[meteorite-list] Impact Landing Ends SMART-1 Mission To The Moon

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sun Sep 3 16:44:48 2006
Message-ID: <200609032044.NAA22127_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

http://smart.esa.int/science-e/www/object/index.cfm?fobjectid=39961

European Space Agency
Press Release No. 31-2006
Paris, France
3 September 2006

Impact landing ends SMART-1 mission to the Moon

Early this morning, a small flash illuminated the surface of the Moon as the
European Space Agency's SMART-1 spacecraft impacted onto the lunar soil, in
the 'Lake of Excellence' region. The planned impact concluded a successful
mission that, in addition to testing innovative space technology, had been
conducting a thorough scientific exploration of the Moon for about a year
and a half.
 
SMART-1 scientists, engineers and space operations experts witnessed the
final moments of the spacecraft's life in the night between Saturday 2 and
Sunday 3 September at ESA's European Space Operations Centre (ESOC), in
Darmstadt, Germany. The confirmation of the impact reached ESOC at 07:42:22
CEST (05:42:22 UT), when ESA's New Norcia ground station in Australia
suddenly lost radio contact with the spacecraft. SMART-1 ended its journey
in the Lake of Excellence, in the point situated at 34.4 deg South latitude
and 46.2 deg West longitude.

The SMART-1 impact took place on the near side of the Moon, in a dark area
just near the terminator (the line separating the day side from the night
side), at a "grazing" angle between 5 and 10 degrees and a speed of about 2
kilometres per second. The impact time and location was planned to favour
observations of the impact event from telescopes on Earth, and it was
achieved by a series of orbit manoeuvres and corrections performed during
the course of summer 2006, the last of which was done on 1 September.

Professional and amateur ground observers all around the world -- from South
Africa to the Canary Islands, South America, the continental United States,
Hawaii, and many other locations -- were watching before and during the
small SMART-1 impact, hoping to spot the faint impact flash and to obtain
information about the impact dynamics and about the lunar surface excavated
by the spacecraft. The quality of the data and images gathered from the
ground observatories -- a tribute to the end of the SMART-1 mission and a
possible additional contribution to lunar science -- will be assessed in the
days to come.

For the last 16 months and until its final orbits, SMART-1 has been studying
the Moon, gathering data about the morphology and mineralogical composition
of the surface in visible, infrared and X-ray light.

"The legacy left by the huge wealth of SMART-1 data, to be analysed in the
months and years to come, is a precious contribution to lunar science at a
time when the exploration of the Moon is once again getting the world's
interest," said Bernard Foing, ESA SMART-1 Project Scientist. "The
measurements by SMART-1 call into question the theories concerning the
Moon's violent origin and evolution," he added. The Moon may have formed
from the impact of a Mars-size asteroid with the Earth 4500 million years
ago. "SMART-1 has mapped large and small impact craters, studied the
volcanic and tectonic processes that shaped the Moon, unveiled the
mysterious poles, and investigated sites for future exploration," Foing
concluded.

"ESA's decision to extend the SMART-1 scientific mission by a further year
(it was initially planned to last only six months around the Moon) allowed
the instrument scientists to extensively use a number of innovative
observing modes at the Moon," added Gerhard Schwehm, ESA's SMART-1 Mission
Manager. In addition to plain nadir observations (looking down on the
'vertical' line for lunar surveys), they included targeted observations,
moon-spot pointing and 'push-broom' observations (a technique SMART-1 used
to obtain colour images). "This was tough work for the mission planners, but
the lunar data archive we are now building is truly impressive."

"SMART-1 has been an enormous success also from a technological point of
view," said Giuseppe Racca, ESA SMART-1 Project Manager. The major goal of
the mission was to test an ion engine (solar electric propulsion) in space
for the first time for interplanetary travel, and capture a spacecraft into
orbit around another celestial body, in combination with gravity assist
manoeuvres.

SMART-1 also tested future deep-space communication techniques for
spacecraft, techniques to achieve autonomous spacecraft navigation, and
miniaturised scientific instruments, used for the first time around the
Moon. "It is a great satisfaction to see how well the mission achieved its
technological objectives, and did great lunar science at the same time,"
Racca concluded.

"Operating SMART-1 has been an extremely complex but rewarding task," said
Octavio Camino-Ramos, ESA SMART-1 Spacecraft Operations Manager. "The long
spiralling trajectory around Earth to test solar electric propulsion (a
low-thrust approach), the long exposure to radiation, the strong
perturbations of the gravity fields of the Earth-Moon system and then the
reaching of a lunar orbit optimised for the scientific investigations, have
allowed us to gain valuable expertise in navigation techniques for
low-thrust propulsion and innovative operations concepts: telemetry
distribution and alerting through the internet, and a high degree of ground
operations automation -- a remarkable benchmark for the future," he
explained.

"For ESA's Science Programme, SMART-1 represents a great success and a very
good return on investment, both from the technological and the scientific
point of view," said Professor Southwood, ESA's Director of Science. "It
seems that right now everyone in the world is planning on going to the Moon.
Future scientific missions will greatly benefit from the technological and
operational experience gained thanks to this small spacecraft, while the set
of scientific data gathered by SMART-1 is already helping to update our
current picture of the Moon."

Note to editors:
 
SMART-1, (Small Mission for Advanced Research and Technology) is the first
European mission to the Moon. It was launched on 27 September 2003 on board
an Ariane 5 rocket, from the CSG, Europe's Spaceport in Kourou, French
Guiana and reached its destination in November 2004 after following a long
spiralling trajectory around Earth.

In this phase, the spacecraft successfully tested for the first time in
space the series of advanced technologies it carried on board. The
technology demonstration part of the mission was declared successfully
concluded when SMART-1 reached the Moon and was captured by the lunar
gravity field in mid-November 2004.

SMART-1 started its scientific observations of the Moon in March 2005,
running on an elliptical polar orbit that ranged from about 500 to 3000
kilometres over the lunar surface. The instruments on board included a
miniaturised imaging camera (AMIE), an X-ray telescope (D-CIXS) to identify
the key chemical elements in the lunar surface, an infrared spectrometer
(SIR) to chart the Moon's minerals and an X-ray solar monitor (XSM) to
complement the D-CIXS measurements and study the solar variability.

SMART-1 was a small unmanned satellite weighing 366 kilograms and roughly
fitting into a cube just 1 metre across, excluding its 14-metre solar
panels. It was manufactured by the Swedish Space Corporation, Solna
(Sweden), leading a consortium of more than 20 European industrial teams.

For more information:

Bernard Foing, ESA SMART-1 Project Scientist
Email: bernard.foing _at_ esa.int

Gerhard Schwehm, ESA SMART-1 Mission Manager
Email: gerhard.schwehm _at_ esa.int

Octavio Camino-Ramos, ESA SMART-1 Spacecraft Operations Manager
Email: octavio.camino _at_ esa.int

Giuseppe Racca, ESA SMART-1 Project Manager
Email: giuseppe.racca _at_ esa.int

[NOTE: Images supporting this release are available at
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM7A76LARE_index_1.html ]

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ESA News
http://www.esa.int

SMART-1 impact update

3 September 2006
 
Scientists have received and are analysing the final data gathered by
SMART-1 on 2 September, prior to today's Moon impact. This update presents
several of the images received, as well as additional images and information
from the worldwide ground observation campaign.
 
The seven AMIE images included in this update article were taken on 2
September by the AMIE camera on board SMART-1 during the last few orbits
prior to Moon impact. They were taken between 15:19 - 17:34 CEST (17:19 -
19:34 UT) and were analysed by camera scientists during the night of 2-3
September.

The images include both oblique and nadir (vertical) views, with the camera
pointing mode having been selected to best exploit the illumination
conditions during the final orbits over the Moon's night side.

In several of the images, the Moon's horizon can clearly been seen;
excellent details of the surface are also visible.

Ground observation campaign
 
An impressive sequence of impact images was captured by the
Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope (CFHT), a 3.6-meter optical/infrared
telescope located atop the summit of Mauna Kea, a 4200-meter volcano on
Hawaii's Big Island (see before, during, after image sequence below).

The CFHT observed the projected impact area between 07:00 - 08:44 CEST
(05:00 06:44 UT), and astronomers were rewarded with a beautiful image of
that indicates a very short impact flash, possibly lasting less than a
second. While still to be confirmed, a preliminary assessment indicates the
impact flash was possibly caused by thermal emission from the impact itself
or by the release of spacecraft volatiles, such as the small amount of
hydrazine fuel remaining on board.

"It was exciting to see the impact flash live from Hawaii, just after
receiving, at ESOC, the last radio signal from SMART-1," said Prof. Pascale
Ehrenfreund, from Leiden University, Impact Ground Campaign Coordinator.

Many other observatories, including both professional and amateurs sky
watchers, also participated in ground observation activities.

"We look forward to collecting worldwide reports from this impact. We call
upon the community to search for the ejecta blankets and for future lunar
orbiters to search for the SMART-1 crater," says Bernard H. Foing, ESA's
SMART-1 Project Scientist. Their updates will be published on the ESA portal
as they are received in the coming days.

Radio telescope observations
 
SMART-1 was also observed by a network of five cooperating radio telescopes
over several months leading up to Moon impact. The observatories' activities
are coordinated by the Joint Institute for Very Long Baseline Interferometry
(JIVE), hosted by ASTRON (the Netherlands Foundation for Research in
Astronomy), Dwingeloo, The Netherlands.

The participating observatories are capable of making highly sensitive
observations, characterized by very accurate timing and the ability to
detect very weak radio signals.

Starting in the spring of 2006, the cooperating telescopes observed radio
signals emitted by SMART-1 and reflected from the Moon as part of a
programme to test and validate the very long baseline interferometry (VLBI)
technique. VLBI allows ground-based telescopes to track spacecraft with very
high accuracy, and furthermore has applications in radio astronomy,
including the testing of radio wave propagation in the vicinity of massive
bodies like the Moon and the study of the Moon's surface physical
properties.

In working with SMART-1, the radio telescopes applied the same techniques
used by ground telescopes to track the descent of ESA's Huygens probe to the
surface of Saturn's moon Titan in January 2005. This technique is also
expected to be used in tracking China's Chang'e-series of Moon missions, to
be launched starting in 2007.

Summary:
 
These and other SMART-1 data will be analysed by the science teams in the
coming days and the ESA Portal plans to publish results as soon as they are
available.

Note to editors:

The five radio telescopes involved in the SMART-1 observations and
coordinated by the Joint Institute for VLBI (Very Long Baseline
Interferometry) in Europe (JIVE), are: the Medicina (INAF) 32-metre antenna
in Italy, the Fortaleza (ROEN) 14-metre antenna in Brazil, the
German-Chilean TIGO (BKG) 6-metre antenna in Chile, the Mount Pleasant
Observatory of the University of Australia and the Australia Telescope
Compact Array (CSIRO).

The SMART-1 impact observation campaign involved several amateur and
professional astronomers all around the world. They include: the South
African Large Telescope (SALT), the Calar Alto observatory in Andalucia,
Spain, the ESA Optical Ground Station (OGS) at Tenerife, Spain, the TNG
telescope in La Palma, Canary Islands, Spain, the CEA Cariri observatory in
Brazil, the Argentina National Telescope, the Florida Tech Robotic
telescopes, US telescopes, NASA IRTF, the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope,
the Japanese Subaru Auxiliary telescopes on Hawaii, and many others.

For more information:

Bernard H. Foing, ESA SMART-1 Project Scientist
Email: bernard.foing _at_ esa.int

Pascale Ehrenfreund, SMART-1 Impact Ground Campaign Coordinator
Leiden University, The Netherlands
Email: pascale _at_ strw.leidenuniv.nl

Leonid Gurvits, Radio VLBI Coordinator
Joint Institute for VLBI in Europe (JIVE), Dwingeloo, The Netherlands
Email: lgurvits _at_ jive.nl

[NOTE: Images supporting this release are available at
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM2N58ZMRE_index_1.html ]
Received on Sun 03 Sep 2006 04:44:44 PM PDT