Why NASA Wants to Go Back to the Moon
Posted: Sat Aug 13, 2022 3:50 pm
https://www.wired.com/story/why-nasa-wa ... -the-moon/
WITH THE ARTEMIS 1 mission certainly scheduled to blast off in a few weeks, NASA is poised to return to the moon for the first time in half a century. It’s a major step in a formidable plan to launch new spacecraft, assemble a lunar space station, and bring humans back to the moon for the first time since the end of the Apollo program, when astronauts Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt were the last people to set foot on the dusty regolith.
Artemis 1 will mark the inaugural launch of a 32-story rocket called the Space Launch System, topped by the Orion space capsule. The capsule will fly within 62 miles of the lunar surface, while deploying small spacecraft for research on "and beyond" the moon. Although this first flight will be uncrewed, others with astronauts will follow in the coming years, and Orion is capable of carrying humans farther than any spacecraft has ever flown before. While the momentous Artemis 1 mission includes some research objectives, it serves as a technology demonstration and a symbol. "To all of us who gazed up at the moon, dreaming of the day humankind returns to the lunar surface, we are going back. That journey, our journey, begins with Artemis 1," said NASA chief Bill Nelson at a virtual press conference in early August.
WITH THE ARTEMIS 1 mission certainly scheduled to blast off in a few weeks, NASA is poised to return to the moon for the first time in half a century. It’s a major step in a formidable plan to launch new spacecraft, assemble a lunar space station, and bring humans back to the moon for the first time since the end of the Apollo program, when astronauts Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt were the last people to set foot on the dusty regolith.
Artemis 1 will mark the inaugural launch of a 32-story rocket called the Space Launch System, topped by the Orion space capsule. The capsule will fly within 62 miles of the lunar surface, while deploying small spacecraft for research on "and beyond" the moon. Although this first flight will be uncrewed, others with astronauts will follow in the coming years, and Orion is capable of carrying humans farther than any spacecraft has ever flown before. While the momentous Artemis 1 mission includes some research objectives, it serves as a technology demonstration and a symbol. "To all of us who gazed up at the moon, dreaming of the day humankind returns to the lunar surface, we are going back. That journey, our journey, begins with Artemis 1," said NASA chief Bill Nelson at a virtual press conference in early August.