The American space agency NASA has prepared the launch of the miniature Lunar Flashlight satellite (“Moonlight”), it should take place on November 30. The satellite will spend three months orbiting the Moon, whose purpose will be to search for water, or rather, water ice, on the surface of the Earth’s natural satellite. About the size of a briefcase, the Lunar Flashlight features a four-laser reflectometer that emits near-infrared light in wavelengths that are easily absorbed by water ice. If the lasers hit bare rock or regolith (the surface layer of loose Moon soil), the light is reflected back to the spacecraft, but if the radiation is absorbed, it indicates the presence of water ice. The greater the absorption, the more ice there may be on the Moon’s surface at that point. This method allows you to search for water even in dark craters,

The Lunar Flashlight satellite will be launched into a so-called almost linear orbit. It will allow it to use less fuel because, due to its miniature dimensions, the “lighter” cannot carry a large amount of fuel on board. At the farthest point, the altitude of the orbit will be 70,000 kilometers from the surface of the Moon, and at the closest – only 15 kilometers, at this altitude the device will pass over the South Pole of the Earth satellite.

Interestingly, the Lunar Flashlight will use a new type of environmentally friendly fuel that is safer to transport and store, and safer than the traditional fuel used in spaceships. In fact, the “lantern” will be the first interplanetary spacecraft to use this type of fuel, and one of the mission’s main goals is precisely to test this technology for further use. Scientific data collected by Lunar Flashlight will be compared with observations by other moons to more accurately reveal the distribution of water ice on the lunar surface for use by astronauts in the future. Source