by The year 2023 proved to be an important one for space missions, with NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission returning an asteroid sample and India’s Chandrayaan-3 mission exploring the lunar south pole, and 2024 is shaping up to be another exciting year for space exploration. .
Several new missions under NASA’s Artemis plan and the Commercial Lunar Cargo Services initiative will target the Moon.
The second half of the year will feature several interesting launches, with the Martian Moons eXploration mission launching in September, Europa Clipper and Hera in October, and Artemis II and VIPER to the Moon in November, if all goes as planned.
I’m a planetary scientist and these are six of the space missions I’m most excited to pursue in 2024.
1. Europe Clipper
NASA will launch the Europa Clipper, which will explore one of Jupiter’s largest moons, Europa. Europa is slightly smaller than Earth’s Moon and has a surface made of ice. Beneath its icy shell, Europa likely hosts a saltwater ocean, which scientists expect to contain more than twice as much water as all of Earth’s oceans combined.
With Europa Clipper, scientists want to investigate whether Europa’s ocean could be a suitable habitat for extraterrestrial life.
The mission plans to do this by passing near Europa nearly 50 times to study the moon’s icy shell, the geology of its surface and its underground ocean. The mission will also look for active geysers emanating from Europa.
This mission will be a game-changer for scientists hoping to understand ocean worlds like Europa.
The launch window, the period in which the mission could launch and reach its planned route, opens on October 10, 2024 and lasts 21 days. The spacecraft will launch on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket and reach the Jupiter system in 2030.
2. Launch of Artemis II
The Artemis program, named after Apollo’s twin sister in Greek mythology, is NASA’s plan to return to the Moon. It will send humans to the Moon for the first time since 1972, including the first woman and the first person of color. Artemis also includes plans for a sustained, long-term presence in space that will prepare NASA to eventually send people even further: to Mars.
Artemis II is the first manned step of this plan, and four astronauts are expected to be on board during the 10-day mission.
The mission is based on Artemis I, which sent an unmanned capsule into orbit around the Moon in late 2022.
Artemis II will put astronauts into orbit around the Moon before returning them home. It is currently scheduled to launch in November 2024, but there is a possibility it could be delayed until 2025, depending on whether all the necessary equipment, such as spacesuits and oxygen equipment, is ready.
3. VIPER to search for water on the Moon
VIPER, which stands for Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover, is a golf cart-sized robot that NASA will use to explore the Moon’s south pole in late 2024.
Originally scheduled to launch in 2023, NASA delayed the mission to complete more testing on the lander system, which Astrobotic, a private company, developed as part of the Commercial Lunar Payload Services program.
This robotic mission is designed to search for volatiles, which are molecules that vaporize easily, such as water and carbon dioxide, at lunar temperatures. These materials could provide resources for future human exploration on the Moon.
The VIPER robot will rely on batteries, heat pipes and radiators throughout its 100-day mission, as it navigates everything from the extreme heat of lunar daylight, when temperatures can reach 224 degrees Fahrenheit (107 degrees Celsius), to the icy shadowed regions of the Moon. which can reach a mind-blowing temperature of -400 F (-240 C).
Launch and delivery of VIPER to the lunar surface is planned for November 2024.
4. Lunar Trailblazer and PRIME-1 Missions
NASA has recently invested in a class of small, low-cost planetary missions called SIMPLEx, which stands for Small, Innovative Missions for PLAnetary Exploration. These missions save costs by accompanying them on other launches as what is called rideshare or secondary payload.
An example is the Lunar Trailblazer. Like VIPER, Lunar Trailblazer will search for water on the Moon.
But while VIPER will land on the Moon’s surface, studying a specific area near the south pole in detail, Lunar Trailblazer will orbit the Moon, measuring the surface temperature and mapping the locations of water molecules around the world. .
Currently, Lunar Trailblazer is on track to be ready in early 2024.
However, because it is a secondary payload, the launch time of the Lunar Trailblazer depends on the readiness for launch of the primary payload. The PRIME-1 mission, scheduled to launch in mid-2024, is the journey of the Lunar Trailblazer.
PRIME-1 will drill the Moon: it is a test for the type of drill that VIPER will use. But its release date will likely depend on whether previous releases happen on time.
A previous Commercial Lunar Payload Services mission with the same landing partner was delayed until February 2024 at the earliest, and further delays could set PRIME-1 and Lunar Trailblazer back.
5. JAXA Martian Moon Exploration Mission
While Earth’s Moon has many visitors (large and small, robotic and manned) planned for 2024, Mars’ moons Phobos and Deimos will also soon receive a visitor. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, has a robotic mission in development called Martian Moon eXploration, or MMX, scheduled to launch in September 2024.
The main scientific objective of the mission is to determine the origin of the moons of Mars. Scientists are not sure whether Phobos and Deimos are ancient asteroids that Mars captured and put into orbit with its gravity or whether they formed from debris already in orbit around Mars.
The spacecraft will spend three years around Mars conducting scientific operations to observe Phobos and Deimos. MMX will also land on the surface of Phobos and collect a sample before returning to Earth.
6. ESA’s Hera mission
Hera is a European Space Agency mission to return to the Didymos-Dimorphos asteroid system visited by NASA’s DART mission in 2022.
But DART not only visited these asteroids, it collided with one of them to test a planetary defense technique called “kinetic impact.” DART hit Dimorphos with such force that it actually changed its orbit.
The kinetic impact technique smashes something into an object to alter its trajectory. This could prove useful if humanity ever finds a potentially dangerous object on a collision course with Earth and needs to redirect it.
Hera will launch in October 2024 and, at the end of 2026, will arrive at Didymos and Dimorphos, where it will study the physical properties of the asteroids.
This article is republished from The Conversation, an independent, nonprofit news organization bringing you data and analysis to help you understand our complex world.
It was written by: Ali M. Bramson, Purdue University.
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Ali M. Bramson receives funding from NASA.
