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Israel’s Beresheet Spacecraft Moon Landing Attempt Appears to End in Crash
- zymhan 7y ago> On the way down, the main engine cut out. The engine was successfully restarted, but then communications were cut off, and no more information was sent back. Definitely a terrible time to have an engine failure :/
- duxup 7y agoGotta be a terrible "oh man we're back up---- nope" moment :(
- jerf 7y agoIt was. Some people in the audience were clapping when the announcement came that the engine was back on, but quite a few other people were shaking their heads and shushing them.
- Hamuko 7y agoWhen is it not a terrible time to have an engine failure?
- zymhan 7y agoWhen you're floating along on a stable orbit not about to impact the surface. Or with more time to recover from the outage before landing. If it happens within the last minute (wild estimation) then you have little time to recover the lost velocity.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- Voloskaya 7y agoWhen you are floating along on a stable orbit the engines are off, so it's quite hard to have a failure in this context.
- Hamuko 7y agoBut you're still having an engine failure when the engine is far away from anyone that could potentially start mending it.
- Jach 7y agoNot an engine failure, but: "Debugging a program running on a $100M piece of hardware that is 100 million miles away is an interesting experience." http://www.flownet.com/gat/jpl-lisp.html http://www.flownet.com/gat/jpl-lisp.html
- zymhan 7y ago"failure" does not necessarily imply it is permanently disabled. It just means the engine stopped working as expected at some point. Obviously they restarted it after this failure so it was not a complete breakdown of the engine.
- veryworried 7y agoWhen you have redundant engines?? I was on a plane that had one engine fail. It was fine.
- StreamBright 7y agoWhile parked on the surface.
- ronilan 7y agoBased on the telemetry from the broadcast it seems that there was a failure at 13km that resulted in both telemetry and engine loss. When telemetry connection came back vertical speed has already doubled and it kept going up until spacecraft hit the ground. Engine was probably never restarted. Edit1: Telemetry came back at 10k. For the next minute and a half there was uncertainty about the main engine even though telemetry clearly showed vertical speed going up fast. More then a minute later, at 5k a reset request was made. Edit2: A minute goes by and at about 500m controller asked if there is a confirmation to send rest to JPL, another, announced that engine is on. Crash happens at that moment. 149m, 134.3ms vertical.
- ctdonath 7y ago>900m/s horizontal.
- ghostbrainalpha 7y agoWas the request to restart the engine made from Earth? It seems like the landing program would want to have a feature in place that automatically restarted the engine in a situation like this.
- karmakaze 7y agoFrom the NY Times story “We are resetting the spacecraft to try to enable the engine.” I can't tell from that if normally an engine outage would automatically restart but didn't or if the condition would always require manual intervention. I hope we get more details soon. The moon seems close enough (a few seconds), but accidents always happen closest to your destination. More automation is more complexity but it will be valuable for longer trips.
- whoopdedo 7y agoWhen they said the engine had a problem the altitude was 678m and vertical velocity was 130.1m/s. After restart it was 149m at 134.3m/s. They never had a chance. Assuming those numbers were correct. A few minutes before they had lost the intertial measurement unit.
- reaperducer 7y agothen communications were cut off, and no more information was sent back. Have any of these moon landings been done at night where people have been able to watch it happening through a telescope? Or are things so small at the moon's distance that there'd be nothing to see?
- trothamel 7y agoIt might be a stretch to call it a landing, but the LCROSS mission maneuvered a Centaur upper stage to a controlled crash on the moon. IIRC it was done at night so that telescopes on Earth could see it, but none actually did. Actual landers tend to try to land during lunar day, to take advantage of the warmer temperatures and to have sunlight to recharge batteries.
- weaksauce 7y agoJust watched the ted talk from the woman who came up with the algorithm to photograph the black hole and she had a slide of the best picture we can get of the moon from earth and she said each pixel on that picture could fit something like 600,000 oranges. don't think it's possible that we can see a spacecraft landing on the moon with what we have.
- 420codebro 7y agoIs the issue Earth's atmosphere (and other stuff) messing up the optical image at that range/detail/resolution? If a huge-camera-satellite (eg, spy-sat class) were placed at a Lagrange point, would it increase our ability to see at extremely high resolution? Sorry for the noob questions.
- aurailious 7y agoThe resolution a 10 meter telescope on Earth can make out of the moon is about 22 meters per pixel. We can yet make out the moon landing site with earth based telescope.
- dmurray 7y agoMaking a 23 metre mark on the moon seems like a natural project for some country, then. Perhaps easier than orchestrating a soft landing. There are lunar retroreflectors about a metre across [0] that are detectable with optical equipment, for some definition of optical. But to leave a mark that can be seen from earth - to leave your tag, or an X, or a crude drawing of a penis and testes - surely that's an urge as old as art itself. [0]https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/LRO/multimedia/lroimages/lroc-20100413-apollo15-LRRR.html https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/LRO/multimedia/lroimages/...
- Taniwha 7y agoThere was mention there about IMU issues - losing track of where you're pointing, then trying to recover could mean you're pointing the wrong way (while still running the main engine ....)
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- mmsimanga 7y agoIf at first, you fail, try and try again. This was sobering. I watched expecting the normal rush I get when watching live events of this nature but it was not to be.
- talhof8 7y agoStill a great achievement! An inspiration for all kids looking to do science.
- pfortuny 7y agoSo: first attempt to get to the moon (by them, who are not quite USA or China) and they just fail at the very end. Like getting a silver medal at the Olympics. Yes, sad. But man!
- hirundo 7y agoWith a population of < 3% of the USA, < 1% of China.
- nativeimigrant 7y agoIncluding the Palestinians?
- JackFr 7y agoVery important if attempt involves standing on shoulders!
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- moate 7y agoRight, and I'm sure they didn't get any tech or mission critical help from the US. Don't get me wrong, good on them for doing this, but let's not pretend like this happened in a bubble away from anyone else.
- sctb 7y agoDiscussion prior to the outcome: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19634570 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19634570.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- nativeimigrant 7y agoThey're obviously better at ethnic cleansing.
- ragebol 7y agoThat's got to be tough: successfully going ~300000km from Earth and then see it fail in the last couple hundred meters. With nothing you can do.
- moate 7y agoLandings and take offs are always the hardest part of any aerospace event. You're much more likely to see system or mechanical failures when you first start everything up or try to stop moving on an uneven surface.
- mrtksn 7y agoIt seems that they just got a new word in the dictionary: https://mobile.twitter.com/teamspaceil/status/1116312931103399937 https://mobile.twitter.com/teamspaceil/status/11163129311033... I find it a bit irritating to be that cocky when it comes to space technology. Better luck next time!
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- bluetidepro 7y agoI'm sure/I'd hope the actual engineers on the project wouldn't align to that tweet's wording by the marketing team (aka, they prob wouldn't be that cocky/have phrased it that way themselves).
- _Microft 7y agoPride comes before a fall. (scnr)
- ethbro 7y ago> Pride comes before a fall. (scnr) Only if your pride is traveling at less than 11.2 km/s.
- dredmorbius 7y agoAnd/or lithobraking.
- oska 7y agoContrast with Elon Musk saying the next launch of the Falcon Heavy (today) has a 5-10% chance of failure. [1] This is after it has already successfully launched once. [1] https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1115998728878321672 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1115998728878321672
- adventured 7y agoOr Musk persistently pointing out how he expected the first Falcon Heavy launch to explode as the most likely outcome. The early intense trauma of SpaceX failures I think taught him valuable lessons in humility when it comes to space.
- jesseab 7y agoIt's time to retire the tired old nation-state space-race narrative. We're all in this together people. Their failure is our failure.
- nativeimigrant 7y agoI'm as about as happy for them as I would have been for Germany during 30s and 40s.
- moate 7y agoAgree to disagree here. The whole "we're all one people thing" is a great idea and all (I'm a huge fan, would love for the U.N. to be something other than the personification of national relations and instead be a real governing body) but that's not how things work. This is Israel's project. They had assistance from other organizations/countries, but they're not doing this to better North Korea in any real way and you shouldn't hold North Korean responsible for their failure.
- brainpool 7y agoDisagree to agree here. It should really be how things can work. We have the opportunity and possibly the unity to get together on a vision for mankind for the first time in history. Obviously there are challenges, but if all people got to vote in their respective democraties for a global push to space - I would be surprised to not see it approved.
- SketchySeaBeast 7y ago> but if all people got to vote in their respective democraties for a global push to space Isn't that anathema to the current isolationist, nationalist bent a lot of the worlds biggest and baddest powers people seem to be adopting?
- oliveshell 7y agoWho cares? Doesn’t mean it’s not something we should hope for.
- oriolgg 7y agoI was just watching it live, cheering for SpaceIL, it's a pity that the landing was not successful. I was part of the engineering team of the Japanese team Hakuto of the Google Lunar XPRIZE. I always wondered how it would feel to be in the control room at this time, but our launch deal fell through. I can understand what the SpaceIL engineers are going through right now. Congratulations to all the SpaceIL team for reaching this far, your work has been impressive. Keep trying and you will make it!
- ronnier 7y agoMaybe not a success this time, but a lot will be learned. These types of failures are now we learn, adapt, and move forward.
- sanxiyn 7y agoI doubt SpaceIL will be able to use anything they learned. IIUC they are out of money and can't move forward.
- dmix 7y agoThe prime minister of Isreal announced they'll try again in two years. So that judgment may be a little premature. Regardless knowledge transfer isn't limited to either of those.
- sanxiyn 7y agoI understood incorrectly then. Nice to hear.
- dvirsky 7y agoWhat he said was more along the lines of "I hope we'll try again in a couple of years", really non committing.
- electriclove 7y ago
- jpindar 7y agoWhat appears to be the last image the spacecraft managed to send before it crashed: https://twitter.com/EladRatson/status/1116427960033136640 https://twitter.com/EladRatson/status/1116427960033136640
- techie128 7y agoDo I detect a bit of condescension in NYT's tone? Do we need to remind the numerous failures US & USSR had before they got their space program off the ground? Also, they forgot India who did send a lunar orbiter and sent a probe on Moon's surface back in 2008.
- sanxiyn 7y agoChandrayaan-1's Moon Impact Probe was an impactor, not a lander.
- ncmncm 7y agoBoth were, in the end. But this one was going slower.
- KSS42 7y agoI didn't notice any condescension in the article. I thought it was fairly positive towards the mission. Also, India was mentioned in the article.
- i_can_c_sharp 7y agoHow dare they. Condescending tone is not allowed when talking about anything that comes from the Chosen state.
- superduh 7y agoI'm not surprised, no one Israeli rocket every landed smoothly on Palestine
- sschueller 7y agoWhy did they not have live video of the landing attempt? Should be double shouldn't it? What was used in the 60s to broadcast the landing?
- sanxiyn 7y agoThis was an extremely low budget mission. Live video is of course doable, but probably not with the budget.
- matt4077 7y agoIt's hard to conjure much sympathy for a nationalistic boondoggle with little scientific value that's trying to participate in a space race that ended decades ago. Now, instead of a flag, they have a commemorative crater in the desert. Talk about symbolism...
- peteradio 7y agoSpace is not a race, its a jungle gym. Get on it.
- rsstack 7y agoThis project wasn't started by the state or by any university. This was a, mostly, volunteer project that wanted to excite children about STEM and space and to educate the young generation. The Prime Minister was invited because it was cool, but it was a private endeavour.
- _zachs 7y agoThink you missed the point there Matto.
- ncmncm 7y agoI just wonder if the encyclopedia survived. It seems possible.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- Symmetry 7y agoAs they say, space is hard and SpaceIL is hardly the first to have lost a lander. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missions_to_the_Moon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missions_to_the_Moon It came tantalizingly close to working, though, and I have high hopes for future attempts. Per aspera ad astra.
- jansan 7y agoThanks for teaching me a new Latin proverb. I like that very much.
- Jach 7y agoToo bad. "You just destroyed a 100 megabuck lander." Alternatively, 85% of a Juicero.
- peteradio 7y agoSo is this the first moon wreckage?
- olex 7y agoFar from it. Both the USA and USSR have crashed multiple landers before successfully touching one down. And that doesn't even count intentional "impactor" missions that came before that.
- JoeAltmaier 7y ago...and a billion years of meteorite rubble
- 51Cards 7y agoArticle subtitle: "The failure of the landing highlighted the risks of a fast and cheap approach to space exploration." I would say the opposite. Not specifically just in reference to this mission but in general. They now have a lot of experience and data to use going forward for "not much" expense. A lot of extremely expensive missions were lost because they didn't have the opportunity to iterate.
- mjevans 7y agoThe history of rocketry really took off during WW-II, and was further refined by the military (generic, but pretty much the nations that have successfully landed on the moon), further developing and releasing to civilian government, and eventually private interests. If I were to make a guess extrapolation to air-flight we're probably still roughly in the 1940s. Private space flight is making things more standard and long-run production instead of one-offs; but we aren't there yet and haven't found workhorse designs that are both reliable and cheap. Experiments like this will hopefully help us get there.
- ncmncm 7y ago30s, but OK. Aircraft production was fully industrial going into the 40s.
- chasd00 7y agoyeah that's kind of a ridiculous statement. Big and expensive approaches to space exploration fail just the same.
- pnathan 7y agothe US had a tremendous number of rockets lost early on in the space program. Each was a learning opportunity. hats off to SpaceIL! I look forward to following their next go at it.
- rdxm 7y agospace is hard
- dmitryminkovsky 7y agoI don't understand how you even attempt to recover from failures that occur during a descent like this. Latency to the moon appears to be 1.3 seconds. How much time do you have to do anything?
- deathhand 7y agoMultiple 'if' statements and then backup modules loaded with more 'ifs'
- sandworm101 7y agoA hard landing is still a landing. This is rocket science, not general aviation.
- sharksauce 7y agoThe saddest thing is that the moon men are still bereft of queso: https://www.kvue.com/article/news/weird/austin-queso-launched-into-space-crash-lands-on-the-moon/269-b9180441-c518-40c4-af37-1898ba9e528b https://www.kvue.com/article/news/weird/austin-queso-launche...
- deathhand 7y agoWhy do we give aid to space fairing nations? Couldn't the aid be better spent on our own space program?
- scarejunba 7y agoBecause if you just gave billions of dollars to Lockheed-Martin, Boeing, and Raytheon people would complain. So you give it to someone and make them buy from these guys.
- gerash 7y agoIt seems Israel is doing just fine economically and technologically. So I don't get why US politicians still justify giving out O($billion) every year in foreign aid while there are ample opportunities to spend them in their own country.
- tick_tock_tick 7y agoCause all the aid is conditioned on them using it to buy US military hardware. It's roundabout military spending.
- Udik 7y ago> Cause all the aid is conditioned on them using it to buy US military hardware Not true, only 3/4 of it. And it's not an explanation, otherwise they could give the same aid to any other country, but they don't. "Israel is the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign assistance since World War II." https://fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL33222.pdf https://fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL33222.pdf
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- bsaul 7y agoyou give aid to political allies that share a common view of what democracy is about, and face high military threats. Budget for this lunar mission is probably extremely small compared to military spendings.
- nicodjimenez 7y agoAfter seeing how people drive in Tel Aviv, I'm not surprised.
- i_can_c_sharp 7y agoWhy are we not boycotting this apartheid state? Their Prime Minister just announced annexation of the larger part of West Bank. It shows what their ultimate goal is and always was. Peace talks are just smoke and mirrors.
- volkisch 7y agoIt seems jews aren't allowed on the Moon. A wise decision by TPTB.
- nayyad 7y agoSo now you want to convince me that in 1969 they could man land on the moon and then come back to earth and in 2019 they still trying to nail down the tech ?
- rorykoehler 7y agoHow much did NASA spend in the 60s?
- nayyad 7y agoWhat technologies did they have in the 60s? I computer used to cost thousands of dollars and its the size of your room in the 60s also.
- rorykoehler 7y agoWe have both landed and crashed on Mars and the Moon recently. We're not just trying to figure this out, we're trying to figure it out AND do it cheaply.
- Ice_cream_suit 7y agoGreat name ! In Hebrew, it means " In the beginning..."
- outside1234 7y agoKarma's a bitch
- acomjean 7y agoWell they got very close. I really can't get enough of images from space. The gallery linked from the article was pretty good. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/04/11/science/spaceil-beresheet-moon-photos.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/04/11/science/space... I haven't been able to find what it would have done had it landed correctly. (edit) I guess it had a few scientific instruments and a "time-capsule" of sorts. Wikipedia editors are fast, they already have the crash on there. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceIL https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceIL --------------- Payload The spacecraft carried a "time capsule" created by the Arch Mission Foundation, containing over 30 million pages of analog and digital data, including a full copy of the English-language Wikipedia, the Wearable Rosetta disc, the PanLex database, a Nano Bible (complete Bible in Hebrew), children's drawings, a children's book inspired by the space launch, memoirs of a Holocaust survivor, Israel's national anthem (Hatikvah), the Israeli flag, and a copy of the Israeli Declaration of Independence.[8][35][36][37][38] Its scientific payload included a magnetometer supplied by the Israeli Weizmann Institute of Science to measure the local magnetic field, and a laser retroreflector array supplied by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center to enable precise measurements of the Earth–Moon distance.[39][40] --------------------- As an aside, the youtube video series on the original Apollo launch computer it pretty neat. (The core memory on those old machines was nuts..) https://www.youtube.com/user/mverdiell/videos https://www.youtube.com/user/mverdiell/videos
- draw_down 7y agoSo will they just leave the debris up there? Will there just be wreckage on the moon now? (Maybe there already was?)
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- m0zg 7y agoSurprised by the sheer number of naysayers on the thread. What is wrong with you people? 7th country to get that far in space, 4th to attempt to land, those are enormous achievements for a country that's has 2/3rds the population of New York (city, not state) and doesn't have a hundred billion dollars to burn in a dick-measuring contest. They'll launch another one and land next time. If Israel knows anything, it's how to persevere.
- rmason 7y agoI am not sure what connection that Buzz Aldrin had to the folks at SpaceIL but thought he had a pretty classy tweet tonight. Guess everyone in the space community pulls for each other. https://twitter.com/TheRealBuzz/status/1116458014708420608 https://twitter.com/TheRealBuzz/status/1116458014708420608