A NASA satellite was launched last month, released from Earth's orbit and now heading toward the moon. This is all part of the great plan to bring astronauts back to the moon.




We have previously reported on NASA's plans to send a manned mission to the moon under the Artemis program. The Space Launch System (SLS) captured all the lights because of its enormous structure and propulsion capabilities. However, the launch vehicle is only part of the larger mission, and cubeSat's contracted launch late last month is now important as NASA plans how to bring humans back to the moon.

In the early hours of June 28, a 59-foot (18-meter) rocket set off from New Zealand's Mahia Peninsula with a small satellite testing the possibility of using a new orbit around the moon for human landing. The mission, dubbed cislunar independent GPS technology operations and navigation experiment or CAPSTONE, was called Electron, an booster from Rocket Lab, the U.S. launch service provider.

What is CAPSTONE's mission?

Minutes after launch, the second stage of the rocket named Futon separated from the booster and carried a 55-pound (25 kg) payload from Cubesat or a small satellite.

Over the next five days, the engines fired at the photon repeatedly to lift its orbit and keep it away from Earth, and finally on the sixth day it launched again to increase its speed to 24,500 mph (39,500 km/h) to leave Earth's orbit. orbit and head towards the moon. About 20 minutes later, Futon launched the small satellite, which has its own propulsion system, but will only release it occasionally to make its way to the moon, a process that will take more than four months.

Once close to the moon, the small satellite will launch its boosters again to place itself in a nearby straight halo orbit (NRHO) that resembles a rubber band stretching between two fingers. Interestingly, this is the first time NASA has tried to place a spacecraft in such orbit.

How does this help land on the moon?

If the mission succeeds, NASA plans to create an orbital space station around the moon in the same orbit, which will also help astronauts descend toward the moon on the Artemis mission.

The small satellite will send images and information that NASA has never seen before. Due to the nature of the orbit, the satellite as well as the next space station will remain in constant contact with the Earth and also reduce the fuel requirements of the mission.

The satellite carries small amounts of fuel and burns it with high energy efficiency, which is why it is slowly moving towards the moon. However, the low fuel load saved NASA millions of dollars, with the entire CAPSTONE project costing just $32.7 million.

"For tens of millions of dollars, there is now a rocket and spacecraft that can take you to the moon, to asteroids, to Venus, to Mars," Peter Beck, founder of Rocket Lab, told The Associated Press. "It's a crazy ability that didn't exist before."