Connect with us

Technology

One faulty valve led to failure of Astrobotic’s $108 million Peregrine lunar lander mission

Published

on

peregrine astrobotic ula vulcan. lunar laner loaded in nose of rocket

Astrobotic’s Peregrine lunar lander failed to reach the Moon due to an issue with a single valve within the propulsion system, according to a mission report released on Tuesday. Company executives said at a news conference that engineers had redesigned the valve and added redundancy to the propulsion system of the subsequent lander, Griffin, to make sure the problem wouldn’t repeat itself.

The report comes from a review board that met shortly after the tip of the Peregrine mission in January. That mission bumped into problems just hours after its Jan. 8 launch, when engineers fired up the spacecraft’s propulsion system for the primary time in orbit.

At that time, the fuel and oxidizer tanks must have been full of helium after opening two pressure control valves, or PCVs. But helium began to flow “uncontrollably” through the second valve into the oxidizer tank, Astrobotic CEO John Thornton explained during a news conference.

Advertisement

“This caused a significant and rapid overpressure of the tank,” he said. “Unfortunately, the tank ruptured and as a result, oxidizer leaked, which continued to leak for the rest of the mission.”

The PCV was unable to reseal, likely due to a mechanical failure attributable to “vibration-induced loosening” between some of the threaded components contained in the valve, said review board chairman John Horack. Telemetry data was able to pinpoint the placement and time of the anomaly, and the information was consistent with the PCV’s autonomous opening and shutting sequence and the valve’s position within the propulsion system. Engineers were also able to recreate the failure during ground testing.

While the oxidizer leak continued, the Astrobotic team managed to stabilize the spacecraft, charge the batteries, and power the payloads. However, the issue ultimately proved fatal to the mission, and after 10.5 days, the spacecraft returned to Earth and burned up within the atmosphere.

The 34-person review board included 26 company insiders and eight outsiders. The board analyzed not only the information collected throughout the mission, but additionally all the information from the flight qualification campaign and component tests. Ultimately, it was determined that the probable cause of the failure was the failure of a single helium PCV within the propulsion system.

Advertisement

Management also laid out a timeline of events leading up to the failure, starting in 2019, when Astrobotic signed a contract with an unnamed supplier to develop a drive power system. When that supplier began experiencing technical and provide chain issues due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Astrobotic made the choice in early 2022 to terminate the contract and complete the partially assembled power system itself.

“At this point, we had already made the decision to do the Griffin propulsion system in-house to do more vertical integration,” said Astrobotic mission director Sharad Bhaskaran. “We had already developed a lot of capabilities to do that propulsion integration. … That also reduced some of the risk in the Griffin program, which is much more complex than Peregrine.”

Astrobotic’s Peregrine lander in orbit.
Image sources: Astrobotic (opens in recent window)

However, Astrobotic engineers began to encounter problems with the unique supplier’s propulsion components—specifically, the PCVs. In August 2022, they switched to one other, unnamed PCV supplier, and people valves were installed on the lander.

The final set of propulsion system tests showed leaks in a single of the 2 PCVs—but not the one which ultimately leaked in orbit. That one performed well; the one which leaked was repaired. While Bhaskaran acknowledged that the second PCV had been identified “as a risk in our risk register” because the primary one leaked during testing, engineers ultimately deemed the failure minor, because the lander passed final acceptance testing.

Advertisement

The rationale for not replacing the second PCV was that it was situated much further back within the spacecraft and would require “extensive surgery” on the lander, invalidate final testing, and involve the extra risk of disassembly and reassembly.

Horack reiterated that the team’s decision-making was sound throughout: “I really found that when I looked at the team and what happened… I don’t see any decisions made in the lead-up to launch where I could say, ‘Hey, I think you should have done this differently.’”

These findings have already begun to inform development of the much larger Griffin lander, which is currently scheduled to launch to the moon before the tip of 2025. In addition to redesigning the valve, engineers have added a regulator to the propulsion system to control the flow of helium to the fuel and oxidizer tanks, in addition to backup latching valves as additional redundancy in case the PCV problem occurs again.

Advertisement
This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com
Continue Reading
Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Technology

This is the shipping of products from China to the USA

Published

on

By

Shein and Temu icons are seen displayed on a phone screen in this illustration photo

The Chinese retailer has modified the strategy in the face of American tariffs.

Thanks to the executive ordinance, President Donald Trump ended the so -called de minimis principle, which allowed goods value 800 USD or less entering the country without tariffs. It also increases tariffs to Chinese goods by over 100%, forcing each Chinese firms and Shein, in addition to American giants, similar to Amazon to adapt plans and price increases.

CNBC reports that this was also affected, and American buyers see “import fees” from 130% to 150% added to their accounts. Now, nevertheless, the company is not sending the goods directly from China to the United States. Instead, it only displays the offers of products available in American warehouses, while goods sent from China are listed as outside the warehouse.

Advertisement

“He actively recruits American sellers to join the platform,” said the spokesman ago. “The transfer is to help local sellers reach more customers and develop their companies.”

(tagstotransate) tariffs

This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com
Continue Reading

Technology

One of the last AI Google models is worse in terms of safety

Published

on

By

The Google Gemini generative AI logo on a smartphone.

The recently released Google AI model is worse in some security tests than its predecessor, in line with the company’s internal comparative test.

IN Technical report Google, published this week, reveals that his Flash Gemini 2.5 model is more likely that he generates a text that violates its security guidelines than Gemini 2.0 Flash. In two indicators “text security for text” and “image security to the text”, Flash Gemini 2.5 will withdraw 4.1% and 9.6% respectively.

Text safety for the text measures how often the model violates Google guidelines, making an allowance for the prompt, while image security to the text assesses how close the model adheres to those boundaries after displaying the monitors using the image. Both tests are automated, not supervised by man.

Advertisement

In an e-mail, Google spokesman confirmed that Gemini 2.5 Flash “performs worse in terms of text safety for text and image.”

These surprising comparative results appear when AI is passing in order that their models are more acceptable – in other words, less often refuse to answer controversial or sensitive. In the case of the latest Llam Meta models, he said that he fought models in order to not support “some views on others” and answers to more “debated” political hints. Opeli said at the starting of this yr that he would improve future models, in order to not adopt an editorial attitude and offers many prospects on controversial topics.

Sometimes these efforts were refundable. TechCrunch announced on Monday that the default CHATGPT OPENAI power supply model allowed juvenile to generate erotic conversations. Opeli blamed his behavior for a “mistake”.

According to Google Technical Report, Gemini 2.5 Flash, which is still in view, follows instructions more faithfully than Gemini 2.0 Flash, including instructions exceeding problematic lines. The company claims that regression might be partially attributed to false positives, but in addition admits that Gemini 2.5 Flash sometimes generates “content of violation” when it is clearly asked.

Advertisement

TechCrunch event

Berkeley, California
|.
June 5

Book now

Advertisement

“Of course, there is a tension between (after instructions) on sensitive topics and violations of security policy, which is reflected in our assessment,” we read in the report.

The results from Meepmap, reference, which can examine how models react to sensitive and controversial hints, also suggest that Flash Gemini 2.5 is much less willing to refuse to reply controversial questions than Flash Gemini 2.0. Testing the TechCrunch model through the AI ​​OpenRoutter platform has shown that he unsuccessfully writes essays to support human artificial intelligence judges, weakening the protection of due protection in the US and the implementation of universal government supervisory programs.

Thomas Woodside, co -founder of the Secure AI Project, said that the limited details given by Google in their technical report show the need for greater transparency in testing models.

“There is a compromise between the instruction support and the observation of politics, because some users may ask for content that would violate the rules,” said Woodside Techcrunch. “In this case, the latest Flash model Google warns the instructions more, while breaking more. Google does not present many details about specific cases in which the rules have been violated, although they claim that they are not serious. Not knowing more, independent analysts are difficult to know if there is a problem.”

Advertisement

Google was already under fire for his models of security reporting practices.

The company took weeks to publish a technical report for the most talented model, Gemini 2.5 Pro. When the report was finally published, it initially omitted the key details of the security tests.

On Monday, Google published a more detailed report with additional security information.

(Tagstotransate) Gemini

Advertisement
This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com
Continue Reading

Technology

Aurora launches a commercial self -propelled truck service in Texas

Published

on

By

The autonomous startup of the Aurora Innovation vehicle technology claims that it has successfully launched a self -propelled truck service in Texas, which makes it the primary company that she implemented without drivers, heavy trucks for commercial use on public roads in the USA

The premiere appears when Aurora gets the term: In October, the corporate delayed the planned debut 2024 to April 2025. The debut also appears five months after the rival Kodiak Robotics provided its first autonomous trucks to clients commercial for operations without a driver in field environments.

Aurora claims that this week she began to freight between Dallas and Houston with Hirschbach Motor Lines and Uber Freight starters, and that she has finished 1200 miles without a driver to this point. The company plans to expand to El Paso and Phoenix until the top of 2025.

Advertisement

TechCrunch contacted for more detailed information concerning the premiere, for instance, the variety of vehicles implemented Aurora and whether the system needed to implement the Pullover maneuver or the required distant human assistance.

The commercial premiere of Aurora takes place in a difficult time. Self -propelled trucks have long been related to the necessity for his or her technology attributable to labor deficiencies in the chairman’s transport and the expected increase in freigh shipping. Trump’s tariffs modified this attitude, not less than in a short period. According to the April analytical company report from the commercial vehicle industry ACT researchThe freight is predicted to fall this yr in the USA with a decrease in volume and consumer expenditure.

Aurora will report its results in the primary quarter next week, i.e. when he shares how he expects the present trade war will affect his future activity. TechCrunch contacted to learn more about how tariffs affect Auror’s activities.

For now, Aurora will probably concentrate on further proving his safety case without a driver and cooperation with state and federal legislators to just accept favorable politicians to assist her develop.

Advertisement

TechCrunch event

Berkeley, California
|.
June 5

Book now

Advertisement

At the start of 2025, Aurora filed a lawsuit against federal regulatory bodies after the court refused to release the appliance for release from the protection requirement, which consists in placing warning triangles on the road, when the truck must stop on the highway – something that’s difficult to do when there isn’t a driver in the vehicle. To maintain compliance with this principle and proceed to totally implement without service drivers, Aurora probably has a man -driven automotive trail after they are working.

(Tagstranslate) Aurora Innovation

This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com
Continue Reading
Advertisement

OUR NEWSLETTER

Subscribe Us To Receive Our Latest News Directly In Your Inbox!

We don’t spam! Read our privacy policy for more info.

Trending