WASHINGTON — NASA has postponed the launch of the asteroid mission Psyche per week to update the configuration of thrusters on the spacecraft.
NASA announced late Sept. 28 that it has rescheduled the launch of the spacecraft, previously planned for Oct. 5, for Oct. 12. A Falcon Heavy rocket may have an instantaneous launch window at 10:16 a.m. Eastern that day from Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Complex 39A.
NASA said the one-week delay, decided during a flight readiness review for the mission, will give engineers more time to confirm parameters used for nitrogen cold-gas thrusters that orient the spacecraft. Those parameters required changes after engineers concluded that the thrusters would operate at warmer temperatures than previously predicted.
“Operating the thrusters inside temperature limits is important to make sure the long-term health of the units,” NASA said in an announcement concerning the delay, adding that the verification work involves running simulations and making adjustments to flight parameters and procedures.
“It’s so vital that we get this right. These thrusters aren’t the principal propulsion system, but they matter, especially right after launch, and we would like to ensure that we’re using them in a really robust way after they are needed,” said Laurie Leshin, director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is leading the mission, in a social media post.
“We’re confident the team is on the right track to mitigate this concern, and we look ahead to our launch in only 2 weeks!” she added.
The delay takes away one week from a three-week launch period for Psyche. The spacecraft has each day instantaneous launch opportunities from Oct. 12 through 25 that might allow it to fly its trajectory to the principal belt asteroid Psyche.
That trajectory was revised last 12 months when the spacecraft missed its original launch date of August 2022 due to software testing problems. An investigation into that delay uncovered significant institutional problems at JPL that contributed to the slip, which the independent panel that led that review said in June have since been addressed.
The delay increased the price of the mission from slightly below $1 billion to $1.2 billion and pushed back the spacecraft’s arrival on the asteroid from 2026 to 2029. Once on the asteroid, it can spend two years in a series of progressively lower orbits to check the structure and composition of the asteroids, the primary solar system body made primarily of metal to be visited by a spacecraft.
At a Sept. 6 briefing, project officials said they were working no issues with the spacecraft, making no mention on the time of any concerns concerning the spacecraft’s cold-gas thrusters. The principal uncertainty on the time was whether a possible federal government shutdown in October due to a lapse in appropriations might affect the mission.
NASA officials said Sept. 28 that the Psyche launch has been classified as an “excepted” activity and will probably be allowed to proceed if there may be a shutdown. That shutdown looks increasingly likely as neither the House nor the Senate have yet passed a seamless resolution that might fund the federal government on a brief basis when the brand new fiscal 12 months starts Oct. 1.