NASA will look again on 2022 very fondly certainly.
The space company had rather a lot to have a good time this 12 months, from the deployment and operation of the $10 billion James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to the end-to-end success of the pioneering Artemis 1 moon mission.
“2022 will go down as one of the crucial achieved years in all of NASA historical past,” NASA Administrator Invoice Nelson instructed company staff throughout a city corridor assembly on Tuesday (Dec. 13).
Associated: James Webb Space Telescope’s 1st photos (gallery)
Nelson cited JWST as one in every of his chief examples. The large observatory launched on Dec. 25, 2021, then spent a month touring to its last vacation spot, a gravitationally secure spot almost 1 million miles (1.6 million kilometers) from Earth.
JWST aced its frighteningly advanced deployment sequence, which featured almost 350 single factors of failure — particular person steps that will scuttle all the mission in the event that they weren’t accomplished efficiently. JWST’s testing and checkout phase additionally went effectively, and the infrared telescope began observing the heavens in July.
The primary few months of science have been eye-opening and eye-watering; JWST has already peered at a few of the universe’s most distant galaxies, for instance, and characterized the atmosphere of a close-by alien planet.
“Earlier this 12 months, the James Webb House Telescope kicked off a brand new period of astronomy,” Nelson stated. “Each picture is a brand new discovery. It deepens our understanding of the universe, simply how huge it’s, and our place in it.”
Nelson additionally talked about the company’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission, which slammed a spacecraft into an asteroid moonlet known as Dimorphos in late September.
The collision considerably modified Dimorphos’ orbit round its father or mother physique, a bigger space rock known as Didymos, serving to researchers higher perceive the “kinetic impactor” technique of asteroid deflection.
The DART impression was “a watershed second for planetary protection,” Nelson stated. “It was a smashing success, actually and figuratively.”
Nelson additionally hailed the landmark Artemis 1 mission, which despatched an uncrewed Orion capsule to lunar orbit and again.
Artemis 1, the first-ever mission for NASA’s big Space Launch System rocket and the second for Orion, lifted off on Nov. 16. It wrapped up when Orion splashed down within the Pacific Ocean about 100 miles (160 kilometers) off Baja California on Sunday (Dec. 11) — 50 years to the day that the ultimate Apollo mission, Apollo 17, touched down on the lunar floor.
NASA can now start gearing up for Artemis 2, which is scheduled to ship 4 astronauts across the moon in 2024. If all goes effectively with that flight, Artemis 3 will put boots down close to the lunar south pole in 2025 or 2026.
Preparations for these and different Artemis flights will proceed all through 2023; NASA already has {hardware} in progress to final by way of the Artemis 5 mission, company officers have stated.
And there is extra to stay up for subsequent 12 months as effectively, such because the return to Earth of asteroid samples collected in deep space by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx probe. That materials will contact down within the Utah desert next September, if all goes in keeping with plan.
“I am wanting ahead to each day in 2023,” Nelson stated.
Mike Wall is the creator of “Out There (opens in new tab)” (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated by Karl Tate), a guide in regards to the seek for alien life. Comply with him on Twitter @michaeldwall (opens in new tab). Comply with us on Twitter @Spacedotcom (opens in new tab) or on Facebook (opens in new tab).
