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After its successful launch and deployment last week, NASA has lost its communications link with the CAPSTONE (Autonomous GPS Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment) satellite, which is headed toward lunar orbit.
However, Colorado-based Advanced Space, which built CAPSTONE, said Wednesday that its team and mission partners have been able to determine the cause of the anomaly and have now reconnected with the satellite, digitartlend reports.
Advanced Space said the signal confirmed the spacecraft's location, adding that "initial indications are that the spacecraft's systems are working properly" and that they are "happy and healthy."
The company explained that after ensuring that the system returned to operational capability, “the team has prepared updated navigational solutions and a new estimate of the situation and future forecasts has been delivered. ".
She said the team had "high confidence" that the issue had been resolved despite warning that it was still "a very dynamic situation", and the company confirmed that status updates would be coming soon.
The CAPSTONE satellite was launched by New Zealand company Rocket Lab on June 28. CAPSTONE is an essential part of NASA's preparations for a new era of lunar exploration. The satellite will test the proposed lunar orbit for the Gateway, a multipurpose space station that will provide support for long-range manned missions to the lunar surface.
And the first manned mission to the moon in five decades could take place as soon as 2025, and when that happens, it will put the first woman and first people of color on the moon in the coming years, and NASA wants to build bases on the moon where astronauts can live and work for extended periods of time. With the Gateway serving as a link between those bases and Earth, and now that CAPSTONE is back in touch with its mission controllers, it won't be long before it enters a target lunar orbit, giving NASA vital information that will help it plan for the Gateway's deployment.
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