[X] My Assistant

[Phil Stooke]

I'm setting this up in preparation for the launch of SpaceIL's lunar mission, probably early next year. They have arranged a rideshare with Spaceflight Industries on a Falcon 9 launch early in 2019. Earlier they were saying launch in December, land on the Moon in February, so now I assume the landing might be delayed until March. This mission was originally going to be part of the Google Lunar X Prize, but that of course is now gone. It might be rekindled with a different sponsor (though I doubt it).

SpaceIL is the first of the GLXP teams to actually make it to a launch. For what it's worth, I expect Astrobotic to fly as well, and I think Team Indus and PTScientists may also get off the ground. I'm hearing things about Moon Express which cause me to doubt its chances.

More on landing sites shortly.

Phil

[marsbug]

It's not my field so I cannot vouch for it, but from what was said by this source.... https://amp.businessinsider.com/tardigrades...alive-2019-89-8
"Tardigrades in dry state can survive pressures up to 74,000 times the pressure we experience at sea level, so the [crash] impact should not be a problem for them," evolutionary zoologist Roberto Guidetti told Business Insider.

As for the vehicle... the retro reflector experiment, a small simple chunk of solid material, is thought to have perhaps survived. So I imagine that other components that are also small and basically solid chunks of material, could have survived. So not the vehicle, but identifiable components of it, perhaps, based on my layman reading of what is being said by engineers on the subject.