its schedule of return missions to the Moon. NASA now targets September 2025 to complete Artemis II, the first manned mission that will orbit the Moon aboard the Orion spacecraft. While Artemis III has been postponed until September 2026. The United States Government Accountability Office published a report in December in which he already indicated that it was “unlikely” that It will be possible to put humans on the Moon before 2027.