Vulcan VC2S 1st launch - Peregrine Lander - CCSFS SLC-41 - 24 Dec 2023 06:49 UTC

[FutureSpaceTourist]

https://twitter.com/ulalaunch/status/1726686143914430556

The Centaur V upper stage for the inaugural United Launch Alliance #VulcanRocket was integrated atop the booster on Sunday, completing initial buildup for the #Cert1 mission.

Read more about this #CountdownToVulcan milestone in the blog:

https://blog.ulalaunch.com/blog/vulcan-cert-1-centaur-v-preparations-underway

[FutureSpaceTourist]

https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-to-talk-science-highlights-of-first-artemis-robotic-moon-landing/

NASA to Talk Science Highlights of First Artemis Robotic Moon Landing

Abbey A. Donaldson
NOV 20, 2023
RELEASE
M23-141
NASA Headquarters

NASA will host a What’s on Board media teleconference at 2 p.m. EST Wednesday, Nov. 29, to discuss the science payloads flying aboard the first commercial robotic flight to the lunar surface as part of the agency’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative under the Artemis program.

Carrying NASA and commercial payloads to the Moon, Astrobotic Technologies will launch its Peregrine lander on ULA’s (United Launch Alliance) Vulcan rocket. Liftoff of the ULA Vulcan rocket is targeted no earlier than Sunday, Dec. 24, from Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The Peregrine lunar lander will touch down on the Moon in early 2024.

Audio of the call will stream on the agency’s website at:

https://www.nasa.gov/nasatv

Briefing participants include:

Joel Kearns, deputy associate administrator for Exploration, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters in Washington
Ryan Watkins, program scientist, Exploration Science Strategy and Integration Office, NASA Headquarters
Chris Culbert, program manager, CLPS, NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston
John Thornton, CEO, Astrobotic, Pittsburgh
To participate by telephone, media must RSVP no later than two hours before the briefing to: [email protected].

NASA awarded a task order for the delivery of scientific payloads to Astrobotic in May 2019. Among the items on its lander, the Peregrine Mission One will carry NASA payloads investigating the lunar exosphere, thermal properties of the lunar regolith, hydrogen abundances in the soil at the landing site, and magnetic fields, as well as radiation environment monitoring.

Through Artemis, NASA is working with multiple CLPS vendors to establish a regular cadence of payload deliveries to the Moon to perform experiments, test technologies, and demonstrate capabilities to help NASA explore the lunar surface. This pool of companies may bid on task orders to deliver NASA payloads to the Moon. Task orders include payload integration and operations, launching from Earth, and landing on the surface of the Moon. The indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity CLPS contracts have a cumulative maximum value of $2.6 billion through 2028.

With CLPS, as well as with human exploration near the lunar South Pole, NASA will establish a long-term cadence of Moon missions in preparation for sending the first astronauts to Mars.

For more Artemis updates, follow along at:

https://blogs.nasa.gov/artemis/

-end-

Photo caption:

Teams with Astrobotic install the NASA meatball decal on Astrobotic’s Peregrine lunar lander on Tuesday, Nov. 14, 2023, at the Astrotech Space Operations Facility near the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
NASA/Isaac Watson

[FutureSpaceTourist]

Is teh celestis payloads burn also centaurs disposal burn? Or will there be a separate disposal for centaur after that?

https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/1726273153234825724

After we have separated Peregrine and conducted some test maneuvers, Centaur V will place itself in a heliocentric orbit, carrying the @celestisflights payload on a never ending journey to circle the Sun until the end of time

Are you gonna burn the centaur tell depletion or just enough to be to HEO what’s the trajectory plan

https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/1726293993452187842

We always passivate the upper stage at the end of its mission. So there wont be any propellants, battery juice or other energy on board after it’s on the final trajectory

[LouScheffer]

https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/1726293993452187842

We always passivate the upper stage at the end of its mission. So there wont be any propellants, battery juice or other energy on board after it’s on the final trajectory

Is it known why three previous Centaurs have exploded on orbit?  Are there changes in the new Centaur design to prevent this?

[Newton_V]

https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/1726293993452187842

We always passivate the upper stage at the end of its mission. So there wont be any propellants, battery juice or other energy on board after it’s on the final trajectory

Is it known why three previous Centaurs have exploded on orbit?  Are there changes in the new Centaur design to prevent this?

It's a poorly worded question.  Similar to "when did you stop beating your wife?"

[abaddon]

https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/1726293993452187842

We always passivate the upper stage at the end of its mission. So there wont be any propellants, battery juice or other energy on board after it’s on the final trajectory

Is it known why three previous Centaurs have exploded on orbit?  Are there changes in the new Centaur design to prevent this?

It's a poorly worded question.  Similar to "when did you stop beating your wife?"

I'm going to pretend you didn't say that second part.  How would you word the question?

[mn]

https://twitter.com/torybruno/status/1726293993452187842

We always passivate the upper stage at the end of its mission. So there wont be any propellants, battery juice or other energy on board after it’s on the final trajectory

Is it known why three previous Centaurs have exploded on orbit?  Are there changes in the new Centaur design to prevent this?

It's a poorly worded question.  Similar to "when did you stop beating your wife?"

Hmm why is that a bad question? We do know that 3 previous wives were beaten (we just don't know if it was self inflicted, by the husband or by strangers. (we have no proof it's the fault of the centaur, but certainly a fair question).

See here for further discussion: https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=48035.0

[ChrisC]

Just to illuminate, Newton's antagonizing statement above is merely a well-known example of a loaded question.  Nothing personal

[Phil Stooke]

Chang'e 6 in 2020? 

[tbellman]

Chang'e 6 in 2020?

I suppose that was a comment to the chart in reply #939 by FutureSpaceTourist.

That chart is obviously old.  It shows Peregrine in 2021, and Artemis in 2024, and it is missing Chandrayaan-3 (and IM-1, and a few others tentatively planned for the near future).

But it does show the horrible dearth of lunar surface missions we had for a long time.

[LouScheffer]

Is it known why three previous Centaurs have exploded on orbit?  Are there changes in the new Centaur design to prevent this?

It's a poorly worded question.  Similar to "when did you stop beating your wife?"

I don't think it's poorly worded.   What we know is:
(a) Three Centaurs have exploded, and
(b) ULA (Tory) has said nothing about the cause, or any corrective measures.  They have repeatedly stated the stages are fully passivated.  But fully passivated stages can't explode.

I can think of two possible scenarios:
(1) ULA honestly has no idea why they exploded.  They truly believe they have passivated the stages completely.
(2) Someone is using leftover Centaur stages for target practice.  They pay/order ULA to not disclose what they know.  ULA is allowed to state "We fully passivate our stages" and nothing more.

It's hard to believe it's case (1).  Engineers hate to have unexplained bugs.  And if you don't understand it, how do you know it won't happen earlier, in an orbit where debris matters more?  So in this case I'd expect *some* changes - more instrumentation, more vent valves, a stronger battery case, etc.

So that's the point of question two - if Tory says no changes, then ULA is satisfied with the current status. That would reinforce my opinion that it's case (2) - ULA is not even a little worried that some of their stages exploded.  This would imply they *know* the cause, and know it won't repeat in a case where it would cause damage.

[Asteroza]

Is it known why three previous Centaurs have exploded on orbit?  Are there changes in the new Centaur design to prevent this?

It's a poorly worded question.  Similar to "when did you stop beating your wife?"

I don't think it's poorly worded.   What we know is:
(a) Three Centaurs have exploded, and
(b) ULA (Tory) has said nothing about the cause, or any corrective measures.  They have repeatedly stated the stages are fully passivated.  But fully passivated stages can't explode.

I can think of two possible scenarios:
(1) ULA honestly has no idea why they exploded.  They truly believe they have passivated the stages completely.
(2) Someone is using leftover Centaur stages for target practice.  They pay/order ULA to not disclose what they know.  ULA is allowed to state "We fully passivate our stages" and nothing more.

It's hard to believe it's case (1).  Engineers hate to have unexplained bugs.  And if you don't understand it, how do you know it won't happen earlier, in an orbit where debris matters more?  So in this case I'd expect *some* changes - more instrumentation, more vent valves, a stronger battery case, etc.

So that's the point of question two - if Tory says no changes, then ULA is satisfied with the current status. That would reinforce my opinion that it's case (2) - ULA is not even a little worried that some of their stages exploded.  This would imply they *know* the cause, and know it won't repeat in a case where it would cause damage.

Wouldn't the simple explanation be Tory is saying they are passivated now, but in the past they might not have, then they had a few pop, decided that isn't cool but they don't really know why, so the simple solution is to vent all gases and dump battery power to the frame to reduce the obvious sources of popping?

[LouScheffer]

I don't think it's poorly worded.   What we know is:
(a) Three Centaurs have exploded, and
(b) ULA (Tory) has said nothing about the cause, or any corrective measures.  They have repeatedly stated the stages are fully passivated.  But fully passivated stages can't explode.

I can think of two possible scenarios:
(1) ULA honestly has no idea why they exploded.  They truly believe they have passivated the stages completely.
(2) Someone is using leftover Centaur stages for target practice.  They pay/order ULA to not disclose what they know.  ULA is allowed to state "We fully passivate our stages" and nothing more.

It's hard to believe it's case (1).  Engineers hate to have unexplained bugs.  And if you don't understand it, how do you know it won't happen earlier, in an orbit where debris matters more?  So in this case I'd expect *some* changes - more instrumentation, more vent valves, a stronger battery case, etc.

So that's the point of question two - if Tory says no changes, then ULA is satisfied with the current status. That would reinforce my opinion that it's case (2) - ULA is not even a little worried that some of their stages exploded.  This would imply they *know* the cause, and know it won't repeat in a case where it would cause damage.

Wouldn't the simple explanation be Tory is saying they are passivated now, but in the past they might not have, then they had a few pop, decided that isn't cool but they don't really know why, so the simple solution is to vent all gases and dump battery power to the frame to reduce the obvious sources of popping?

But Tory Bruno swears up and down that Atlas Centaurs have always been passivated, all gasses released and batteries drained, that the passivation is monitored, and this has been the procedure since day one.

[mn]

...
But Tory Bruno swears up and down that Atlas Centaurs have always been passivated, all gasses released and batteries drained, that the passivation is monitored, and this has been the procedure since day one.

Just because Tory swears up and down doesn't mean the engineers aren't trying to figure out what happened. And doesn't mean that they didn't make any changes for this in the the centaur. He's just not going to admit it.

I think that is far more plausible than your theory about target practice...

[LouScheffer]

...
But Tory Bruno swears up and down that Atlas Centaurs have always been passivated, all gasses released and batteries drained, that the passivation is monitored, and this has been the procedure since day one.

Just because Tory swears up and down doesn't mean the engineers aren't trying to figure out what happened. And doesn't mean that they didn't make any changes for this in the the centaur. He's just not going to admit it.

I think that is far more plausible than your theory about target practice...

If Tory had risen from the finance or legal departments, then I would side with your theory.   But he strikes me as too much an engineer to flat out lie about a technical matter.   I think he truly believes the Centaurs were passivated.  But that in turn means he believes it was some outside influence that fragmented them.  But then he expresses no curiosity as to what that influence is, which I find very strange.  So I think he *knows* what happened to them, that it was not a lack of passivation, and he is defending ULA (Yes, we take debris seriously.  We passivate all our stages...) to the public.  It's the true cause he won't admit.

Of course even otherwise honest folks may lie in the interest of national security.  I don't think we'll know for sure until more information eventually comes out.

[Asteroza]

I don't think it's poorly worded.   What we know is:
(a) Three Centaurs have exploded, and
(b) ULA (Tory) has said nothing about the cause, or any corrective measures.  They have repeatedly stated the stages are fully passivated.  But fully passivated stages can't explode.

I can think of two possible scenarios:
(1) ULA honestly has no idea why they exploded.  They truly believe they have passivated the stages completely.
(2) Someone is using leftover Centaur stages for target practice.  They pay/order ULA to not disclose what they know.  ULA is allowed to state "We fully passivate our stages" and nothing more.

It's hard to believe it's case (1).  Engineers hate to have unexplained bugs.  And if you don't understand it, how do you know it won't happen earlier, in an orbit where debris matters more?  So in this case I'd expect *some* changes - more instrumentation, more vent valves, a stronger battery case, etc.

So that's the point of question two - if Tory says no changes, then ULA is satisfied with the current status. That would reinforce my opinion that it's case (2) - ULA is not even a little worried that some of their stages exploded.  This would imply they *know* the cause, and know it won't repeat in a case where it would cause damage.

Wouldn't the simple explanation be Tory is saying they are passivated now, but in the past they might not have, then they had a few pop, decided that isn't cool but they don't really know why, so the simple solution is to vent all gases and dump battery power to the frame to reduce the obvious sources of popping?

But Tory Bruno swears up and down that Atlas Centaurs have always been passivated, all gasses released and batteries drained, that the passivation is monitored, and this has been the procedure since day one.

Huh, that's a pretty clear statement from Tory then.

That reddit thread seems to suggest that there's no evidence of collision, so external target practice also seems unlikely though.

There may be other possibilities though. If they did passivation of the stage as they say, and nothing hit it, that does suggest some other scenarios.

1. Is there FTS explosives still onboard, that perhaps armed themselves somehow?
2. A secondary payload did something. Saying you passivated the stage, but a payload was naughty, would fit with Tory's statements and within the limits of not revealing a classified event/objective.
2A. The secondary payload was designed to be naughty.
2B. The secondary payload was not necessarily designed to be naughty, but created an opportunity for a pressurized thing to exist and fail.

2B could have been some sort of classified demo of IVF/ACES tech in some capacity, or a servicing/inspector craft, either of which could have collected resources from the host centaur stage before passivation and failed to properly dispose of collected resources themselves.

[LouScheffer]

Huh, that's a pretty clear statement from Tory then.

That reddit thread seems to suggest that there's no evidence of collision, so external target practice also seems unlikely though.

There may be other possibilities though. If they did passivation of the stage as they say, and nothing hit it, that does suggest some other scenarios.

1. Is there FTS explosives still onboard, that perhaps armed themselves somehow?
2. A secondary payload did something. Saying you passivated the stage, but a payload was naughty, would fit with Tory's statements and within the limits of not revealing a classified event/objective.
2A. The secondary payload was designed to be naughty.
2B. The secondary payload was not necessarily designed to be naughty, but created an opportunity for a pressurized thing to exist and fail.

2B could have been some sort of classified demo of IVF/ACES tech in some capacity, or a servicing/inspector craft, either of which could have collected resources from the host centaur stage before passivation and failed to properly dispose of collected resources themselves.

There are several pieces of circumstantial evidence to support this hypothesis.

One is that there were 5 Centaurs in similar orbits.  The three military ones blew up, the 2 civilians ones did not (see chart).   If they blow up at random, there is only a 10% chance of observing this pattern.

Second, AEHF-5 was launched on exactly the same model rocket (Atlas 551) but achieved a much better orbit (and its Centaur did not blow up) than AEHF-4, one of the missions whose Centaur did blew up.  Since the same rocket was used, and AEHF-4 and AEHF-5 are believed to be near identical, this means the AEHF-4 mission may have been carrying some extra mass.   AEHF-4 got to 8913 x 35300 x 12.8^o, whereas AEHF-5 got to 14434 x 35300 x 9.95^o.  Even ignoring the plane change, that's about 270 m/s more for AEHF-5.  Now plugging in the rough Centaur numbers (20800 kg propellant, 2500 kg empty mass, 6168 kg for AEHF-5), you find you need to add about 700 kg to AEHF-4 to account for the lower performance.  This seems consistent with a secondary payload.

And as you point out, this is exactly consistent with Tory's assertion Centaurs are always passivated, but yet these 3 blew up.

[Apollo-phill]

Thanks!  If any Forum members come to the Museum, make sure to ID yourself as such.

On a different subject, anyone know the VC launch azimuth for this flight?

Not seen it published anywhere yet.

But back of envelope calc  ( literally🤓) and they launch onto the Lunar Orbit Plane from Cape then I think azimuth will be around 55 Deg North East .( I didn't have access to accurate numbers for Cape coordinates, Earth & Moon ecliptic info..at time calc).

Please NASA/ Astrobotic's tell us what you plan 🚀💫

[Apollo-phill]

On a different subject, anyone know the VC launch azimuth for this flight?

Not seen it published anywhere yet.

But back of envelope calc  ( literally🤓) and they launch onto the Lunar Orbit Plane from Cape then I think azimuth will be around 55 Deg North East .( I didn't have access to accurate numbers for Cape coordinates, Earth & Moon ecliptic info..at time calc).

Please NASA/ Astrobotic's tell us what you plan 🚀💫

THIS CALC WAS WRONG - DUE TO ME READING WRONG NUMBER WHEN DOING A DIVISION - SO PLEASE IGNORE .😩

I'll try and recalc using right figure 🤔

[Apollo-phill]

Beginning to question my sanity - or more precisely - calc routines 🤔

I'm getting 85 Deg NE azimuth from Cape if going to lunar orbit plane. But seems high value as that would mean " flying" up close to the eastern states?First stage fairly certain would impact Atlantic ocean . Also could be done as taking 2nd stage to orbit.

Any one else had a crack at it?

Of course different scenario if going to take option of doing plane change later in mission?