Yes, it’s time to say bye to 2024 (and a mini-moon) and welcome 2025. Let’s get the calendar warmed up:
First things first, SBAG (Small Bodies Assessment Group) is in Orlando, FL next week (Jan 7-9).
Soon after will be the big AAS meeting, Jan 12-16. This one’s not so important, since there was the separate AAS-DPS meeting months ago, but there’s still some crossover.
As an odd-numbered year, we’ll have a PDC (Planetary Defense Conference) in the Spring, May 5-9.
We’ll also have Apophis T-4 Years– just barely enough time to get a smallsat mission in time for 2029!
The LPI’s hosting an Itokawa and the Dawn of Asteroidal Sample Return Workshop, Jan 28-29…
…and a Workshop on Bennu and Ryugu: Samples from the Early Solar System in Autumn.
Regular meetings include LPSC (Lunar and Planetary Sci. Conf.) in March,
the Meteoritical Society annual meeting (“MetSoc”) in July (early this year!),
the Goldschmidt 2025 (geochemistry/cosmochemistry) meeting,
SBAG’s counterpart/complement ExMAG in Spring,
and the PERC Dust Meeting (IDP- International Symposium on Dust and Parent Bodies).
The Macau Space Science meeting may be interesting, I’ve never been.
Let’s not forget events like the launch of SPHEREx/PUNCH (together), in a few short weeks.
Euclid was launched and commissioned, and released early data– full release One will be in months.
And of course Vera Rubin will be seeing first light… date depends on your definition of “first light.”
In existing flights, Lucy will fly by (52246) Donaldjohansen this Spring, and trickle down data for weeks.
Psyche, however, is in midcourse cruise and will not encounter anything (we know of) this year.
Same with Hera– asteroid-wise, at least; it will make a Mars gravity assist in March.