Hubble in a death spiral that could end as early as 2028 without a reboost

A newly released plot of the Hubble Space Telescope's altitude shows just how quickly the observatory has descended in recent years. The post on Bluesky by astronomer Jonathan McDowell is a stark reminder that Hubble is heading back to Earth, possibly sooner than previously thought, as its orbit decays. Hubble was launched …

[Anonymous Coward]

2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

If 2028 is the deadline, the US won't have a pro-science administration in time.

NASA budget will be spent with SpaceX or some other friend of Trump who can grift off it. The Trump administration's space agenda is all about showing off. Hard science doesn't register as a priority. The administration doesn't give a damn about one of the most successful scientific instruments in human history, because that's science, not a press release for politicians to tweet about.

Hubble doesn't meet those criteria.

The administration has already announced it will squander tens of billions going back to the moon, mostly for show, with few (if any) hard scientific objectives.

[Peter Gathercole]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

Could both be a reboost and money spent with SpaceX.

A Crew Dragon (or possibly even a Cargo Dragon, although a manned mission may be preferable) should be able to boost Hubble, and can work at that altitude. After all, they boost the ISS, and Hubble is so much lighter.

But at some point, it just isnt worth it. Hubble has been amazing, but all things must pass. Without some actual maintenance Hubble will suffer an unrecoverable failure at some point in the not to distant future.

[NoneSuch]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

Like Voyager 1 & 2?

Its working and in orbit. The cost to boost it is trivial to the cost of replacing it.

Whether the Great Pumpkin will see that or not is debatable unless NASA creates a Peace Prize to give him.

[David 164]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

Lazuli Space Observatory an Xuntian are already two fully funded replacement for Hubble. One will launch this year and will launch in the early 2030s. Rescueing Hubble is probably a waste of money. Time for the next generation of telescopes to be built an have their time in the limelight.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

> Lazuli Space Observatory

Awesome project, but lacks the same wavelength coverage as Hubble. Losing Hubble creates a UV blind spot and discontinuity in ongoing observations.

> Xuntian

Chinese.

Western academics will always take back seat there. Dependence on their instrumentation is a big problem, complicated by the fact that many academics would not set foot in that country, creating inherent barriers to research collaboration.

[David 164]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

You don't have to step foot in the country to collaborate nowadays.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

It helps, whether on the research itself, or at one of the many academic symposia.

As does merely being open to going. As does accepting invitations.

Negative opinions about China won't get you very far with the Chinese, even if the criticisms are true.

[teknopaul]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

I'm much more afraid to step into USofA than China.

I know folks jailed in USA for years for nothing considered illegal in the first world.

Not that it matters, you wont get into usa for a visit if ICE doesnt like your socials.

Remember if you heard it in American English it has bias. Communist is a dirty word for yanks. Capitalist doesn't have the same weight in China.

[QET]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

Watch a plan for boosting Hubble being both greenlit and funded in a second, after one of the Cheesy Poof in chief's lackeys suggests renaming it in his honor.

[Matthew 25]

The Great Pumpkin

I love that!

Upvote just for that.

P. S. You owe me a keyboard.

[BartyFartsLast]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

The first intergalactic peace prize for contributions to science should do ut

[Roland6]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

Shame the award ceremony is being held at Alpha Centauri…

[Peter Gathercole]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

Did you read about the failing gyroscopes? Without any functioning, it becomes impossible to aim Hubble. Not that much use after that.

If the shuttle was still working, it may have been worth replacing the gyros, but although Crew Dragon is rated for EVA, any significant rebuild in orbit from a Crew Dragon would be difficult.

I do of course know about Voyager 1 and 2, but even these will stop functioning once their power source drops below the minimum threshold to run the comms and stop them freezing. Like the Voyagers, Hubble has already exceeded it's design lifetime.

All things must pass.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

> Could both be a reboost and money spent with SpaceX.

> A Crew Dragon (or possibly even a Cargo Dragon, although a manned mission may be preferable) should be able to boost Hubble, and can work at that altitude. After all, they boost the ISS, and Hubble is so much lighter.

Skeptical of Trump's NASA, but perhaps Musk might do it for the PR? He could certainly use a boost of his own after everything he's done to damage his brand with science-minded types. Just read that a judge overseeing a trial against him had difficulty seating a jury, because so many potential jurors expressed hatred of him.

> But at some point, it just isnt worth it. Hubble has been amazing, but all things must pass. Without some actual maintenance Hubble will suffer an unrecoverable failure at some point in the not to distant future.

We basically don't have another option until there is a replacement on deck. The will just doesn't exist to build one right now. Awareness is coming up short, too.

Even many science-minded people think JWST is a Hubble replacement, and it's not. JWST operates in completely different wavelengths.

[QET]

Re: Just read that a judge overseeing a trial against Musk had difficulty seating a jury

The problem here is that Afrikaaner Cartman is both petty & petulant, and stuck in a self-enforcing filter bubble consisting of looney fringe stuff intersecting with hard-right viewpoints.

He was once Tesla's and SpaceX's greatest asset, but is now the biggest liability holding them both back.

[ThatOne]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

> Even many science-minded people think JWST is a Hubble replacement

The Duning-Kruger is strong on them. Unfortunately, for most people who know little about astronomy we (mankind) just need a telescope, i.e. one. "Telescope? Check. Who cares what it is called, it's a telescope after all, isn't it". Their dentists should set about using a pneumatic drill, that would teach them about the complexity of the world they live in...

[jpennycook]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

Given how SpaceX haven't managed to demonstrate getting 19 Starship tankers into orbit, and decided not to go to Mars despire their dear leader saying he would like to die there and promising a landing years ago, I'm not sure SpaceX could get its act together in time.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

Hubble wasn't designed for in-space maintenance. Yes I know a shuttle managed it, but there isn't a docking port to attach a Dragon to, so it would need a special attachment.

There's also the risk that you boost it and the remaining gyro(s) immediately fail and you've now pushed junk into a slower-decaying orbit.

The prospect of building a capsule which could attach to hubble and provide additional attitude control (ie its own gyros) has been mooted but deemed infeasible. Cheaper/more effective to build a new telescope to stick on the front of such a vehicle.

[Doctor Syntax]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

"there isn't a docking port to attach a Dragon to"

Provision has been made for this. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-125 (the last service mission):

"The crew also installed ... a soft-capture mechanism that would aid in the safe de-orbiting of the telescope by a robotic spacecraft at the end of its operational lifespan."

[frankvw]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

"Hubble wasn't designed for in-space maintenance. Yes I know a shuttle managed it, but there isn't a docking port to attach a Dragon to, so it would need a special attachment."

First, Hubble WAS designed for in-space maintenance.

Second: the docking port isn't the problem. The main problem is that the Shuttle was designed for in-space maintenance missions while the Dragon capsule is not. The Shuttle had a cargo hold that could support large chunks of hardware, a big arm to connect with Hubble and bulky EVA equipment. The Dragon can carry cargo, but that's it. Deploying hardware in space... Not so much.

[Trident]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

Actually, Hubble was designed from the start to be in-space maintainable.

Last year I met Dr. Kathryn (Kathy) Sullivan, one of the astronauts on STS-31 which deployed Hubble, she was one of those responsible for making sure Hubble would (and is) maintained in space. Ref: "Handsprints on Hubble" by Kathryn D. Sullivan.

[alain williams]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

Hubble doesn't meet those criteria.

With a bit of luck it will fall onto the orange one's head in the White House.

Having said that I would prefer to have a functioning Hubble telescope.

[cookieMonster]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

Oooh, given the chance I’m not sure… that’s a real difficult choice

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

It would be WELL WORTH losing Hubble if the Zit in the Blight House were LANCED thereby....

[Yet Another Anonymous coward]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

>With a bit of luck it will fall onto the orange one's head in the White House.

Sadly Hubble's orbit inclination is about 28.5deg so it can't even hit Houston

Mar-a-lago on the other hand.....

[BartyFartsLast]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

50/50 on that one,

[frankvw]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

"With a bit of luck it will fall onto the orange one's head in the White House."

You raise a good point.

Hubble is roughly the size and weight of a large school bus. The single remaining gyro will probably have failed by 2028. That means no attitude control. That in turn means no reentry control whatsoever. The more solid sections of Hubble might come down anywhere.

This could get messy.

[goodjudge]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

A satellite with attitude? Run!

[TVU]

Re: 2028 sounds like a death sentence for Hubble

The Hubble Space Telescope is still doing great work that complements the newer infrared James Webb Space Telescope and so I would very much like to see a rescue mission to boost the HST's orbital height as there are not going to any new space telescopes anytime soon.

[midgepad]

as it descends

It becomes more reachable.

And as time goes on robot/telefactors get more able.

At what point do salvage rules apply?

[b0llchit]

Re: as it descends

Soon you can reach it with a ladder and a gentle push is all that is required. You just have to wear heat resistant gloves. These devices are usually a bit hot when they reach ladder altitudes.

OTOH, you can claim the device as a legitimate salvage when you can reach it from your home's roof with a ladder. Might be worth something on ebay, I guess?

[Ken Hagan]

Is it small enough to burn up on the way down, or are we looking at a hazard here?

[Irongut]

It fit inside the shuttle's cargo bay. It is not that big.

From Wikipedia...

Dimensions 13.2 m × 4.2 m

Or 1x London bus. (surprisingly similar at 12 - 13.75m long)

[Anonymous Coward]

As far as I know, no London buses have been dropped back into the atmosphere, so I'm not sure that helps the OP?

[IglooDame]

I think that was going to be a part of an upcoming episode of Mythbusters but alas the series ended before they could get it going.

[Philo T Farnsworth]

I had no idea that Jamie and Adam had that kind of payload launch capability.

BTW, my own personal all-time favorite episode was the pilot where they busted the "JATO car" urban myth.¹

I found their earlier emphasis on urban myths to be much more interesting than their later fixation with movie special effects since they're, you know, special effects and not to be taken at face value. But maybe that's just me.

Jamie's Big Booms² were cool, though.

_______________

¹ Wikipedia: JATO Rocket Car

² "Say it with me. . ."

[AndrueC]

Or the cement mixer full of set concrete myth.

"..I'm sure I parked it around here somewhere."

:)

[Philo T Farnsworth]

> Or 1x London bus. (surprisingly similar at 12 - 13.75m long)

Or for Americans, the size of a school bus, which seems to be the journalist's go-to unit of measure for space craft dimensions on this side of the Atlantic.

[Roland6]

Perhaps decommissioning all the space shuttles in 2011 was a little premature.

Interestingly, the Dream Chaser, fingers crossed first flight 2026, is significantly smaller so can’t be used to retrieving Hubble or anything the shuttle lifted into orbit…

[Philo T Farnsworth]

> Perhaps decommissioning all the space shuttles in 2011 was a little premature.

Or, perhaps a couple of decades too late.

If we'd have decommissioned the thing as soon as we realized that the tiles were essentially a disaster waiting to happen¹, at least seven² and possibly a total of fourteen people³ would be alive today.

_________________

¹ Wikipedia: Space Shuttle thermal protection system -- Early TPS problems

² Wikipedia: STS-107

³ Wikipedia: Space Shuttle Challenger disaster

[wolfetone]

You can't put a price on military supremacy - which unfortunately is what kept the Shuttle going.

[jpennycook]

The USSR couldn't believe what was being claimed for the US space shuttle - both the design and the planned launch cadence were daft. Whether they actually believed it was supposed to be an orbital bomber with amazing cross-range ability or just said that to boost funding for their own shuttle, I don't know, but at least the Soviet shuttle launcher didn't have solid rocket boosters (it used Ukrainian rockets instead), and could be used to launch non-Shuttle payloads (as long as the guidance on those payloads was facing in the right direction). I think it also had ejector seats for the crew.

[Philo T Farnsworth]

What may be forgotten is that a substantial number of the Shuttle missions, especially the earlier ones, where deemed Classified. Per Space.com

In the early days of the space shuttle program, some of the missions were run jointly by NASA and the military. This was in part because the National Reconnaissance Office had successfully requested the shuttle's payload bay — the part of the shuttle that carried satellites be carried into space — be enlarged to accommodate large military satellites, according to Air & Space Magazine.

NRO also wanted polar shuttle missions, since polar missions make it possible to see the Earth's entire surface below (as opposed to equatorial missions, which are limited.) The Air Force went so far as to create a launch pad in Vandenberg, California for polar-orbiting space shuttle missions, but after the Challenger incident, plans to use the pad were permanently mothballed.¹

In all, 10 Classified missions were flown.

It's interesting to note, as Smithsonian Magazine reports

[...] Neither the Air Force nor the NRO was ever comfortable relying exclusively on NASA’s vehicle, however. Delays in shuttle launches only increased their worry; even before the 1986 Challenger accident, they were looking for a way off the shuttle and back onto conventional rockets like the Titan.³

That alone should have been a great big hint that the whole Shuttle program was somewhat Quixotic, to say the least.

The military, as most here probably are aware, went on develop and fly their own uncrewed spacecraft, the X-37³, which can stay in space for literally years,⁴ something which you can't do without the huge overburden of life support of the ISS,⁵ which, while somewhat self-sustaining, still requires continual resupply missions⁶ for consumables such as food at considerable cost to keep the human components ticking.

_______________

¹ Space.com: Classified Shuttle Missions: Secrets in Space

² Smithsonian Magazine: The Secret Space Shuttles

³ Wikipedia: Boeing X-37

⁴ Associated Press: Unmanned, solar-powered US space plane back after 908 days

⁵ New Space Economy: Sustaining Life in Space: The ISS Environmental Control and Life Support System

⁶ Wikipedia: Commercial Resupply Services

[frankvw]

"Perhaps decommissioning all the space shuttles in 2011 was a little premature."

No. On the contrary, it was long overdue.The aging Shuttles were kept in service for far too long, but this was willfully ignored until the Columbia disaster drove the point home.

Not planning for it was ridiculously shortsighted, though. Since the start of the Shuttle program the need to design any follow-up spacecraft to support manned LEO missions was completely ignored. And expecting the private sector to take over from that point was never realistic. When the Shuttle was retired, the private launch sector was barely getting started.

At least SpaceX is now able to run a basic taxi-and-truck service to ISS for the moment, or the US would still have to rely on Putin to get anyone's feet off the ground at all, and ISS would either have been shut down by now or been exclusively manned (not to say hijacked) by Russia. But nothing SpaceX is capable of today will support a proper LEO mission that involves Shuttle-era EVA missions.

Seriously... Did nobody see this coming?

[Roland6]

>” No. On the contrary, it was long overdue.The aging Shuttles were kept in service for far too long, but this was willfully ignored until the Columbia disaster drove the point home.”

The same fate as Concorde…

The problem with advanced technology engineering is the cost. Both Concorde and the Shuttle were expensive R&D projects that got put into service with no real regard for longevity or funding for a Mk.2

In Concorde’s case, it didn’t really matter there wasn’t a Mk.2; with the Shuttle and its key design goal and use to take large bits of kit into orbit and take it out of orbit and return it to earth, this was a (future) problem, which we are now having to work with.

My point about the decommissioning, wasn’t so much NASA should continued to patch up an aging fleet, but they should have continued the Shuttle programme (ie. Built the Mk.2 and possibly the Mk.3), but that required funding…

[kmorwath]

Exactly. NASA should have learned that using the Space Shuttle just to launch satellites was a mistake. Its orbital workshop capabilities, and the capability to return hardware to land intact were the real important ones.

So they should have designed a new generation trying to solve the isses of the first one - the boosters, and the heath shield, with new technology that became available, especially the latter. And maybe raise the max orbit altitude as well.

It also didn't need five of them - probably two-three were enough to cover the needs of orbital repairs and decommissiiong, when the failed hardware has to be inspected or refubished if valuable enough.

Ferrying astronauts back and forth could be done with systems like Falcon/Dragon.

But NASA still suffers from the Pentagon obsession for a single vehicle doing it all - it doesn't work for combat planes, it doesn't work for space vehicles. It could theoritcally save money, but in reality it requires too many compromises and in the end it can't work as needed.

And of course, the politician obsessions for spectacular missions without any real value - like Artemis II - or "going to Mars" without the technology needed for a one-year travel....

[Philo T Farnsworth]

But NASA still suffers from the Pentagon obsession for a single vehicle doing it all - it doesn't work for combat planes, it doesn't work for space vehicles. It could theoritcally save money, but in reality it requires too many compromises and in the end it can't work as needed.

And which often end up with phenomenal cost overruns that dwarf any putative savings.

The F-35 is probably a textbook example of a "One size fits all" application that ends up not fitting any and you end up with multiple versions anyway.¹

You'd think we (that is, the US Pentagon) would have learned from the F-111 (aka TFX), to wit,

The F-111B was the most controversial aircraft ever to touch down on a U.S. aircraft carrier. It also was one of the most versatile aircraft to enter U.S. service, although the Navy Department rejected it with a vengeance.

The U.S. Air Force initiated the F-111 program to provide a successor the F-105 Thunderchief, a long-range nuclear-strike aircraft. The program was redirected by Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara in 1961 and relabeled TFX—for tactical fighter experimental—to provide a single aircraft design for tactical strike, close air support, fleet air defense, and battlefield interdiction. He envisioned the Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps all procuring TFX variants. Although the Air Force and Navy had differing requirements for a tactical aircraft, Admiral George W. Anderson, Chief of Naval Operations (an aviator), and General Curtis E. LeMay, Air Force Chief of Staff, publicly announced their endorsement of the new tactical fighter program on 1 September 1961.²

. . . but, as tthe F-35 shows, we never seem to.

________________

¹ The National Interest: All About America’s Three F-35 Fighter Jet Variants

² US Naval Institute: The Aircraft that Couldn’t

[Anonymous Coward]

Two buses, if we consider the width.

[frankvw]

"Two buses, if we consider the width."

Or a bendy bus, if we consider the shape after reentry.

[Bebu sa Ware]

Two buses, if we consider the width.

"Or a bendy bus, if we consider the shape after reentry."

Either way I would prefer a stop outside the house – not in it.

[Spazturtle]

It's near failure anyway, unless you commit to a full servicing mission a reboost alone won't do much good.

[Roland6]

$140M to move a museum exhibit or use it as a deposit to do something with Hubble.

Making lots of assumptions; it does look like in a thousand years the only evidence of Earth’s reach for the stars will be Voyager 1 and 2.

[Ze]

Wouldn't it have been a lot cheaper to launch multiple copies of the Hubble instead of servicing it. We could've had more orbital telescopes like Hubble with more total star watching time if we just launched more of them, sounds like better science to me.

[Yet Another Anonymous coward]

Yes but only if you had used disposable rockets instead of cheap safe reliable reusable Space Shuttles

[John Robson]

What could we produce now, with the capacity of starship as an option?

Specifically the diameter of the primary mirror could be substantially larger (~8m/26ft cargo diameter rather than 4.6m/15ft)

And that's before considering origami on the scale of JWST - which could result in a genuinely astonishingly large primary (which is important for both light collection and for resolution).

They had to build with the technology they had...

It would be a shame not to at least push it out to a parking orbit, for possible servicing or retrieval at a later date.

[kmorwath]

JWS mirror in IR wavelengths allows for less precise mirrors.

Startship capacity for now is just to ditch bananas into the Indian Ocean.

[jpennycook]

Lots of Hubbles were launched, but only one was pointed outwards. Currently there are 7 Hubble-class space telescopes in orbit if Wikipedia is to be believed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KH-11_KENNEN

[JK63]

Nancy Grace Roman is one one of 2 donated chassis to NASA. Oddly enough, a satellite designed to have a look down makes a great survey telescope looking out. IR mostly. Will be a good companion to JWST at L2.

[gecho]

The donated telescopes have a much wider field of view than Hubble so couldn't be turned into direct Hubble successor. The Nancy Roman telescope has 100x the field of view of Hubble's wide field camera. It would be neat to send one to Mars for very high detail surface mapping.

[Spazturtle]

That was one of the proposals back when it was called WFIRST, put it in orbit of Mars and it could do both ground and space observations, it would also mean we could survey parts of the sky that are blocked by the Sun from Earth (for the period when Mars is on the other side of the Sun obviously). Would have required the use of a SLS as the launch vehicle though.

[frankvw]

"...a satellite designed to have a look down makes a great survey telescope looking out..."

Ehm... No. The optics required are of an entirely different order. Hubble has a narrow field of view, extreme low-light capability, extreme long-exposure capability, and sensitivity on wavelengths important to astronomy. Down-looking sats have none of that.

[Spazturtle]

"Hubble has a narrow field of view"

Which is good for studying things, but bad for surveying since you can only see a tiny part of the sky at once.

"extreme low-light capability"

KH-11 and Hubble have the same mirror size, so they collect the same amount of light. The mirrors are just ground differently giving different focal lengths.

"extreme long-exposure capability, and sensitivity on wavelengths important to astronomy. "

Those are features of the instruments, not the optical assembly.

[David 164]

Nah Nasa is only allow one, the US NRO is allow dozens to spy on earth through.

[kmorwath]

How much did Hubble cost? Moreover servicing missions were more than just service missions - they were also researches about how we can operate in space. Having to manouvre, catch the telescope, service it even in parts that weren't designed to be serviced in space were all valuable lessons about space operations - some the ISS can't offer.

[David 164]

Hubble had it glory, let it go out in a flame of glory instead of limping on forever. Let other telescopes take up the task of exploring the cosmos Xuntian in 2026 and Lazuli Space Observatory in the thirties.

[Joe W]

like JWST, Lazuli covers other wavelengths... so that's not a good argument.

[David 164]

The only one it doesn't cover is UV, but there are satellites such as UVEX an ULTRASAT an others.

[Joe Gurman]

Let her go down

Time to build a new uv/optical “great observatory.”

[Doctor Syntax]

Start a rumour that the Chinese are setting up a mission to boost it. Money will then be found.

[Yet Another Anonymous coward]

I really don't think the American tax-payer is quite so guillable.

On the other hand if Fox "News" said it was being allowed to crash and burn because it had discovered aliens .....

[mirachu]

Taxpayers? They don't really get a say.

[wolfetone]

Can confirm this is true.

I saw one for sale on Temu.

[Oneman2Many]

Jarred had offered to pay for it out of his own pocket at the time, NASA said no as they were worried that somebody getting killed or made the situation worse.

Anyway, cost wise its not worth saving. But if somebody has money to burn for sentiment reasons then sure, give it a go.

[NetMage]

Now that’s he’s head of NASA, perhaps he can approve his own mission?

[Oneman2Many]

He has been asked this and the answer was that he has been approached NASA since he did.

The issue is that there isn't a suitable option, if you want to do a human mission and assuming that NASA won't let you use Russian or Chinese capsule, that leaves one choice and it isn't capable of the mission without major changes. Alternative is a build a specialised robotic satellite and that is going to take some time.

Regardless the mission is likely to cost in excess of $100m so aside from Jarred, Elon or Jeff, I don't know who has deep enough pockets to throw away that amount and the passion to do it ?

[Acrimonius]

Nothing more to look at

It seems more it now looks the more unknowns or more unexplainable it discovers or it is more of the same from different parts, imaged countless of times and nothing to further derive having exhausted all the post-processing sleight of hand.

[BiffoTheBorg]

If projects get the funding, far side lunar observatories sound far more interesting than propping up this 40 year old tech.

[ThatOne]

That's like saying "developing faster-than-light propulsion sounds far more interesting than trying to return to the Moon".

Baby steps. Right now we can't even simply go to the Moon, so how are we supposed to install heavy high(est)-precision instruments on it? Not to mention the small problem of communicating with anything on the far side of the moon. Sorry, reality is a bitch...