韓国の報道の言う「ルナインパクター(Lunar Impactor、超小型衛星基盤の国際 月探査研究)」プロジェクトの正体はこれかなと思う。
気になったので調べてみると、NASAのHPでこんなのを見つけた。
NASA Successfully Launches Lunar Impactor
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. NASA successfully launched the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite, or LCROSS, Thursday on a mission to search for water ice in a permanently shadowed crater at the moon"s south pole. The satellite lifted off on an Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla., at 5:32 p.m. EDT, with a companion mission, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO.
LRO safely separated from LCROSS 45 minutes later. LCROSS then was powered-up, and the mission operations team at NASA"s Ames Research Center at Moffett Field, Calif., performed system checks that confirmed the spacecraft is fully functional.
LCROSS and its attached Centaur upper stage rocket separately will collide with the moon at approximately 7:30 a.m. on Oct. 9, 2009, creating a pair of debris plumes that will be analyzed for the presence of water ice or water vapor, hydrocarbons and hydrated materials. The spacecraft and Centaur are tentatively targeted to impact the moon"s south pole near the Cabeus region. The exact target crater will be identified 30 days before impact, after considering information collected by LRO, other spacecraft orbiting the moon, and observatories on Earth.
"LCROSS has been the little mission that could," said Doug Cooke, associate administrator for NASA"s Exploration Systems Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "We stand poised for an amazing mission and possible answers to some very intriguing questions about the moon."
The 1,290-pound LCROSS and 5,216-pound Centaur upper stage will perform a swing-by maneuver of the moon around 6 a.m. on June 23 to calibrate the satellite"s science instruments and enter a long, looping polar orbit around Earth and the moon. Each orbit will be roughly perpendicular to the moon"s orbit around Earth and take about 37 days to complete. Before impact, the spacecraft and Centaur will make approximately three orbits.
On the final approach, about 54,000 miles above the surface, LCROSS and the Centaur will separate. LCROSS will spin 180 degrees to turn its science payload toward the moon and fire thrusters to slow down. The spacecraft will observe the flash from the Centaur"s impact and fly through the debris plume. Data will be collected and streamed to LCROSS mission operations for analysis. Four minutes later, LCROSS also will impact, creating a second debris plume.
"This mission is the culmination of a dedicated team that had a great idea," said Daniel Andrews, LCROSS project manager at Ames. "And now we"ll engage people around the world in looking at the moon and thinking about our next steps there."
The LCROSS science team will lead a coordinated observation campaign that includes LRO, the Hubble Space Telescope, observatories on Hawaii"s Mauna Kea and amateur astronomers around the world.
Ames manages LCROSS and also built the instrument payload. Northrop Grumman in Redondo Beach, Calif., built the spacecraft.
The LCROSS mission is providing updates via @LCROSS_NASA on Twitter. To follow, visit:
要するにルナー・リコネサンス・オービター(Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter：LRO 月周回無人衛星)と一緒に、月面に衝突させるエルクロス(Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite：LCROSS)衛星を打上げ、LCROSS他を落着させる様子をLROから観測しようという趣旨のもの。
この時にLCROSSからも落下中の情報をLROは受信し続けてより多くの情報を収集しようという性格のものです。
2009年10月9日、月面衝突探査機LCROSSを月面に落着。
この際に、日本のかぐやのデータも提供しています。
そういや、落下時に巻き起こった月面表面の物質から、月面に水分が云々という記事をちょっと前に読んだような気がしますね。
報道にいう「韓国が製作した人工衛星」とは月面衝突探査機LCROSSの事を指すのではないかと思う。
つまり、アメリカが第２の「Lunar Impactor」を計画しており、その月面衝突探査機LCROSSの製作を韓国が請け負う方向で調整が行われている、という趣旨の記事ではないかと推察される。
これならば、「人工衛星」が「月面に到達する」のも頷ける所であるし、「月面探査」というのも納得がいく。
しかし・・・
これ、韓国は米国と旧ソ連に続いて世界３番目の月探査国となる！
などとホルホルできる内容のものか？