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NASA Completes LADEE Mission


Waspie_Dwarf

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NASA Completes LADEE Mission with Planned Impact on Moon's Surface

Ground controllers at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif., have confirmed that NASA's Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) spacecraft impacted the surface of the moon, as planned, between 9:30 and 10:22 p.m. PDT Thursday, April 17.

LADEE lacked fuel to maintain a long-term lunar orbit or continue science operations and was intentionally sent into the lunar surface. The spacecraft's orbit naturally decayed following the mission's final low-altitude science phase.

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I think this is hardly a moment to be proud of, No matter how beautiful the scientific poetry colours it, this type of reckless abandon should cease immediately. At the cheapest convenient moment I hope a clean up crew is deployed to retrieve the lunar rubbish.

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I think this is hardly a moment to be proud of, No matter how beautiful the scientific poetry colours it, this type of reckless abandon should cease immediately.

I do not think that anybody is some kind of proud about this event and it is likely that there was no other option

than the one carried out. As LANDEE lacked on fuel it is likely that there was even no or not enough fuel for an

orbit escape burn to take the probe away from the moon and away from the zone of influence of moons/earth

gravity to avoid a comeback as space debris as this would endanger current and future missions.

At the cheapest convenient moment I hope a

clean up crew is deployed to retrieve the lunar rubbish.

*spacepalm*

Edited by toast
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*spacepalm*

:clap:

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taniwha, LADEE impacted the Moon at around 3,600 mph. You do realise that the energy realised by such an impact is going to basically vaporise a small spacecraft don't you?

Actually, that is a rhetorical question, clearly you don't realise that.

There will be no lunar debris to retrieve, just a small, new crater.

Edited by Waspie_Dwarf
typo.
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NASA Completes LADEE Mission with Planned Impact on Moon's Surface

On April 17, 2014, between 9:30 p.m and 10:22 p.m. PDT, NASA's Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) spacecraft successfully completed a planned de-orbit, bringing an end to the mission to study the structure and composition of the thin lunar atmosphere.

For more information about the LADEE mission, please visit: http://www.nasa.gov/LADEE

For more information about NASA Ames, please visit: http://www.nasa.gov/ames

Credit: NASA/Ames Research Center

Source: NASA/Ames - Multimedia

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