Grail gravity satellites slam into Moon The US space agency's (Nasa) Ebb and Flow gravity mapping satellites have ended their mission to the Moon. The duo were commanded to slam into a 2km-high mountain in the far lunar north. The deliberate ditching avoids the possibility of an uncontrolled descent on to locations of historic importance, such as the Apollo landing sites. Nasa's deep-space radio-tracking system confirmed the loss of signal from the satellites just before 22:30 GMT. Afterwards, it was announced the impact site would be named for Sally Ride, the first female American astronaut who died earlier this year. Ms Ride's educational programme had run the outreach cameras on the spacecraft. The satellite twins returned some remarkable data during their operational mission, which got under way in March. Their maps of the subtle variations in gravity across the Moon's surface are expected to transform many areas of planetary science. "Ebb and Flow have removed a veil from the Moon and removing this veil will enable discoveries about the way the Moon formed and evolved for many years to come," said principal investigator Prof Maria Zuber from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, US. Together known as Grail (Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory), the pair hit the flank of the lunar-nearside mountain about 3km and 30 seconds apart. The peak - located at 75 degrees North latitude close to a crater named Goldschmidt - was in darkness at the time. The Sally Ride Science organisation ran the "Moonkams" on the Grail satellites Being only the size of washer-driers, and having completely depleted their fuel tanks, the pair were not expected to produce any sort of impact flash visible to Earth observers. That said, another of Nasa's missions at the Moon, its Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), was looking out for the crashes. If it was lucky, LRO's ultraviolet imager might have seen some volatile materials being driven off the surface by the heat from the impacts. The orbiter will also image the site in a couple of weeks to see if it can discern any new craters.
Satellites – спутники Slam – хлопать Deliberate – преднамеренный Ditching – рытье канав Subtle – тонкий Veil – завеса Flank – фланг Latitude – широта Depleted – истощенный Fuel tanks – топливные баки I think all people are interested about spacecraft and space. It’s an endless topic of discussion. I’m always interested if life on other planets. I think similar space travels will bring us closer to a solution.
