By akademiotoelektronik, 07/03/2022

2022 space calendar: what will be the major events of the year?

By Romain Challand (@challandromain) Share:

What will the conquest of space be made of in 2022? After a year 2021 extremely rich in appointments and launches, the next few months promise to be equally captivating for space professionals and other curious people.

January 2022 – First orbital flight of the Starship rocket (SpaceX)

Elon Musk announced it last November: SpaceX's Starship mega-rocket should make its first orbital flight at the very beginning of the year. The particularity of this rocket is to be fully reusable and to carry out several types of missions. Its first flight will obviously be unmanned, but this vessel could eventually embark tourists in space, place satellites in orbit, transport astronauts during various missions, be used for supplies, or even clean up particularly dangerous debris. In the bosom of the “super rockets”, we also expect to see Blue Origin’s New Glenn fly, but also and above all the SLS, launcher heir to the mythical Saturn V, which should allow NASA to return to the Moon.

February – Departure of the Artemis-1 mission around the Moon

This is a very symbolic mission ahead of the return of human beings to the Moon. No astronauts will be on board the Orion spacecraft, which should circle our natural satellite and return to Earth for this test flight. If all goes well, the next voyage could have humans on board. During this approximately three-week mission, the spacecraft will travel several hundred thousand kilometers. Orion will stay in space longer than any habitable ship without docking with a space station.

February 28 – Mission Ax-1, the first entirely private mission to the ISS

Democratization of space tourism obliges (at least for the extremely affluent), SpaceX Axiom Space-1 is a mission scheduled for February 28, 2022, to send the Crew Dragon spacecraft to the International Space Station (ISS). This launch will be operated by SpaceX on behalf of Axiom Space. Four tourists will take off for an eight-day stay aboard the ISS atop a Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket that will launch from Launch Complex 39-Pad A at Kennedy Space Center (Florida).

Mars – Capstone Rocket Lab Mission to the Moon

Before assembling the Gateway space station in orbit around the Moon as part of the Artemis program, it is necessary to ensure the feasibility of the project. This is where Capstone comes in, a 25 kg nano-satellite that will be launched in March by an Electron rocket. It will take three months before it is placed in orbit around the Moon for a nine-month mission. The latter will be conducted by Rocket Lab from its site in New Zealand.

May – Capital test flight for the Boeing Starliner

Calendrier spatial 2022 : quels seront les grands événements de l'année ?

Will the CST-100 Starliner manage to pass the last key stages before being deemed fully operational? This capsule to join the ISS as part of the Orbital Flight Test-2 is indeed crucial for Boeing, after a first failure which left it at a distance from its competitor developed by SpaceX. Since then, the Crew Dragon has been able to perform its first manned flights to the ISS, including a round trip with Thomas Pesquet on board. Will Boeing be able to settle the last details that pose a risk to the use of its machine?

June – Liftoff of JUICE towards Jupiter

The JUICE mission (for JUpiter ICy moons Explorer) should be launched in June. This probe, packed with scientific instruments, aims to analyze the icy moons of Jupiter in order to discover any conditions conducive to the development of life. At the helm, Airbus Defense & Space, which is finalizing the assembly of the probe in Toulouse.

July – Russia launches the Luna 25 mission

Russia was certainly not going to let the United States resume moon missions without batting an eyelid. The country will retaliate by launching its own mission, dubbed Luna 25, in July. The Russian lander will be the first to land at the South Pole of our natural satellite. If successful, Luna 25 will become the first lunar probe launched by the former USSR since the Luna 24 sample return mission in 1976. This lunar lander will perform various experiments and technology demonstrations, paving the way for future missions .

July – The first data from the James-Webb Space Telescope

A major event at the end of 2021, the James-Webb space telescope has soon arrived at Lagrange point L2, its final destination. It will then have covered more than a million kilometers and will still be a few months away from its operational status. It is from June-July that the first data collected by the most ambitious space telescope of the moment will be able to be analyzed by scientists.

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August 1 – Space probe Psyche will visit an iron asteroid

In August, NASA's Psyche space probe will take off in the direction of the asteroid of the same name. With more than 200 km in diameter, Psyche is one of the ten most massive objects in the asteroid belt located between Mars and Jupiter. The presentation video of the project is impressive and allows us to understand the size of this metallic object, but whose exact composition is still unknown. On the other hand, it will be necessary to wait until 2026 for the probe to go into orbit around Psyche.

September 20 – ExoMars 2022 mission

A new rover on Mars, one! First scheduled for 2020, the ExoMars mission will normally launch in September 2022. ESA will have a 12-day window of opportunity to catapult its toy into space, with the rover expected to land on Mars on June 10, 2023. The mission of the rover will be to collect samples to a depth of 2 m and analyze them with new-generation instruments in its on-board laboratory. In line of sight, search for traces of past life on the red planet.

October 2 – DART, asteroid diversion operation

This may be interesting to follow. NASA's DART spacecraft, with a land mass of 550 kg, will crash into the asteroid Dimorphos on October 2. Part of the US space agency's Planetary Defense Initiative, DART is designed to study kinetic impact aimed at redirecting dangerous asteroids before they can hit Earth. In short, this is a first attempt to potentially save humanity later.

Late 2022 – Probable launch of the Euclid space telescope

Much has been said about the James-Webb telescope, but Europe also has another project to bring to life at the end of the year. If the schedule is respected, the Euclid telescope of the European Space Agency (ESA) should move towards the Lagrange point. His observations should contribute to determining the origin of the acceleration of the expansion of the Universe, just that, as well as the source, generically called dark energy. 10 billion years back will theoretically be traced back and a hundred European laboratories are working on this mission.

2022 – Completion of the Chinese Space Station (CSS)

If all goes as planned, China will complete construction of its own space station within the year. This station, which is about a fifth of the size of the ISS, is already capable of accommodating astronauts for a long period, but there are still a few modules to be assembled. The station, placed in a low orbit of 300 to 400 km, should make it possible to carry out scientific experiments in microgravity, contribute to the development of space technologies and prepare Chinese crews for long flights.

All year round – regular asteroid showers to observe with the naked eye

For our French readers, the year in the sky will not include major events such as a solar eclipse, but they will have something to grant many wishes: star showers. The best known is that of the Perseids, active between July 14 and August 24 and which will experience its peak of activity on August 12. But several other swarms will be observed during the year if the atmospheric conditions allow it. The Lyrids swarm will have its peak of activity on April 22, 2022 (about 20 meteors per hour), that of the Eta Aquarids on May 6 (barely 20 shooting stars per hour), the Alpha Auriginids swarm on September 1, that of the Orionids on October 21, that of the Leonids on November 17, and finally the Geminid swarm on December 14.