Space Roundup Jan 10th, 2021
Hello, dear space lovers! Happy new year!
As this is the first issue of the year, instead of doing a summary of last week’s updates, I wanted to share with you all the exciting missions that we can expect to see during 2021.
Before I get started, I wanted to publicly thank O.T.G., my new Patron on Patreon, for his support of this project. You can’t imagine what this support means to me. Thanks so much! :)
Now, let’s take a seat and prepare for what’s coming in 2021...wohooo!
Mars!
How else can we start this list of exciting upcoming missions? This year we have three missions arriving at the red planet: NASA’s rover and helicopter, The United Arab Emirates’ orbiter, and China’s orbiter, lander, and rover. They’ll all arrive next month. How exciting is that?
The year of the moon?
This year we will see the beginning of the commercial trips to the Moon. Both Astrobotic and Intuitive Machines will fly their commercial landers to the Moon, carrying scientific payloads and several very cool robots (such as the VIPER or Astrobotic’s CubeRover) both from NASA and from commercial companies. This will make lunar exploration much affordable and accessible.
Apart from those two commercial missions, if everything goes according to the plan, we’ll see NASA's Artemis-1 mission launch the new Orion capsule aboard the massive SLS rocket. This mission is uncrewed, but it’s the first step towards setting human feet on the moon again.
Russia, India, and Japan want to also be part of the Moon party and they will launch this year a mission each: Russian’s Luna-25 lunar lander, India’s Chandrayaan-3 lander and rover, and Japan’s Yaoki, their very first moon mini-rover which will travel aboard Astrobotic’s lander. Busy schedule for our dear moon this year!
A new space telescope
This is probably the most important launch of the decade: the James Webb Space Telescope is so powerful that its scientific potential is yet unknown. If Hubble is continuously blowing our minds, even 30 years after its launch, imagine when we start collecting data of the JWST, which will be 1.5 million kilometers from Earth and with massive new technological improvements. October 31st is the launch date: mark it on your calendar!
Space station(s) progress
China is launching the first module of its new Space Station during the first half of 2021. The full station will take about two years to be built, and the astronauts are already being trained. They have more than 40 launches planned for the year, so we can expect a very high construction speed.
Russia is launching the new Nauka module for the ISS, which will provide more room to live and work. It is scheduled to launch in July. Additionally, ESA will Launch the European Robotic Arm for the ISS.
SpaceX will launch two crewed missions to the ISS and Boeing will conduct their first crewed flight to the ISS if their previous test mission is a success.
And then, we’ll witness a private mission to the ISS: Axiom's AX-1 mission, with astronaut Michael López-Alegría and three space tourists aboard a SpaceX rocket.
Tons of new rockets!
This year we’ll see tons of new rockets launch for the first time, both heavy and small launchers. NASA’s massive SLS, SpaceX’s Starship (the one I am more excited about, to be honest) and ULA’s Vulcan are the ones that are taking multiple tons of payload to orbit, making it easier and affordable to go to the Moon, Mars and beyond.
And then we have the new wave of small rocket launchers, all trying to reach orbit this year: Firefly's Alpha, ABL Space Systems RS1, Relativity Space's Terran 1, Virgin Orbit’s LauncherOne, Astra's Rocket 3, ESA’s Vega-C and ISRO’s Small Satellite Launch Vehicle. Just wow!
This crazy activity only means one thing: the more companies and organizations reaching orbit, the easier and faster a new orbital economy will be. This will have a massive impact on our ability to explore the universe, by cutting costs down and letting research and commerce bloom.
Orbital debris removal
But, wait, wait, wait: won’t all these launches make the orbital debris problem even worse? That’s exactly what Astroscale wants to prevent! This year they will launch their first servicer spacecraft that will test technologies needed to dock, release, move and deorbit small dead satellites.
Research missions
We have lots of unanswered questions about the universe, so we need to keep sending missions to find answers. Here are some of the most exciting missions that will launch this year:
With NASA's DART mission we'll learn if we can alter the direction of an asteroid when needed. We’ll learn that by striking an asteroid with a spacecraft. Boum!
Then we’ll learn more about the formation of planets by studying the Trojan asteroids around Jupiter with the LUCY mission.
In October, with the IXPE mission, we will study X-rays coming from black holes and finally, we’ll learn much more about our neighbor planet, Venus, thanks to two flybys by ESA’s probes BepiColombo and SolarOrbiter. Not bad!
As you can see I am mind-blown by all the exciting missions that are coming this year: I feel we are making good progress in all areas and this makes me really happy. What about you? What missions are you more excited about? Feel free to answer this email or leave a comment below.
Picture of the week
Multi-Galaxy Collision!
280 million light-years away from Earth, there are four galaxies colliding at three million kilometers per hour. Boum! The group is known as the Stephan’s Quintet. Credit: NASA Hubble
Upcoming launches & events
Very well packed week ahead!
Jan 11th - CRS-21 Dragon - Undock from the International Space Station reentry and splashdown.
Jan 12th - SpaceX Starship SN9 | 12.5 km Flight (temptative)
Jan 13th - Virgin Orbit LauncherOne | Launch Demo 2
Jan 14th - SpaceX Falcon 9 Block 5 | Transporter 1
Jan 16th - RocketLab Electron | “Another One Leaves The Crust”
Space jobs
Do you want to play an active role in space exploration? Here are some open positions in the aerospace industry:
And that’s it for this week! :)
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Cheers from unexpectedly frozen Spain!
Juan, the Curious Astronaut