Heavenly bodies are always in motion: Pushing back the asteroid probe’s blastoff date could require a new trajectory, longer travel time, and much more power.
NASA and the Psyche team declined interview requests until an independent review of the mission delay has been completed. Agency officials will make a decision about next steps based on that review in the coming months, said Lori Glaze, head of NASA’s planetary science division, at last month’s press conference. But WIRED spoke with other experts about options for sending a probe deep into the solar system, even if you can’t whip it past Mars.
Parker says that using the Falcon Heavy for launch is another advantage, because it will give the spacecraft more kinetic energy to start with than a smaller rocket would, which means it has to come up with less solar energy en route. Focusing on power from the liftoff and from the onboard propulsion system would give the mission planners some flexibility about launch times, he thinks, potentially allowing them to make the journey without counting on an alignment with Mars.
Rosetta’s team faced two additional challenges: The comet had a swooping elliptical orbit rather than a more circular one like most asteroids, which made it hard to match its speed and velocity. And the researchers wanted to plan the trek so that Rosetta and its lander sidekick would rendezvous with the comet when it wasn't very close to the sun, where it would be more active, ejecting bits of ice and dust and complicating a landing that already would be tricky to pull off.
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