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NASA Pauses Psyche, a Mission to a Metal-Rich Asteroid - The New York Times

NASA Pauses Psyche, a Mission to a Metal-Rich Asteroid - The New York Times

NASA Pauses Psyche, a Mission to a Metal-Rich Asteroid - The New York Times
Jun 24, 2022 1 min, 18 secs

Computer software delays pushed back the launch of a NASA spacecraft to explore what appears to be a metal asteroid that may be the core of a protoplanet that was blown apart in the early days of the solar system by a giant collision.

The completed spacecraft, named Psyche after the asteroid it is to visit in the main belt between Mars and Jupiter, is sitting at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida and had been scheduled to launch from there on Aug.

In addition, the testing setup, which sends signals to the spacecraft computer making it think it is already in space, did not work properly when engineers tried to merge components from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, which is managing the mission, and Maxar, the company that built the Psyche spacecraft.

NASA officials said it was too early to know how much the delay would add to the $985 million price tag, which includes the Falcon Heavy launch.

Now, the Psyche mission team is back to considering launches in 2023 and 2024, and the spacecraft would not reach the asteroid until 2029 or 2030.

The setback does not just delay Psyche, but also the Janus mission, two small identical spacecraft that are to tag along for launch before heading off to explore two pairs of binary asteroids.

Another NASA mission at the Kennedy Space Center announced better news on Friday.

Still, NASA officials decided they now have enough data to get the rocket ready for its launch, a mission that will send a capsule, without astronauts aboard, on a trip around the moon

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