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(meteorobs) Gene's Finally Going to the Moon
From www.yahoo.com's news headlines of this morning at
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/ts/story.html?s=v/nm/19990730/ts/space_
moon_1.html
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ITHACA, N.Y. (Reuters)
When the Lunar Prospector spacecraft slams into the moon Saturday, it will
carry a tiny vial of the remains of would-be astronaut and accomplished
astronomer Gene Shoemaker, who had always longed to go there.
``Not going to the moon and banging on it with my own hammer has been the
biggest disappointment in life,'' Shoemaker once said.
Best known for his part in the discovery of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 before
its fiery 1994 collision with Jupiter, Shoemaker had tried out for NASA's
astronaut program but was disqualified by Addison's disease. He later
taught geology to Apollo astronauts destined for the moon, and became an
expert on celestial crashes.
After his death in 1997 in a car crash in Australia, one of his associates
at the University of Arizona, Carolyn Porco, conceived of the idea of
sending some of his cremated remains on the Prospector mission.
``When he died, it just sort of went through my brain like a bullet: let's
send him to the moon,'' Porco told Reuters. ``It's a story of one man and
his dreams and frustrations and his final journey home ... We arrived at
the moon 30 years ago in life and now one of us has arrived there in death.''
If all goes as planned, about an ounce of Shoemaker's ashen remains,
sheathed in foil, will land on the moon Saturday morning.
The tiny amount is significant, since the spacecraft's balance is key and
excess weight could be damaging.
The mission is aimed at a crater at the moon's south pole, and its
controlled crash -- Lunar Prospector is designed to go skimming into the
crater at a 6.5 degree angle -- is a bid to search for evidence of water
under the surface of the shadowy bowl.
The orbiting Hubble Space Telescope and telescopes on the ground will be
trained on the site, looking for signs of water vapor that could be
liberated in the explosion. Even NASA officials acknowledge the mission is
a long shot, because of the angle and high speed of the approach.
``While the probability of success for such a bold undertaking is low, the
potential science payoff is tremendous,'' Guenter Riegler at NASA's office
of space science said in a statement.
Still, Shoemaker's former colleagues found his final mission fitting,
especially given his area of expertise.
``He really was the person who defined the important role that impacts
played in the solar system,'' said Joe Burns, an astronomer at Cornell
University and a longtime Shoemaker friend. `` ... Once it was clear that
the moon's features were impact craters, he went on and realized that
everybody in the solar system was being struck continuously.''
Shoemaker's essential discoveries included the idea that ''catastrophism
was OK,'' Burns said in an interview at a meeting of solar system
astronomers in Ithaca. ``Stuff blows up, you wipe out species, life goes
on, but it's continuously being disrupted.''
One highlight of Shoemaker's professional life was his discovery of a
massive crater in Arizona that was created by a meteor crash some 50,000
years ago, before humans inhabited the area.
Most of his remains were scattered in the crater, said Alan Harris, a
former student and colleague of Shoemaker's who works at the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory.
``For those of us who knew him well, you (will) see the moon rise and you
say, Hi Gene, good to see you today,'' said Harris, who also attended the
Ithaca meeting.
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