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Website & Blog of Jatan Mehta, a globally published & cited space writer. Read deep dives on global lunar and space exploration.
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• Jatan Mehta
A look at recent Chinese milestones in the build up to crewed lunar missions, another blow(up) for Artemis, how Firefly’s Ocula can fill critical gaps for NASA, and more.
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
Plus: Examples of how Western media narratives of Chinese lunar activities misjudge capabilities and intent
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
ispace Japan’s second Moon lander
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• Jatan Mehta
Plus more mission updates.
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
And other mission updates.
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
Plus: Firefly to carry UAE’s second lunar rover and more.
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• Jatan Mehta
Our Moon may be one of the largest satellites in the Solar System but its exploration has been concentrated on select areas. One of these is low lunar orbit, where mapping spacecraft from three countries have been concurrently flying from pole to pole between 50 to 150 kilometers above the
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
Key news of the month: China has achieved the first ever daytime Earth-Moon distance measurement wherein a 1.2-meter telescope reflected an infrared laser off of a small retroreflector on the 61-kilogram Tiandu
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• Jatan Mehta
Two announcements before we begin:
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• Jatan Mehta
ISRO has been publishing monthly summaries of the varied activities and programs of India’s Department of Space (DOS) for years. Lately though, there have been consistent delays in publishing them by a month or two, and sometimes even more. The summaries have been trimmed too, now conveying less
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
And more such interesting Moon exploration updates from China’s National Space Day on April 24.
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
Plus: Exploration and science updates from the US, South Korea, and Europe.
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
And, countries allied with the US are facing delays in their own missions, allowing China to lead in this aspect of lunar exploration too.
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
Plus mission updates and some tangents.
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
Plus: A host of new lunar science results from Chandrayaan 2 and 3. Enjoy this 3200-word Chandrayaan-special. 🌙
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• Jatan Mehta
👀 🧊 🌘
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• Jatan Mehta
There’s a lot in this Moon Monday edition to unpack. Grab yourself a coffee or another mild drug of choice and let’s get started. 🤓
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
Also drills, flying regolith, a hard landing, Moonlight, and many more mission updates to quench the lunatic in you.
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
Sometime last year, nasaspaceflight.com (NSF) stopped loading for me. I could not access any page on its website, all of which said “Sorry, you have been blocked” no matter which browser I tried. Since then I’ve been accessing the NSF site in alternate ways because
jatan.space 🌙
• Jatan Mehta
Plus: Contextualizing the failure of Intuitive Machines’ second Moon mission and that of Lunar Trailblazer as grave losses for NASA.
