Pittsburgh engineer played vital role in Astrobotic mission

Four more minutes, and Pittsburgh’s flailing lunar lander could have been lost in space.

Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic did not become the first commercial company to successfully land on the moon.

But without the quick thinking of a Pittsburgh-based engineer, the company’s lander, which traveled more than 30,000 miles from Earth and back might not have been able to collect valuable data during its flight or control its trajectory through space at all.

Peregrine, Astrobotic’s lunar lander, burned up in the atmosphere and broke apart over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean on Thursday afternoon, the company confirmed.

Before that, it flew on a trajectory from Earth out to the orbital path of the moon and then back toward Earth.

Peregrine was supposed to land on the moon and become the first commercial company to achieve this feat. But a fuel leak made a soft landing on the moon impossible.

Astrobotic CEO John Thornton said the company made the tough decision to bring the lander back toward Earth, instead of attempting a slingshot around the planet to hit the moon on its second pass.

Days before making the decision to return Peregrine to Earth, it wasn’t clear whether the spacecraft was going to be able to function at all, Thornton said.

A United Launch Alliance rocket carried Peregrine successfully from takeoff in Cape Canaveral, Fla., on Jan. 8. Thornton said the rocket placed the lander at the perfect injection point.

After Peregrine successfully separated from the rocket, the lander immediately faced problems. An anomaly in the propulsion system meant the lander was having trouble orienting its solar panels toward the sun to charge its batteries. Also, direct communication with the lander was lost.

Thornton said Peregrine had six hours before battery power would run out.

But one Astrobotic engineer working out of mission control at company headquarters in Pittsburgh was up to the task.

Solar power

Thornton said engineer Josh Shaffer sent a command to Peregrine that successfully reoriented the lander to face the sun, enabling the solar panels to recharge the batteries.

Shaffer’s command was completed just four minutes before battery power would have been exhausted, Thornton said. He said Astrobotic didn’t immediately know if the move was successful. He called it a “thrilling moment” when communication was restored.

Thornton said Shaffer’s deep understanding of the code and his work helping to build it into the lander was invaluable.

He said Shaffer was one of the heroes of the mission.

“Our mission control team in Pittsburgh kept their cool and diagnosed the problem,” he said. “We have a mission control team that can handle every stressful situation.”

Mission control for Peregrine was run in a large room inside Astrobotic’s headquarters on North Lincoln Avenue in Pittsburgh’s Manchester neighborhood.

Thornton said a team of engineers, scientists, and others worked around the clock out of Pittsburgh while Peregrine was in space.

“Basically, everything that occurred from the time Peregrine separated from the rocket to when it came back to Earth was from mission control in Pittsburgh,” he said.

Failures and successes

Ultimately, Thornton acknowledged, Peregrine did not fulfill its mission. The lander was tasked with delivering payloads to the moon from private entities, including Carnegie Mellon University and NASA, which awarded Astrobotic a $79.5 million contract.

“We did not achieve the primary objective of landing on the moon, but had success after success after the anomaly,” said Thornton, noting the private payloads were able to collect data and achieve milestones, and the lander’s fuel reserve estimations kept improving.

Once Peregrine regained power, Astrobotic discovered the lander’s fuel reserves were still too low for a soft lunar landing, Thornton said.

He said the company’s hypothesis is that a valve between a helium tank and an oxidizer tank malfunctioned and sent helium rushing too quickly into the oxidizer, which ruptured the tank.

It’s unclear exactly why the valve malfunctioned. Thornton said the company is starting a review board to deeper analyze the mission, which includes experts from NASA.

Thornton said the leak progressively got smaller throughout the mission, but there wasn’t enough fuel to accomplish the mission. He said the propulsion and the engines were activated as Peregrine reentered Earth’s atmosphere and enabled the team to move the lander into a more remote part of the Pacific Ocean.

Also, with power working throughout the mission, Astrobotic was able to activate all of its payloads and gather data while in space.

Thornton said one payload gathered 92 hours of radiation data. Mexico made history as the first country in Latin America to have a working instrument in space between Earth and the moon with its payload.

Dan Hendrickson, vice president of Business Development at Astrobotic, said payload customers were disappointed Peregrine didn’t reach the moon, but they also understood the challenges.

He said the failed mission has not impacted the customer support and Astrobotic already has entered into agreements for payloads for future missions.

Thornton said only 50% of lunar missions have been successful.

A Japanese government mission soft-landed on the moon Friday, shortly before the Astrobotic news conference, but the Japanese robotic explorer is having trouble generating solar power and it’s too soon to determine whether the mission will be a success, CNN reported.

Thornton said Astrobotic believes Peregrine accomplished two of its missions: stable flight of the lander and payload communication. He acknowledged that this doesn’t constitute a success.

NASA will determine the extent to which the Peregrine mission failed. Ten percent of the awarded contract was contingent on mission success.

Joel Kearns, director of NASA’s lunar science program, said Astrobotic was the first private company to launch an American lunar lander on a mission to the moon.

He praised Astrobotic for Peregrine’s ability to collect data on the space environment on the way to the moon and said he believes NASA’s $9 million worth of instruments aboard Peregrine could have operated if they had reached the moon.

Kearns recognized Astrobotic’s obstacles are the same as all lunar missions.

“A successful soft landing on the moon is extremely challenging,” he said. “Space is hard for a reason. Failure is often part of the road to success.”

Peregrine was part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative. Kearns said he expects several other CLPS missions to launch in 2024, including another for Astrobotic.

He said nothing in the failed Peregrine mission will deter NASA from continuing to support CLPS missions. Kearns added that the CLPS initiative has a broader goal of boosting the county’s nascent space industry.

Astrobotic’s next mission

Thornton said Astrobotic is on schedule to launch its next lander, Griffin, in November.

Griffin is three times the size of Peregrine. The larger lander will carry NASA’s Viper rover and help to maneuver the rover down a ramp onto the surface of the moon.

Kearns said NASA hasn’t adjusted its plans with the Griffin mission, and any adjustments will be determined dependent on findings from the Peregrine review.

Thornton said he believes the experience from the Peregrine mission will help Griffin succeed. He said Astrobotic engineers are working on Griffin now.

He said the company is still committed to becoming the first or one of the first private entities to land successfully on the moon.

“We are emboldened by this,” Thornton said. “We are motivated to make it successful this time.”