NASA Successfully Launches Two Lunar Probes
NASA's lunar probes begin journey to the Moon atop an Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. NASA hide caption
America is headed to the Moon again with NASA's successful launch this afternoon of an Atlas V rocket carrying two unmanned lunar probes.
The Lunar Reconnaisance Orbiter should get to the Moon in just over four days and will circle the Moon for a year taking images that will allow scientists to make more accurate maps of the Moon so that scientists will have better information on locations where future manned expeditions should land or avoid. The last manned mission was Apollo 17 in 1972.
The other probe, the Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite, will look for signs of water on the Moon, eventually crashing into a crater and spewing dust that scientists will examine from Earth for traces of the liquid.
India, China and Japan have all launched unmanned probes to the moon in recent years so the U.S. so even though the U.S. pioneered manned lunar flights, the current mission ironically gives off the air of Americans playing catch up.
NASA has a very good blog on which you can follow the missions.
Meanwhile, NASA scrubbed the launch of the Space Shuttle Endeavor as hydrogen leaks continued to plague the spacecraft.