The Moon Express Lunar Lander

Recently, Moon Express delivered its Mission design package to NASA. This Preliminary Design Checkpoint Technical Package is part of its $10M Innovative Lunar Demonstration Data (ILDD) contract. Moon Express provided NASA continuing data on the development of its commercial lunar robotic missions and plans to mine the Moon for precious planetary resources.

Here’s an excerpt from the press release that went out today:

Moon Express, a Google Lunar X PRIZE contender, announced today that it has successfully delivered a mission design package to NASA under its Innovative Lunar Demonstration Data (ILDD) Program, providing NASA continuing data on the development of the company’s commercial lunar missions and plans to mine the Moon for precious planetary resources. The newest task order in the $10M ILDD contract called for Moon Express to provide NASA with data about the company’s progress through a Preliminary Design Checkpoint Technical Package that documents details of mission operations, spacecraft development, payload accommodations and Planetary Protection Plans.

Technology luminaries Naveen Jain and Barney Pell teamed with space visionary Bob Richards in the founding of Moon Express in 2010, announcing a partnership with NASA to develop a new robotic spacecraft capable of going to the Moon and asteroids. Silicon Valley-based Moon Express was one of only three U.S. companies awarded funding under NASA’s ILDD program in that year. Although the ILDD contract is an important substantiation of NASA’s interest in commercial lunar providers, the majority of Moon Express funding is coming from private investment and is supplemented by revenues from payload customers.

Read the press release here.

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tarantula nebula as seen from Hubble Space Telescope- Source: NASA-ESA-ESO

Space Shuttle Discovery Gets Piggy Back ride over DC Skyline on its way to Smithsonian - Source: AP

Solar Flare Eruption on the sun Source: NASA-GSFC-SDO

Moon as seen from International Space Station Source: NASA

Beautiful Earth Source: NASA-NOAA

Mars- source: ESA-DLR-FU Berlin

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Diameter:
The diameter of the moon is 2,160 miles (3,476 kilometers)

Formation:
The leading explanation for how the moon formed was that a giant impact knocked off the raw ingredients for the moon off the primitive molten Earth and into orbit. Scientists have suggested the impacting object was roughly 10 percent the mass of Earth.

Size:
The surface area of the moon is 14,658,000 square miles or 9.4 billion acres. About 25% the size of earth.

Age:
The moon is  estimated to be about 4.6 billion years old, or about the same age as Earth.

Gravity:
The surface gravity of the moon is one-sixth that of the Earth. Although your mass would be the same on Earth and the moon, you would weigh much less on the moon than on Earth.

Orbit speed
The moon orbits the Earth at an average speed of 2,300 miles an hour

Orbital Characteristics of Earth’s Moon:
Average Distance from Earth- 238,855 miles
Perigee (closest)-English- 225,700 miles
Apogee (farthest)- 252,000 miles

Composition:
The moon has so many precious minerals. Twenty times more titanium and platinum than anywhere on earth, not to mention helium 3, a rare isotope of helium that many feel could be the future of energy on Earth and in space.

Learn more about my moon aspirations at MoonExpress.com

Sources
NASA, National Geographic, Space.com, moonconnection.com

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Credit: NASA/AP

The biggest solar storm in five years has engulfed Earth, but so far most things such as major power utilities remain undisturbed. Scientists say that could change as the storm spends the day shaking the planet’s magnetic field. As a result, some airlines are flying alternate routes.

According to Fox News “In a study released last week, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation — an organization certified by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission — noted that the most likely outcome from a severe solar storm would be the loss of reactive power.

So far there’s no big impact, but scientists continue to monitor the effects.

Full story here.

Solar flares are caused by the sudden release of magnetic energy stored in the Sun’s atmosphere and coronal mass ejection (CME), bursts of charged particles are released into space. This can interfere with technology on Earth, such as electrical power grids, communications systems and satellites – including satellite navigation signals.

Despite the negative effects, it can bring about a cool sighting of “Northern lights”, as was seen over Canada, Norway and UK this week.

More photos here.

Credit: Moon Express

Space.com notes several space missions to look out for in 2012, including:
- Planetary Mission Milestones
- Space Station Gets New Additions
- Big Mars Rover Arrive at Red Planet
- LightSail-1: A New Solar Sail Mission
- NASA’s Grail Moon Probes

See their full list here.

1. Increase access to technology – We can’t expect students to join the workforce if they are not ready to work with current technology.

2. Provide alternatives to standard education – If a student can’t learn the concepts sitting in a 42-minute class there must be some other way to educate them.

3. Foster creativity – We are responsible for instilling in these future scientists the desire to discover and develop new technologies in the STEM fields. No discovery was ever made by someone who was satisfied with the status quo.

The private sector will be on the moon within the next 2 years, but to able to explore further we will need to develop new technologies. Within the next 15 years we will need to develop systems of production and manufacturing with off world capabilities. The work to this end has been started, but to finish it we are going to need a new generation of pioneers and thinkers. To be able to have a future without a ‘final frontier’ and to keep expanding how far we can explore, we need to start preparing the students of today to be the explorers of tomorrow.

Moon Express Lander

Even though it may seem that space exploration has taken a huge step back after NASA retired its shuttle program, the future might be a highly bright one thanks to privatized space programs. Naveen Jain, co-founder and chairman of Moon Express, Inc., is one of the couple of billionaires today who share a common vision – the future of private space capitalization. Jain’s idea, in particular, is that of bringing lunar landers and mining platforms to the moon. “People ask, why do we want to go back to the moon? Isn’t it just barren soil?” Jain said. “But the moon has never been explored from an entrepreneurial perspective.” He actually sees a lot of opportunities with lunar exploration, besides mining. “No one has ever captured people’s fascination with the moon,” he said. “What if, say, we take a picture of your family on the moon and project it back to you? Or take DNA up there?”

So far, this company Moon Express has already been awarded $10 million by NASA, part of the agency’s Innovative Lunar Demonstration Data (ILDD) program, and is also shooting for the $30 million put into play by Google’s Lunar X Prize. Jain, a self-made billionaire, is confident that by 2013 his company will commence the first mining operations on the moon. So far, MoonEx’s lunar lander successfully completed a flight test at the Hover Test Facility in NASA’s Ames Research Center.

Read more here.