NASA’s Psyche mission to metal-rich asteroid rescheduled for October 2023 • TechCrunch

NASA announced Friday that its Psyche mission (named after the asteroid the mission is targeting) has been pushed back to October next year. The news comes just months after the agency announced it would ultimately skip a planned 2022 launch attempt. The schedule delay is due to late deliveries of key components of the spacecraft, including flight software and test equipment. The launch date this year ended on October 11.

NASA conducted an internal review to determine whether the mission could launch next year, in addition to a separate independent review commissioned by the agency to examine the failures that led to the missing launch window. It looks like the review has determined that next year’s launch will go ahead.

While the launch window has changed, NASA said the flight profile will be similar, with the spacecraft using Mars’ gravity in 2026 to propel the spacecraft toward the asteroid Psyche. If the mission continues next year, the spacecraft should arrive at the asteroid in August 2029.

The mission, led by Arizona State University, will study a metallic asteroid called Psyche located between Mars and Jupiter. It was chosen for study because scientists believe it is the iron-nickel core of an earlier planet, making it a good target for understanding how our planet came to be. Of course, people with asteroid mining ambitions are sure to be of interest as well.

The total cost of the mission, including launch, is $985 million; of that, $717 million had been spent as of June. Two additional projects were planned to be launched with Psyche: a NASA mission called Janus to explore the binary asteroid system and a demonstration of high data rate laser communication technologies. The latter is already integrated with the Psyche spacecraft and will launch alongside it, but NASA is still exploring options for Janus.

In February 2020, NASA announced the launch contract to SpaceX in the amount of 117 million dollars. The agency booked a ride on the Falcon Heavy, the most powerful rocket currently in operation and which has only flown three times in its history. (The fourth could happen as early as next week.)