S Stacked SpaceX Launch Is Sending Groundbreaking Science To The Moon And Beyond

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Should Wednesday's launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy Space Center proceed as planned, it's gonna be carrying a buttload of science with it.

The rocket will be carrying not one, not two, but three important payloads, including a satellite set to orbit the Moon, a privately operated lunar lander, and a spacecraft that could pave the way for asteroid mining. It's also launching an unidentified 16U satellite, managed by Exolaunch, that'll park itself in geostationary Earth orbit.

While the mission's launch window opens on February 26, with blastoff ideally occurring at 7:17 p.m. ET from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, these types of things can get delayed in a hurry if conditions aren't optimal. That said, the 45th Weather Squadron is currently predicting 95% chance of favorable conditions at launch, so things are looking good. NASA will be livestreaming the launch on its website . Alternately, you can watch it at the livestreams below, courtesy of NASA Spaceflight.

After decades of largely being ignored, the Moon has become an object of increased fascination, and two items on the manifest could provide data that contributes to the goal of building crewed bases on the lunar surface. That includes a Nova-C lander, dubbed Athena, built by Intuitive Machines for NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program.

In February 2024, Intuitive Machines became the first private company to successfully land on the Moon, though there was a slight snafu. The company's Odysseus ended up getting one of its legs caught, causing it to tumble on its side. Like Odysseus, Athena is set to land on the Moon's South Pole region, specifically an area called Mons Mouton. The lander is equipped with a drill and mass spectrometer, which it will use—if all goes well—to search for and measure chemical components like water, carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus that could support future crewed exploration of the Moon.

Hitching a ride on the lander will be Grace, a Micro-Nova robot designed to hop in and out of a permanently shadowed crater. While inside the crater, Grace will search for water and snap a few photos.

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