An hour after liftoff, the spacecraft fired its engines and started on its 105-hour journey toward the moon. Operated by Spaceport Florida, the launch site can accommodate a variety of rockets in an effort to bring more commercial launch business to the area. Officials expect to start getting data back from the moon that same morning. Prospector will circle the moon once every 118minutes using instruments to describe the moon's magnetic and gravitational fields while it also searches for water and minerals. Prospector's main goal is to detail the composition of the moon, where 75percent of the surface remains unmapped.
Scientists are eager to study the entire moon's dusty crust.
We learned through Apollo that there are abundant resources in the surface of the moon, but we only looked at very specific areas. If successful, Lunar Prospector will give us that information over the whole globe of the moon. The search for water, which may be frozen in a deep crater on the moon's south pole, is another prime goal. The ice would be a valuable resource to future moon dwellers who could use it for drinking and also break it into its constituent hydrogen and oxygen to make rocket fuel. By mapping the moon's composition intimately, scientists say they can address lingering questions about where the moon came from and how it has changed over time.