Emily posted a very nice article in her blog on the SMART-1 lunar impact in September this year. Here's a map of the targeted point:

Click to view attachment

But as Emily explained, the actual point may be off because of uncertainties about topography.

I'm starting this thread to have a place for news and opinions on it, and - I really hope - maybe some observations at the time from any amateur astronomers out there. This event will be the last event to make it into my atlas. I've left a space for it, and I will make the final maps and fit them in, and then send the stuff off to the publisher.

Phil

The March 16 edition of LPOD has an image of the SMART-1
impact region from Lunar Orbiter 4:

http://www.lpod.org/?m=20060316

Interesting quote:

"The good news is that SMART-1 has captured thousands of images of the Moon; the bad news is that because of the daily pressures of flying the mission the team will not have time to start archiving the images and release then until after the impact. Apparently many of the images have not been looked at by anyone!"

Now, why doesn't that excuse work for, say, MSSS? Well, I guess SMART-1 doesn't have a "People's Camera" installed.

Pah! We'd have looked at them if they'd let us...

In the famous words of the Eurovision Song Contest: ESA - Nil Points!

Bob Shaw

Somehow, they get away with that excuse across the whole of ESA.

Doug

SMART-1 @ Home?

As a taxpayer who funds an admittedly minuscle component of this I am embarassed. The science is good and theadministration is defensible but the public outreach is abysmal.
Oh well - time to ping my MEP yet again.

What we need is Esawatch - I'm not a Cowing fan, but at least he asks the awkward questions from time to time.

Doug

Do you really think an "ESAWatch" would work in Europe, given that U.S. "democracy" materially differs from European "democracy"? We (the U.S.) have our faults, as Europeans are more than willing to point out, but there are some ideas that work here that, in my opinion, wouldn't be easily transplantable to Europe. That said, I would love to see someone give ESA a dose of the "Cowing treatment," even if only for the sake of Schadenfreude.

I'm not optimistic about the results; I'm no expert, but has *any* impacting spacecraft or spent booster on the Moon generated a confirmed flash or ejecta sighting from Earth?

A very good question.

There is general agreement, I believe, that the Hiten impact on 10 April 1993 was visible, in fact imaged in IR (Google will lead you to the image). Like SMART-1 it was in darkness near the terminator on the near side.

There were poorly documented reports that Luna 2's impact was observed (Sky & Tel. Nov 1960 p. 265). Similarly Luna 5's upper stage rocket (New Scientist, soon after impact, but I don't have the reference yet), and Luna 7 (unpublished MSC internal report in LPI library). Most western observers discounted these reports, and strenuous efforts to view the Ranger impacts came to nothing. But modern CCD and IR imaging should do much better. I personally have little doubt that SMART-1 is at the very least worth making an effort to see, and in fact will probably be imaged.

Phil

Dust cloud produced by Luna-5 impacting the lunar surface:

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntr..._1979073878.pdf

Thanks for the answers, people.

Very useful new report on the impact:

http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/object/in...objectid=38988#

Phil

I wonder if the lens cap is off...

This map shows the target locations from the report just referred to. The original point may have been a statement of the nominal perilune rather than the actual impact point, misquoted in the press.

I'm just plotting coordinates on the old LAC chart. The points might be a bit off because of improved selenodetic control since the 60s.

Phil

Click to view attachment

So, like, they're gonna crash it into, like, Lake Excellent, dude?

Excellent!!!! ((insert bad air guitar riff here))

-the Other S. Doug, Esq.

I prefer a Mr Burns-style "Eeeeexcellent!"

Phil

Shall anyone let us know the impact location in the Moon longitudinal and latitud's coordinates. I am not able to ubicate the Lacus Excelentia, forgive me, into an excellent lake!

Rodolfo

Can't give you lat\lon but this puts it in context, Clausius is on the upper left. Looking at the whole moon it is slightly above and to the left of Tycho (the bright crater with very prominent ejecta rays in the southern hemisphere).

ESA press release today:
SMART-1 manoeuvres prepare for mission end

Looks like they're getting ready for the ending. I was wondering if anybody who knows more about lunar geography than I do could take a look at the unfortunately rather low-quality illustration of the impact site in that story and tell me if it looks like the same location as the one posted here previously.

--Emily

Final operational report for the SMART-1 mission.

http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/object/in...fobjectid=39395

That was an interesting article. The following paragraph got my attention.



I thought all you could do with reaction wheels is change spin and orientation, I didn't realize you
could change velocity as well. Does that only work while in a gravity field or can that work in free space
also?

Gary:

I read that, and pondered also. I think the key was in the concurrent mention of attitude-control jet firings - I have the impression that they were 'hanging' the vehicle on the reaction wheels and firing the jets to create a force applied in the appropriate direction (the RCS jets wouldn't be balanced through the vehicle CG the way that the ion drive would be). It's all down to vectors... ...and the article could have been clearer!

Bob Shaw

It's "nice" but not always "necessary" to have balanced attitude control jets, with two jets on opposite sides of a spacecraft's center-of-gravity firing in perfect opposition to rotate the spacecraft without any change in velocity. For a spacecraft doing fine attitude and translational maneuvers in close proximity to another spacecraft, like an Apollo rendezvouis and docking, yes, it's necessary, but often, it's not.

That, of course, is what killed Mars Climate Orbiter. The spacecraft was assymetrical, with one solar panel, and offloaded solar light pressure which slowly spun up the momentum wheels with weekly attitude thruster firings. The firings also imparted a small velocity change on the spacecraft that needed to be included in trajectory calculations. It was.. in the wrong units (english vs metric) throwing off the trajectory models in a particularly insidious way.

SMART-1 towards final impact
European Space Agency
4 August 2006

“Any harm for the Moon?

Nearly 50 years ago, in 1959, the Russian Luna-2 spacecraft was the first man-made object to hit the Moon. Since then many others have done the same, without any noticeable harm, and SMART-1’s impact will be softer than that of any man-made impactor up till now.
... The crater made by SMART-1 will be 3 to 10 metres wide and perhaps a metre deep. The Moon already has 100 000 craters that are more than four kilometres wide, and every day several small meteoroids make craters as big as SMART-1’s.
Every chemical element present on SMART-1 and in its equipment exists naturally on the Moon. For instance aluminium and iron are very common. Hydrogen, carbon and nitrogen are much scarcer on the Moon, but they arrive naturally onto the surface from the solar wind and from the impacts of icy fragments of comets, which contain many elements. From this point of view, one can think of SMART-1 as an artificial comet. Furthermore, the little hydrazine left in the SMART-1 thrusters will burn immediately at impact. “

...Interesting (and a bit silly if not creepy) that ESA took pains to explain that Smart-1’s crash would have a minimal impact on the moon. I suppose they know their audience well and presume them to be extraordinarily green and caring about our fragile little satellite...

Certain Native American groups were upset to learn that Lunar Prospector contained
the ashes of Gene Shoemaker when it crashed on the Moon in 1998, as they consider
our nearest celestial neighbor to be sacred. Muslims also consider the Moon to be
important to their faith.

James Oberg had an article some time ago about radical-Islamic objection to space exploration. There is a strong embracing of the Apollo hoax theories too. I guess the greens also object to space exploration, but usually on the grounds of using petroleum in rockets. And of course, if there is even a small RTG in a space probe, some people go nuts.

But remember that Muslims have made important contributions to space. Farouk El-Bas, for example, is a highly honored scientist in the US program.

Radicalism isn't about Islam or Christianity or ecology. It is just ambitious people searching for political opportunities. If you are curious about some theory, read The True Believer by the philosopher, Eric Hoffer.

Oh, my personal favorite crank political protest -- some people objected to NASA's Deep Impact mission, claiming that if the orbit of the comet was perturbed, it might collide with the Earth someday. :-)

I am assuming you mean plutonium

Lunar research opportunity

As many of you are aware, the ESA's SMART-1 lunar probe is scheduled to spiral down over the next three weeks, culminating in its impacting the Lunar surface on 3 September 2006.

During its descent through the Moon's tenuous atmosphere, our colleague Claudio Maccone has proposed that as many of us as possible monitor its S-band and X-band beacons, to analyze the nature of the Lunar atmosphere through sounding measurements.

He has secured time on the 32 metre VLBI antenna in Medicina to support these measurements. I know several of you have been doing Deep Space Network monitoring - now is your chance to make a significant amateur contribution to science.

Claudio's research proposal to the Istituto di Radioastronomia appears (in English) at:

http://www.setileague.org/articles/maccone.pdf

Please take a look, and contact Claudio at the email address (clmaccon@libero.it) with
cc to me, if you are able to participate in this important experiment. Thanks.

If any of you are in touch with other amateur groups (SARA, ERAC, AMSAT, etc.) that may be interested in monitoring SMART-1, please feel free to cross-post this email to their various Lists.

--
H. Paul Shuch, Ph.D.
Executive Director Emeritus, The SETI League, Inc.
http://www.setileague.org
n6tx@setileague.org

NEWS RELEASE

For immediate release: 2006 July 18

For more information -- Glenn A. Walsh:

Daytime: E-Mail gawalsh@planetarium.cc

Evening: Telephone 412-561-7876

Space Probe Crash on Moon May Be Visible to
Amateur Astronomers with Large Telescopes

Pittsburgh, July 18 – “On the evening of September 2, observers in the eastern half of North America with moderately large telescopes may get a chance to see the European SMART-1 spacecraft crash into the Moon,” according to Friends of the Zeiss Steering Committee Member Francis G. Graham, who is Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Kent State University.

Professor Graham has prepared a practical guide for amateur observers who wish to try to watch the impact of Smart-1 on the Moon, which can be accessed at the following link:

http://www.venustransit.pghfree.net/gcorner/ImpactMoon.htm

For further information, the following is contact information for Professor Graham:

Francis Graham
East Liverpool Regional Campus
Kent State University
400 East 4th Street
East Liverpool OH 43920
USA

Telephone: 330-382-7466
Electronic Mail: fgraham@kent.edu

No, actually there has been some protesting about the use of fossil fuel in rockets, by the same crowd that go around keying SUV's.

How does the resolution and coverage from SMART-1 compare to Clementine? Will this be the best source of information for making maps?

I've been tinkering together a solar-system simulator, and I find it ironic that there is better data for Mars than there is for the Moon. You can make a fine texture map from Clementine data, but there is still no really usable elevation data for generating a good bump map. Looks like we will have to wait for LRO for that.

Don, the SMART-1 images will be a good source of map data. The situation is a bit complex though, but this is how I see it.

SMART-1 is in an orbit that favours southern hemisphere viewing, so its resolution in the south will be better than in the north. At its best I think it will exceed the Clementine Basemap in resolution. Probably the northern mid to high latitudes will still be better in Clementine, but the southern mid to high latitudes better in SMART-1 data.

But that's just resolution. Lighting must be considered as well. Clem was optimized for multispectral, so they wanted to avoid shadows, and we got high sun over most latitudes. SMART-1 will have lower sun angles where Clem is too high for good mapping. So even where resolution is the same or a bit worse, these new images should be better for mapping in many cases.

Then there is coverage. It's not clear yet that we will have global coverage at the higher resolutions which will be useful. I think I'm right in saying that there will be good global coverage at lower resolution from very early in the orbit phase, but I don't know what the coverage looks like at high resolution. I think the goal was global high res low sun imaging but I don't know what they have achieved.

The USGS digitized lunar orbiter images will also give good lower sun almost-global coverage. How that relates to SMART-1 data in quality, lighting and coverage I couldn't say yet.

Clem altimetry was collected over a short period, so it wasn't a dense dataset. I hope LRO and other missions will provide a MOLA-like dataset, and I think that is the goal. I never believed that altimetry could be as good as MOLA, and I'd love to see the same for the Moon. Too bad Venus can't be that good! Radar will never be as good as laser. I assume even an IR laser would not be great at Venus.

Phil

Looking forward do it. For computer rendering of the Moon, the ideal is to actually have the high-sun angle, like what Clementine did. But then compute your own bumb-map shading with altimetry data. Then the shadows will match whatever the Sun's position is.

I've been tinkering with a Venus map for some time. I have a good collection of all the radar data (a box of CDs with high-res Magellan data, all the Venera-15/16 data, the Arecebo maps). One of the technical problems, which fortunately is one of my real-life research interests, is the interpolation of the nonuniformly spaced altimetry measurments. That's something everyone gets wrong.

That certainly works for computer rendering, but as image resolution will usually exceed altimetry resolution by at least one order of magnitude, other kinds of mapping require the highest possible resolution low sun data. Ideally we'll have both at some point, and in fact I think there will be some high sun imaging from SMART-1 as well, but I don't know about its resolution or coverage.

In theory, with overhead-lit and side-lit views, you should be able to do shape from shading. But computer vision algorithms can be pretty dodgy in practice.

UPDATE FOR THE LUNAR IMPACT OF THE SMART-1

Dear Colleagues,


Please, check the news data and news time, images and graphics updated for lunar impact of the SMART-1 in the homepage of the SL/REA SMART-1 Lunar Impact Project, in the Lunar Section of the Rede de Astronomia Observacional REA – BRAZIL.

These are the last orbit prediction we have for SMART-1.

English Version: http://slrea-smart1lunar-impact-project-ing.blogspot.com/


Best regards,


Valmir Martins de Morais- valmirmmorais@yahoo.com.br
Coordinator for the SL/REA SMART-1 Lunar Impact Project - Secção Lunar REA/BRAZIL
Member of the Moon SMART Impact: Predictions and Observation Campaign.

Latest news:

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMTU0Z7QQE_index_1.html

The impact points keep shifting around slightly as timing becomes better known.

Phil

Looking at Stellarium, (and I'm guessing it's accurate) - both those times are a no-go for Western Europe sadly

Doug

Latest news - Star Tracker images:

http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/SMART-1/SEMPFY5LARE_0.html

They are reproduced quite dark, but look what happens if you brighten them and do a little reprojection work

Click to view attachment

Click to view attachment

the lower one is located here (courtesy LPI):

Click to view attachment

I have not found the other one yet.

Phil

What puzzles me is that the star tracker images appear to be interlaced (!?). It's as though they're using an ordinary alternate-field-readout video camera instead of progressively readout frames. I'd thought that would wreak havoc on the star recognition software.
What gives?

There might be a difference between what the camera uses onboard for tracking and what it transmits.

Phil

Will SMART-1 impact around the initially planned zone: Lacus Excellentiae localized about North East of Schickard crater? Now, with the recent post of Phil, the probably impact has moved up to North West of Schickard crater? That means that the previous planned impact zone won't be on the Lacus Excellentiae but other site.

Not yet know by sure where will SMART-1 be impacted doesn't it?

Rodolfo

Some more undistorted (?) images from the star tracker here:

http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/SMART-1/SEMPFY5LARE_0.html

Rodolfo asked about the impact area - it's still in the same general area, as this map shows:

Click to view attachment

Phil

Many thanks for sharing us. What ways will confirm about the impact site?

1. Telescope from Earth
2. Radar from Earth?
3. Last pictures of star tracking of SMART-1
4. SMART-1 altimeter radar
5. Anything else?

I think some of them will be playing and they will be cross-checked for any consistency, won't it?

Rodolfo

QUOTE (RNeuhaus @ Aug 30 2006, 09:03 PM)

Many thanks for sharing us. What ways will confirm about the impact site?

1. Telescope from Earth
2. Radar from Earth?
3. Last pictures of star tracking of SMART-1
4. SMART-1 altimeter radar
5. Anything else?

I think some of them will be playing and they will be cross-checked for any consistency, won't it?

Rodolfo

Source : Ciel et Espace of September 2006
ESA has organised of network from South Africa to Hawaii able to observe the moon from 7pm to 8 am. Two instruments will be able to detect the melt of aluminium : VLT (in Chile) and Salt in South Africa. Rodolfo, you've rigth in the good spot . Nevertheless, they say that, due to some hills on the way of the trajectory, impact could occurs 5 to 7 hours before. They'll know better the day before the crash.

Great work, Phil.
Cannot avoid to process a couple of these images, they are very nice especially after jpeg+interlace removal:
Click to view attachment Click to view attachment