 ...........................................
......................... Francis L. Ridge Project Coordinator, Wednesday, March 25, 2009 Greetings, Welcome to The Lunascan Project web site. The primary goal of the project is a comprehensive directory of the lunar surface and studies related to these features. But, with recent Moon missions by foreign countries, and with plans for a U.S. mission in the works, The Lunascan Project plans to begin new imaging of selected target areas.The much-awaited TransOrbital Trailblazer mission is still on hold due to funding problems. http://www.transorbital.net/bluespartan/index.php But here are the lunar missions that have come about recently: 2006 http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/SMART-1/SEMJHDO3E4E_0.html SMART-1 was a Swedish-designed
European Space agency
satellite that orbited the Moon. It was launched on September 27, 2003
from the Guiana Space Centre in Kourou, French Guiana. "SMART" stands
for Small Missions for Advanced Research in Technology. On September 3,
2006 (05:42 UTC), SMART-1 was deliberately crashed into the Moon's
surface, ending its mission.
2008 http://www.isro.org/chandrayaan-1/announcement.htm Chandrayaan-1, is first mission
to the Moon launched by
India's national space agency the Indian Space Research Organization
(ISRO). The unmanned exploration mission included a lunar orbiter and
an impactor. The vehicle was
successfully inserted into lunar orbit on 8 November 2008. On November
14, 2008, the Moon Impact Probe separated from
the Moon-orbiting Chandrayaan at 20:06 and impacted the lunar south
pole in a controlled manner, making the fourth country to place its
flag on the Moon. The MIP impacted near the crater Shackleton at the
lunar south pole, at 20:31 on 14 November 2008 releasing subsurface
debris that could be analysed for presence of water ice.
http://www.selene.jaxa.jp/en/index.htm Selene, better known in Japan by its nickname Kaguya, is the second Japanese lunar orbiter spacecraft. Produced by the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science and NASDA, the major objectives of the "KAGUYA" mission were to obtain scientific data of the lunar origin and evolution and to develop the technology for the future lunar exploration. "KAGUYA" consists of a main orbiting satellite at about 100km altitude and two small satellites (Relay Satellite and VRAD Satellite) in polar orbit. The orbiters carry instruments for scientific investigation of the Moon, on the Moon, and from the Moon and began imaging in March of 2008 The Lunascan Project Imaging Team is preparing a priority list of features and specific targets, and you can be kept up-to-date by visiting the site. The overall Lunascan Project
description can be found at Status
Report No.1. Of particular interest is the
report on the detection of an object apparently near the Moon in 1996 at
Status Report No. 3. Be sure to visit the sections page (76 nearside lunar Section Directories) where we've recently added considerable information. If you're not on our Mailing List, be sure and email us ASAP. We're usually emailing Lunascan Updates almost every day. Be sure and specify "Lunascan". Sincerely, Francis L. Ridge Coordinator The Lunascan Project 618 Davis Drive Mt. Vernon, IN 47620 (812) 838-3120 |