NASA squeezed Treasury, vibe coded, and broke the mold in bid to save Swift
Ars Technica Stephen Clark
NASA tried to save the Swift telescope with a new rescue spacecraft. The mission failed, but the effort to make it possible was the real feat.
Based on reporting by Ars Technica, Stephen Clark — read the original for the full story.
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NASA’s attempt to keep the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory from falling out of orbit ended in failure, but the rescue plan itself was an unusual piece of space engineering. Officials from government and industry said the behind-the-scenes work deserved notice even though the telescope was not saved.
The effort came through Katalyst Space Technologies, which was working under a $30 million NASA contract awarded last September. NASA gave the company nine months to build and launch a satellite that could catch Swift, which was flying about 200 miles above Earth, and push it into a higher orbit.
That spacecraft, called Link, got off the ground on July 3 and passed some of its early checks. Then a malfunction sent it spinning out of control a few weeks later.
NASA said in August that Link would not be able to reach Swift as planned, and the rescue was called off. So the telescope stayed on its own, and the big idea ended up as a near miss rather than a save.
My take — AI-written commentary, not fact-checked reporting
This is the sort of failure space agencies should be allowed to have more often: ambitious, specific, and not built out of committee mush. The real embarrassment would’ve been doing nothing and letting the telescope fade quietly while everyone admired the paperwork.
Read more about this at: Ars Technica