NASA wants to set fire to the moon. If conducted, the experiment would be the first time humanity has set fire to another planet, according to The Independent.<\/p>\n
\nThe goal is to better understand how flames could behave during emergency situations on future crewed Artemis program missions to Mars and beyond, according to the space agency.<\/p>\n
Those missions will help to expand the reach of humanity and what we know about our solar system.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cSince fire can be a catastrophic hazard for spaceflight and extreme human exploration, FM2 is a critical step in determining material flammability and safety for future missions,\u201d NASA says on the \u201cFlammability of Materials on the Moon,\u201d or \u201cFM2,\u201d experiment\u2019s webpage.<\/p>\n
\nOne of the problems is that some materials that are not flammable on Earth could be flammable in space, NASA notes. That\u2019s because the materials may burn at lower oxygen concentrations in lunar gravity than in our gravity.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cLike there are some materials that, as they\u2019re burning, they tend to kind of like come off in clumps, almost like little tear drops. And you can imagine that, if you\u2019re in a microgravity or partial-gravity environment, those little teardrops are basically turning into little fireballs that could float away and catch something else on fire,\u201d Emily Johnson, the experiment\u2019s project manager, explained in a 2025 podcast.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cSo understanding the different properties of the different materials at the different scales of flames is also incredibly important,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\nFlames behave differently on the moon than on Earth. The classic shape of a flame on Earth is created when gravity pulls cooler and denser air to the bottom. That doesn\u2019t happen to flames on the moon or in weightless microgravity on the International Space Station.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cIn microgravity, this flow doesn\u2019t occur and on the space station, low-momentum flames tend to be rounded or even spherical,\u201d according to a NASA blog post from 2023.<\/p>\n
\nIn lunar gravity, which is around a sixth of Earth\u2019s gravity, the flames are a little more rounded than those on Earth.<\/p>\n
\nSo, what will this experiment look like in reality? Well, good news, nobody is building a bonfire.<\/p>\n
\nInstead, scientists are sending a robotic, self-contained combustion chamber \u2013 a cylindrical metal chamber \u2013 to the lunar surface on a mission carrying commercial payloads.<\/p>\n
\nThe chamber carries four test samples to light, which are made of cotton and fiberglass and acrylic rods.<\/p>\n
\nIt contains an oxygen sensor, an instrument that measures electromagnetic radiation and cameras that record how the fire behaves in lunar gravity, including how fast it spreads.<\/p>\n
\nThere have been plenty of microgravity fire tests on Earth over the last few decades, but tests have shown that NASA needs more information.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cDirect lunar access offers the best way to assess flammability of materials on the moon. An extensive materials qualification test series there would be ideal, but such tests will need to be put off until an extended human presence on the moon is established,\u201d NASA researchers wrote in a paper published earlier this year.<\/p>\n
\nThe paper said the new experiment would help to fill critical knowledge gaps in spacecraft fire safety. New findings could lead to updated standards for spacecraft materials.<\/p>\n
\nThe mission could launch as soon as later this year, according to the paper.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NASA wants to set fire to the moon. If conducted, the experiment would be the first time humanity…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":538824,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[61,60,82],"class_list":["post-538823","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-science","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=538823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538823\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/538824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=538823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=538823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=538823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}