After more than a 50 year hiatus, NASA is finally making strides towards once again sending astronauts to the moon. A few weeks ago the space agency announced the names of the 4 astronauts who will be on the first return mission to the moon. Keeping their promise of increasing the diversity of those sent on missions, the team consists of:
- Christina Koch, an electrical engineer with over a year spent in space who holds the record for longest continuous time in space by a woman, as well as being the first woman ever assigned to a lunar mission.
- Victor Glover, a Navy pilot who made his first spaceflight in 2020 and spent more than 6 months aboard the ISS, and also the first African American on a lunar mission.
- Reid Wiseman, another Navy pilot who served as the head of NASA’s astronaut office as well as making a spaceflight to the ISS in 2015.
- Jeremy Hansen, a former Canadian Air Force pilot who is now a member of the Canadian Space Agency. This will be his first space mission and space flight.
The mission will be NASA’s first back to the moon since Apollo 17 in 1972. Although the astronauts will not be landing on the moon, they will remain caught within its orbit for some time, allowing the team to collect data, run experiments, and prepare for a return mission that will place boots on the ground of the moon once more. NASA plans for this Artemis-2 mission to take place late 2024 to early 2025
This follows the Artemis-1 mission from late last year where NASA sent an unmanned spacecraft around the moon to test the safety and dependability of the new hardware. These are both preparatory stages for the Artemis-3 mission, which NASA expects to occur around 12 months after the completion of Artemis-2. With Artemis-3, NASA plans to send a two-person lander to the south pole of the moon for a multi-day expedition where the team will collect data about the most mysterious region of the moon and use 21st century technology to take photographs and videos of the surface like never before.
All of these missions combined are helping NASA’s ultimate goal of landing a human on the surface of Mars. Beyond Artemis-3, the agency plans to build a permanent base camp on the surface of the moon, allowing crews to remain on the lunar surface for up to 2 months at a time. This will help facilitate their goal of expanding lunar research, but also their ambition of annual lunar missions following Artemis-3.
In order to facilitate the goals of the Artemis-3 mission and beyond, NASA is developing what they call the “Gateway,” a lunar space station designed to make the transfer of astronauts to and from the earth much easier. Not only will Gateway allow for permanent residents to conduct experiments within a lunar orbit, but the station will also allow for a human landing system, making transport between the lunar surface much easier. This project is expected to be completed around the same time as Artemis-2.
While the current purpose of the gateway project is to expedite lunar spaceflights, it is also the groundwork for deep-space exploration and is fundamental to any future manned martian mission. Because of the unique orbit the station will be in, as well as the storage and command capacity of the craft, it will serve as the perfect staging point for missions beyond the earth system. Since the launch will begin at a weak point in the lunar orbit, the total fuel usage of the mission will be greatly diminished. The station would also allow for refueling of rockets, greatly increasing the range of humanity and creating opportunities for exploration beyond anything currently achievable.
Although NASA has incredibly ambitious goals and a roadmap well into the future, their efforts remain focused on the success of the Artemis-2 mission. While almost an exact replica of a mission done 50 years ago, Artemis-2 will serve as the foundation for 21st century human space exploration and one of the many stepping stones on humanity’s path to explore the final frontier.
