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NASA he has chosen SpaceX To launch the next alien hunting mission to Jupiter’s moons.
The mission, called the Europa Clipper, is designed to pass Jupiter’s moon Europa 45 times, approaching 16 miles above its surface. Scientists believe that the moon hides the global oceans beneath its icy crust, and that alien life can thrive in its depths.
NASA announce Friday, it is said to have set a date for the mission and awarded a $178 million launch contract to SpaceX. Now the Europa Clipper is slated to launch on the company’s Falcon Heavy rocket in October 2024.
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The SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket launches on a test flight from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
NASA / Kim Shefflet
The Europa Clipper’s main goal is to determine if Europa can host life at all. It aims to capture high-resolution images of the moon’s surface, plot the composition and thickness of its ice crust, search for lakes below the surface, and measure the depth and salinity of the ocean below.
The spacecraft can fly through the plumes of water vapor spewing out Europa’s ice, as they are known to reach more than 100 miles above the surface. This water appears to have come from the ocean below, and could contain signs of life.
The reason Europa keeps water in a liquid state is because it follows an elliptical orbit around Jupiter. The giant planet’s gravity stretches and relaxes the moon, and this friction heats Europa’s salty water, keeping it liquid. The warmth from this process also allowed the moon to harbor deep-sea ecosystems.
SpaceX has become a NASA favorite
SpaceX, the rocket company founded by Elon Musk in 2002, is not studying other planets. But it’s about launching something for NASA, and the agency is giving companies more opportunities to do that.
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SpaceX was founded by Elon Musk in 2002.
Hannibal Hanschke Paul / Getty Images
SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft transported NASA astronauts to the International Space Station last year. This is the first time the United States has launched its own astronauts since the space shuttle program ended in 2011. SpaceX now regularly transports astronauts to and from the space station.
In April, NASA awarded SpaceX a contract to operate it in development Big spaceship on moon lander. The agency says that Starship is slated to land on the moon in 2024 (though that timeline may not be realistic). It will be the first human landing on the Moon since the Apollo missions ended in 1972.
decision Challenge driven from rival rocket makers Blue Origin and Dynetics because NASA’s original plan was to select two of three companies for the moon landing contract. The protests required NASA to order SpaceX to stop work on the lunar lander.
SpaceX has also yet to win a new Europa Clipper contract without competition. for me Eric BergerA senior space editor at Ars Technica, Congress has spent years urging NASA to launch missions aboard the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket. But lawmakers eventually gave in because of delays in developing the launch system, its high cost, and a recent technical issue that required $1 billion to fix, Berger said.
According to Berger, NASA could save nearly $2 billion by launching missions aboard Falcon Heavy instead of SLS.
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