ESCAPADE on schedule for launch this fall

BUSAN, South Korea — A NASA smallsat mission to Mars stays on observe to launch this fall, though with no particular launch date but.

In a presentation on the Committee on Area Analysis (COSPAR) 45^th Scientific Meeting right here July 15, Rob Lillis of the College of California Berkeley Area Sciences Laboratory mentioned the Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers (ESCAPADE) mission was nonetheless scheduled to launch inside a number of months on the inaugural flight of Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket.

ESCAPADE options two similar smallsats, known as Blue and Gold, that can go into orbit round Mars. The spacecraft carry devices to review the planet’s magnetosphere and its interplay with the photo voltaic wind.

The spacecraft, constructed by Rocket Lab, are virtually prepared for launch. The Blue spacecraft has accomplished environmental testing whereas Gold goes via ultimate vibration testing. “It’s been actually thrilling to see these two probes lastly come collectively after engaged on them for thus a few years,” he mentioned.

The launch of ESCAPADE has arguably attracted extra consideration that the mission itself. The spacecraft are scheduled to launch on the primary flight of New Glenn underneath a NASA activity order awarded in February 2023 valued at $20 million.

The precise launch date for the mission, although, stays unclear. At an April assembly of a COSPAR planetary safety committee, a NASA official disclosed a Sept. 29 launch date for ESCAPADE. The ESCAPADE web site additionally mentions a Sept. 29 launch, however provides that that is solely a “placeholder” date.

Lillis mentioned solely that the mission was scheduled to launch this fall, including {that a} September launch date listed in a single slide “was outdated.” The launch window for Mars missions of any variety this 12 months extends roughly via mid-October.

“We don’t know ourselves but,” he mentioned later within the discuss on the precise launch date for the mission, including that he was working intently with Blue Origin on launch preparations.

If ESCAPADE launches this fall, the spacecraft will arrive at Mars 48 hours aside in September 2025 and start their one-year prime science mission in April 2026. Lillis mentioned he hoped that the spacecraft might work along with a number of different Mars orbiters from NASA and different companies to open a “golden period” of research of the Martian magnetosphere.

ESCAPADE can be a check of the flexibility of small, low-cost spacecraft to conduct science missions past Earth. NASA chosen ESCAPADE in 2019 as a part of its SIMPLEx line of planetary science smallsat missions together with Janus and Lunar Trailblazer. Janus, although, was shelved after delays in its launch as a rideshare payload on the Psyche mission prevented it from reaching its deliberate asteroid flyby targets. Lunar Trailblazer is now scheduled to launch late this 12 months as a rideshare on the second Intuitive Machines lander.

“It’s very a lot an experiment by NASA in decreasing prices for planetary missions. Are you able to do a mission for roughly one-tenth of what NASA would have spent and what dangers are you incurring by doing that?” he mentioned. “NASA may be very within the reply to that query.”

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