NASA will fly a billion-dollar quadcopter to Titan, Saturn’s methane-rich moon

The siren call of Titan could not be ignored. NASA’s next billion-dollar mission, called Dragonfly, will be an innovative quadcopter to explore Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, the agency announced today. The craft will soar and hover over the icy moon’s surface—and land on it—in a search for the conditions and chemistry that could foster life.

more…

Very interested in this

To launch in 2026 and arrive in 2034. Luckily I’m a patient man.

dv said:

To launch in 2026 and arrive in 2034. Luckily I’m a patient man.

I read that time frame, you hope if you designed and built it you still be alive when it landed

Tau.Neutrino said:

NASA will fly a billion-dollar quadcopter to Titan, Saturn’s methane-rich moon

The siren call of Titan could not be ignored. NASA’s next billion-dollar mission, called Dragonfly, will be an innovative quadcopter to explore Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, the agency announced today. The craft will soar and hover over the icy moon’s surface—and land on it—in a search for the conditions and chemistry that could foster life.

more…

“Titan’s dense air and low gravity will allow the 300-kilogram, sedan-size copter, which will be powered by a radioactive generator, to hover with 38 times less power than needed on Earth.”

Now that’s interesting.

My immediate response is: is that more than the power required to fly a helicopter of the same mass innthe same environment?

I thought Bubblecar might like this one

dv said:

I thought Bubblecar might like this one

Ta, didn’t notice it.

Sounds exciting, and as a bonus the mission leader is called Elizabeth Turtle.

Dragonfly will charge up from a radioactive generator during the week-long Titanian night time. It will be able to fly maybe 50 km per charge. It could potentially check out 100-odd locations all over Titan during its two year mission. No previous surface mission to an extraterrestrial body has had such scope.

The sample equipment (drills and suction hoses) are built into the landing skids.

Even though it won’t move during the night cycle it will continue to make obs (weather obs, seismic recordings, taking samples, examining the local environment using LED lighting).

Near as I can tell, it won’t be a floater: solid landings only.

One thing that really surprised me is that the Dragonfly will transmit straight to Earth. Huygens transmitted its data to Cassini, which then transmitted to Earth. You’d have to assume that it will require a high amount of power to achieve this from the surface so I’ll be very interested to find out about its final specs.

dv said:

Dragonfly will charge up from a radioactive generator during the week-long Titanian night time. It will be able to fly maybe 50 km per charge. It could potentially check out 100-odd locations all over Titan during its two year mission. No previous surface mission to an extraterrestrial body has had such scope.

The sample equipment (drills and suction hoses) are built into the landing skids.

Even though it won’t move during the night cycle it will continue to make obs (weather obs, seismic recordings, taking samples, examining the local environment using LED lighting).

Near as I can tell, it won’t be a floater: solid landings only.

One thing that really surprised me is that the Dragonfly will transmit straight to Earth. Huygens transmitted its data to Cassini, which then transmitted to Earth. You’d have to assume that it will require a high amount of power to achieve this from the surface so I’ll be very interested to find out about its final specs.

Lot of scope for things to go wrong in a mission like that. Let’s hope it’s tested to perfection.

Bubblecar said:

Sounds exciting, and as a bonus the mission leader is called Elizabeth Turtle.

I wonder whether she worked on the Galileo mission.