Latest news with #Vestri
Yahoo
03-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
First-Ever Asteroid Mining Mission Loses Contact With Earth
Last week, California-based space company AstroForge launched what it claimed was the first "commercial deep space mission in history." The company's plan was to send its washing machine-sized spacecraft, dubbed Odin, to visit an asteroid millions of miles from Earth and scout it as a potential mining site. But mere hours after the spacecraft lifted off atop a SpaceX rocket last week — alongside Intuitive Machines' Athena lunar lander — the AstroForge team encountered issues while trying to communicate with the probe. Then, less than 24 hours following launch, the team lost contact entirely. "I think we all know the hope is fading as we continue the mission," AstroForge founder Matt Gialich admitted in an update on X-formerly-Twitter over the weekend, as flagged by "So we're going to keep our head up. We're going to keep trying over the weekend, and we'll see how far we get." A number of space companies have raised huge amounts of funds with the promise of turning errant space rocks into a lucrative source of money. But many have failed to live up to that promise, folding before even venturing into space. As the New York Times reports, AstroForge did initially make headway, sending a demonstration satellite into orbit in 2023. Its followup Odin mission, though, is looking rough. Odin made it over 186,000 miles away from home. The spacecraft did manage to unfold its solar panels and likely started charging, according to the company. But then the company ran into some "massive issues," as Gialich wrote in an extremely detailed update posted on AstroForge's website on Saturday. The team found that the polarization on Odin's antennas was "wrong" meaning that "both uplink and downlink for the first 4 hours of the mission did not work." "No commands were getting through, and also, no data was getting down," Gialich wrote. Despite sending a number of commands, "we received nothing in return." In the company's X update, Gialich said that the spacecraft may be tumbling at a "really, really slow speed." The last contact the team received from Odin was 20 hours after liftoff. But the team isn't giving up yet. "We have a plan over the weekend, and there is still a chance that we are going to be able to recover the vehicle," the founder said. "We do think we have some theories on what's going on, and if one of them is true, there is still a recovery path." Beyond Odin, AstroForge is already eyeing an asteroid landing mission, dubbed Vestri, despite the major challenges with its current probe. "We have probably the best group of investors in the world. A lot of them have doubled down on this company," Gialich said. "So regardless of the outcome of Odin, regardless if we ever talk to it again or we don't, we're going to roll these findings into the next mission." More on mining asteroids: Asteroid Mining Startup About to Launch First Mission
Yahoo
01-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
1st private spacecraft to attempt to travel beyond the moon appears to be in trouble
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. The first commercial spacecraft headed beyond the moon is on its way to deep space, but the mission is suffering from unknown issues as the team scrambles to get in contact with the probe. Odin, a small spacecraft built by U.S. space mining company AstroForge, piggybacked on the launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on Wednesday (Feb. 26) that sent the private Intuitive Machines' Athena lander toward the moon. The 265-pound (120 kilograms) Odin is designed to obtain imagery of asteroid 2022 OB5 for a follow-up mission, named Vestri, which will aim to land on the asteroid. The missions are part of AstroForge's plans to make space resources available on Earth. Initially the signs were good for Odin, with AstroForge posting an image of the spacecraft attached to the upper stage in space. The team is, however, still working to understand how the spacecraft is operating. "We don't fully understand the state of the vehicle," Matthew Gialich, AstroForge co-founder and CEO, said in a video update on the state of the Odin mission posted on X on Friday (Feb. 28). Odin is thought to be in a "sun safe mode," which means the spacecraft is in a thermally safe and power positive attitude. "We do believe we're in a power-positive state, though we don't have telemetry coming down to confirm that. Hopefully we can get that tonight," Gialich said. The spacecraft is also almost exactly where it was predicted to be, allowing for tracking using high-gain antennas, Gialich added. The team believes there are two possibilities for the issues. The first is that everything is fine with the spacecraft but there are issues back on Earth, such as AstroForge's ground receivers not being configured correctly. Alternatively, the spacecraft could be in a really slow, uncontrolled tumble, though the team believes it has information to suggest this is not the case. RELATED STORIES: — SpaceX rocket launches private moon lander and NASA 'trailblazer' to hunt for lunar water (video) — Space mining company AstroForge identifies asteroid target for Odin launch next month — Space mining startup AstroForge aims to launch historic asteroid-landing mission in 2025 Next steps, at the time of the update, included sending a command to the spacecraft to turn on a power amplifier, which would then send a high-gain signal back to Earth, providing vital data. AstroForge is providing a livestream of its operations as the mission progresses. For now, Odin is on its way. "We will be in deep space, and we'll be on the other side of the moon in about two days. And nothing is going to stop us unless we hit something," Gialich said.
Sky News
26-02-2025
- Science
- Sky News
Space mission to blast off to moon's south pole - with suitcase-sized 'hopper' on board
Two space mining missions are blasting off this week, with one heading to the southern-most point ever visited on the moon's surface. A robotic moon lander called Athena will embark on Intuitive Machine's second mission to the moon. It made history a year ago by becoming the first private company to successfully land on the moon's surface - although the lander did fall over. Athena will be carrying a set of instruments and a drill to study the rocks and soil beneath the moon's surface and will help scientists identify where possible water sources could be. After lift-off, currently scheduled for shortly after midnight on 27 February, Athena will aim to land on 6 March and then spend ten days gathering data. There are also moon rovers aboard. One is a suitcase-sized hopper which will jump into a deep crater where scientists suspect there is ice and snap some images before jumping back out. 2:11 Catching a lift with Athena before it breaks off on its own is Odin, a robotic spacecraft that will perform a flyby mission of an asteroid. Odin's mission marks US company AstroForge's first attempt to hunt for platinum in space. It should take just five days to reach the far side of the moon, but will then wait for another 300 days in deep space before approaching its target asteroid. 0:15 It will then gather images of the asteroid in preparation for the company's next mission, Vestri, which will land on the asteroid and begin extraction. The same rocket, a SpaceX Falcon-9, will also launch a NASA-developed moon-mapping satellite called Lunar Trailblazer. The Lunar Trailblazer will orbit the moon detecting water on the surface. According to NASA, it will help scientists "determine the form, abundance, and distribution of water across the lunar surface". There's a race to find water on the moon because it may make it feasible to build a base there, making deep space exploration easier.
