16 Psyche

[Christopher K.]

The NASA mission to visit this "unique metal asteroid" has been delayed, sadly. It has not been cancelled! Discovered by Annibale de Gasparis in March 1852, Psyche may be the exposed core of a parent body whose crust and mantle were lost in a collision.

Psyche is currently in Leo. It will cross into Virgo on 30 July.

More information:
https://www.nasa.gov/psyche
https://www.daviddarling.info/encyclope ... craft.html

[Christopher K.]

Delayed, but still important. The flight software was delivered too late for a comfortable time span of testing. Of the $985 million in cost for the Psyche Mission, $717 million was spent as of last month.

Amy Northrop (acting as a Solar System Ambassador for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory) will give a talk on Psyche at HRPO (7:30pm on Friday the 29th).

More information:
https://psyche.asu.edu/2022/07/20/board ... e-mission/
https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa ... id-mission
https://hrpo.lsu.edu//programs/friday.html

[Christopher K.]

At this time NASA has a Psyche launch scheduled for 9:38am CDT on Thursday 5 October. Amy Northrop will give an updated talk on Psyche at next month's public BRAS meeting (Monday 9 October, 7pm at HRPO).

Psyche is currently setting in the west in Libra. It will cross into Scorpius on the morning of 12 October.

More information:
https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa ... ith-psyche
https://blogs.nasa.gov/psyche/2023/01/2 ... h-in-2023/