{"id":17618,"date":"2020-12-09T20:13:26","date_gmt":"2020-12-09T12:13:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/blue-origins-team-turns-in-its-moon-landing-proposal-and-provides-a-sneak-peek\/"},"modified":"2020-12-09T20:13:26","modified_gmt":"2020-12-09T12:13:26","slug":"blue-origins-team-turns-in-its-moon-landing-proposal-and-provides-a-sneak-peek","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/blue-origins-team-turns-in-its-moon-landing-proposal-and-provides-a-sneak-peek\/","title":{"rendered":"Blue Origin\u2019s team turns in its moon landing proposal \u2014 and provides a sneak peek"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_595392\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-595392\" style=\"width: 630px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full-width wp-image-595392\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/201209-landingsystem-630x354.jpg\" alt=\"National Team landing system\" width=\"630\" height=\"354\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/201209-landingsystem-630x354.jpg 630w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/201209-landingsystem-1260x709.jpg 1260w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/201209-landingsystem-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/201209-landingsystem-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/201209-landingsystem-2048x1152.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 630px) 100vw, 630px\"><figcaption data-nosnippet=\"\" id=\"caption-attachment-595392\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">An artist\u2019s conception shows the three main elements of the human landing system being proposed by a team led by Blue Origin. Northrop Grumman\u2019s transfer element is at left, Blue Origin\u2019s descent element is in the middle, and Lockheed Martin\u2019s ascent element is at right. (Blue Origin Illustration)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos\u2019 Blue Origin venture and its partners in the space industry say they\u2019ve given NASA their proposal for a landing system designed to carry astronauts down to the surface of the moon and bring them back up. And they\u2019ve released a 10-minute video explaining how they plan to do it.<\/p>\n<p>This week\u2019s submission of the Blue Origin-led team\u2019s so-called Option A proposal marks a critical step in NASA\u2019s process to select the commercial ventures that will build the human landing system (or systems) for its Artemis moon program. The current schedule calls for the first crewed Artemis landing to take place in 2024, although that date may slip.<\/p>\n<p>NASA has identified three potential providers for the landing system, which would link up with NASA\u2019s Orion deep-space capsule or the yet-to-be-built Gateway platform in high lunar orbit. In addition to Blue Origin\u2019s \u201cNational Team,\u201d California-based SpaceX and a team led by Alabama-based Dynetics are in the running.<\/p>\n<p>Early next year, NASA is expected to select one or two teams to move on to the next phase of development.<\/p>\n<p>Blue Origin\u2019s main contribution to the National Team is to build the system\u2019s descent element, which is based on its Blue Moon lander design.<\/p>\n<p>Three stalwarts of the space industry are focusing on other elements of the landing system: Lockheed Martin is to build the ascent element, which is based on the design for its Orion capsule and will contain the Artemis crew during their trips to and from the lunar surface. Northrop Grumman will build the transfer element, which is based on the design for its Cygnus cargo craft and will provide propulsion for the lander in lunar orbit. Draper is working on avionics.<\/p>\n<p>The National Team provided a progress report in a video released today.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"Tech Demos for NASA\u2019s Artemis Program\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/w6bTFpjeFgE?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen=\"\" data-ratio=\"0.5625\" data-width=\"800\" data-height=\"450\" style=\"display: block; margin: 0px; width: 800px; height: 450px;\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>In the seven months since it was selected as an Option A prospect, the team has been working behind the scenes to execute 25 technical demonstrations, said Brent Sherwood, Blue Origin\u2019s vice president for advanced development programs.<\/p>\n<p>Those tests include this month\u2019s trial runs for Blue Origin\u2019s BE-7 rocket engine, October\u2019s in-space demonstration of a precision landing system, simulated docking tests and cryogenic tests for propellant tanks.<\/p>\n<p>Steve Squyres, Blue Origin\u2019s chief scientist, confirmed that Blue Origin is planning an uncrewed cargo mission to the moon\u2019s south polar region, one year in advance of the crewed Artemis mission, to demonstrate the capabilities of the descent element.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat provides an enormous amount of risk reduction,\u201d said Squyres, a veteran of NASA\u2019s Mars Exploration Rover missions. \u201cWe get to practice. We get to try everything out first, without crew on board, and so we learn from that. We\u2019re going to learn an enormous amount.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A graphic accompanying Squyres video explanation shows the uncrewed Blue Moon lander using an onboard crate to lower a rover to the surface. The graphic suggests that other payloads could be ejected to the surface from the top of the lander.<\/p>\n<p>The video includes a big-name endorsement from Harrison Schmitt, who was one of the last astronauts to walk on the moon and now serves as a member of Blue Origin\u2019s science advisory board. \u201cThe National Team is the kind of outstanding leadership, outstanding experience that I like to work with,\u201d Schmitt said.<\/p>\n<p>But the last word in the video goes to Bezos \u2014 who\u2019s been funding Blue Origin, headquartered in Kent, Wash., for the past 20 years.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have to use the resources of space,\u201d Bezos says in a clip that\u2019s taken from last year\u2019s unveiling of the Blue Moon lander concept. \u201cWe must have a future for our grandchildren and their grandchildren. We were given a gift, this nearby body called the moon. And it\u2019s this generation\u2019s job to build that road to space, so that the future generations can unleash their creativity. None of this is easy. All of it is hard. Big things start small.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An artist\u2019s conception shows the three main elements of the human landing system being proposed by a team led by Blue Origin. Northrop Grumman\u2019s transfer element is at left, Blue Origin\u2019s descent element is in the middle, and Lockheed Martin\u2019s ascent element is at right. (Blue Origin Illustration) Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos\u2019 Blue Origin venture [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[304,1508,509,4572,472,625,190,554],"class_list":["post-17618","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-artemis","tag-blue-moon","tag-blue-origin","tag-draper-lab","tag-lockheed-martin","tag-moon","tag-nasa","tag-northrop-grumman"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17618"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17618"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17618\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17618"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}