NASA is counting on SLS and Orion to help the agency establish a lunar base by the end of the 2020s — a key priority of the Artemis program. And, if all goes according to plan, the two vehicles will also enable even more ambitious feats, helping astronauts get to Mars by the late 2030s or early 2040s.
Last week, on Nov. 10, NASA tested hardware that could help these crewed Mars missions land safely — an inflatable heat shield called LOFTID, which launched to Earth orbit with the JPSS-2 weather satellite and then came barreling back to Earth. LOFTID survived its fiery return trip in great shape, suggesting that the tech has great potential to help land heavy hardware on Mars, team members said.
“The demonstration was a huge success,” Joe Del Corso, LOFTID project manager at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Virginia, said during a press conference on Thursday (Nov. 17).
“We have now the ability to both put heavy payloads into space and to bring them back down,” he added. “These two successes are huge steps in enabling human access and exploration. We’re going to space, and we want to be able to stay there.”
LOFTID (short for “Low-Earth Orbit Flight Test of an Inflatable Decelerator”) is an inflatable heat shield designed to slow a payload’s descent through a planetary atmosphere via drag.
NASA deems this strategy a promising one for its crewed Mars plans, which will require landing big payloads such as habitat modules on the Red Planet. Such gear could tip the scales at 20 tons or so — far too heavy for current Mars entry, descent and landing systems to handle.
NASA’s 1-ton Curiosity and Perseverance Mars rovers, for example, pretty much tapped out the rocket-powered sky crane method that got them down safely through the Red Planet’s thin air, agency officials have said. (Parachutes were part of those rovers’ touchdowns as well, as they would be with an inflatable heat shield landing system.)
Last week’s launch provided an ambitious test of this tech. LOFTID launched in a compact configuration with JPSS-2 aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket. After deploying from the Atlas V’s Centaur upper stage, LOFTID expanded to its full diameter of about 20 feet (6 meters), positioned itself for Earth return and took the plunge.
Initial inspections, conducted after the heat shield was pulled out of the Pacific Ocean near Hawaii, suggested that LOFTID passed the test with flying colors. And a further week of analyses has only strengthened that conclusion.
“The vehicle looks just beautiful. It looks pristine, and I really can’t say that enough,” Del Corso said. “It was surprising to me how well, how good, the vehicle looked.”
Scientists and engineers will continue analyzing data for another year or so to get a complete understanding of the test flight, LOFTID team members said.
The LOFTID project, which cost a total of $93 million over five years, isn’t the final step in inflatable Mars heat shields, however.
A structure about three or four times wider than LOFTID would likely be required to get a big payload like a habitat module down safely on the Red Planet, project team members said. Scaling the tech up so dramatically poses a number of challenges, which scientists and engineers can now start assessing seriously after LOFTID’s successful flight.
“There’s quite a bit of work that needs to be done with that [scaling up]; there are facility considerations with that that need to be looked at,” Trudy Kortes, director of technology demonstrations at NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, said during Thursday’s briefing.
“But the roadmap will guide us on that and our future investments in that,” she added. “We’re taking a look at that now, and really the short-term future for that. So yeah, that would be the next step for this capability.”
Mike Wall is the author of “Out There (opens in new tab)” (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated by Karl Tate), a book about the search for alien life. Follow him on Twitter @michaeldwall (opens in new tab). Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom (opens in new tab) or Facebook (opens in new tab).
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The body of Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei — who died after being set on fire by her partner in Kenya — was received Friday by family and anti-femicide crusaders, ahead of her burial a day later.
Cheptegei’s family met with dozens of activists Friday who had marched to the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital’s morgue in the western city of Eldoret while chanting anti-femicide slogans.
She is the fourth female athlete to have been killed by her partner in Kenya in yet another case of gender-based violence in recent years.
Viola Cheptoo, the founder of Tirop Angels – an organization that was formed in honor of athlete Agnes Tirop, who was stabbed to death in 2021, said stakeholders need to ensure this is the last death of an athlete due to gender-based violence.
“We are here to say that enough is enough, we are tired of burying our sisters due to GBV,” she said.
It was a somber mood at the morgue as athletes and family members viewed Cheptegei’s body which sustained 80% of burns after she was doused with gasoline by her partner Dickson Ndiema. Ndiema sustained 30% burns on his body and later succumbed.
Ndiema and Cheptegei were said to have quarreled over a piece of land that the athlete bought in Kenya, according to a report filed by the local chief.
Cheptegei competed in the women’s marathon at the Paris Olympics less than a month before the attack. She finished in 44th place.
Cheptegei’s father, Joseph, said that the body will make a brief stop at their home in the Endebess area before proceeding to Bukwo in eastern Uganda for a night vigil and burial on Saturday.
“We are in the final part of giving my daughter the last respect,” a visibly distraught Joseph said.
He told reporters last week that Ndiema was stalking and threatening Cheptegei and the family had informed police.
Four in 10 women or an estimated 41% of dating or married Kenyan women have experienced physical or sexual violence perpetrated by their current or most recent partner, according to the Kenya Demographic and Health Survey 2022.
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — A rare Bronze-Era jar accidentally smashed by a 4-year-old visiting a museum was back on display Wednesday after restoration experts were able to carefully piece the artifact back together.
Last month, a family from northern Israel was visiting the museum when their youngest son tipped over the jar, which smashed into pieces.
Alex Geller, the boy’s father, said his son — the youngest of three — is exceptionally curious, and that the moment he heard the crash, “please let that not be my child” was the first thought that raced through his head.
The jar has been on display at the Hecht Museum in Haifa for 35 years. It was one of the only containers of its size and from that period still complete when it was discovered.
The Bronze Age jar is one of many artifacts exhibited out in the open, part of the Hecht Museum’s vision of letting visitors explore history without glass barriers, said Inbal Rivlin, the director of the museum, which is associated with Haifa University in northern Israel.
It was likely used to hold wine or oil, and dates back to between 2200 and 1500 B.C.
Rivlin and the museum decided to turn the moment, which captured international attention, into a teaching moment, inviting the Geller family back for a special visit and hands-on activity to illustrate the restoration process.
Rivlin added that the incident provided a welcome distraction from the ongoing war in Gaza. “Well, he’s just a kid. So I think that somehow it touches the heart of the people in Israel and around the world,“ said Rivlin.
Roee Shafir, a restoration expert at the museum, said the repairs would be fairly simple, as the pieces were from a single, complete jar. Archaeologists often face the more daunting task of sifting through piles of shards from multiple objects and trying to piece them together.
Experts used 3D technology, hi-resolution videos, and special glue to painstakingly reconstruct the large jar.
Less than two weeks after it broke, the jar went back on display at the museum. The gluing process left small hairline cracks, and a few pieces are missing, but the jar’s impressive size remains.
The only noticeable difference in the exhibit was a new sign reading “please don’t touch.”
VICTORIA – The British Columbia government is partnering with a bear welfare group to reduce the number of bears being euthanized in the province.
Nicholas Scapillati, executive director of Grizzly Bear Foundation, said Monday that it comes after months-long discussions with the province on how to protect bears, with the goal to give the animals a “better and second chance at life in the wild.”
Scapillati said what’s exciting about the project is that the government is open to working with outside experts and the public.
“So, they’ll be working through Indigenous knowledge and scientific understanding, bringing in the latest techniques and training expertise from leading experts,” he said in an interview.
B.C. government data show conservation officers destroyed 603 black bears and 23 grizzly bears in 2023, while 154 black bears were killed by officers in the first six months of this year.
Scapillati said the group will publish a report with recommendations by next spring, while an independent oversight committee will be set up to review all bear encounters with conservation officers to provide advice to the government.
Environment Minister George Heyman said in a statement that they are looking for new ways to ensure conservation officers “have the trust of the communities they serve,” and the panel will make recommendations to enhance officer training and improve policies.
Lesley Fox, with the wildlife protection group The Fur-Bearers, said they’ve been calling for such a committee for decades.
“This move demonstrates the government is listening,” said Fox. “I suspect, because of the impending election, their listening skills are potentially a little sharper than they normally are.”
Fox said the partnership came from “a place of long frustration” as provincial conservation officers kill more than 500 black bears every year on average, and the public is “no longer tolerating this kind of approach.”
“I think that the conservation officer service and the B.C. government are aware they need to change, and certainly the public has been asking for it,” said Fox.
Fox said there’s a lot of optimism about the new partnership, but, as with any government, there will likely be a lot of red tape to get through.
“I think speed is going to be important, whether or not the committee has the ability to make change and make change relatively quickly without having to study an issue to death, ” said Fox.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 9, 2024.
