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NASA's First Moon Mission in 50 Years
By Haylee Vejvoda
NASA, along with the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) recently announced the astronauts who will be going to space as part of the Artemis program.
Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Hammock Koch, and Jeremey Hansen will be the next four people to land on the Moon in over 50 Years. Notably, this crew contains the first woman and person of color to land on the Moon.
But what is the Artemis program, and why does NASA want to go back to the Moon? NASA answers the later as follows,
“We’re going back to the Moon for scientific discovery, economic benefits, and inspiration for a new generation of explorers; the Artemis Generation.”
The Artemis program is the next series of Moon missions, with the goals stated above, and will be a partnership between commercial and international entities.
Right now, Artemis has three stages. Artemis I was an unmanned flight test that sent the Orion spacecraft around the Moon. Artemis II will be similar to Artemis I, in that it will be a flight test and feature the Orion spacecraft, the exception being that it will carry a crew. Artemis III is expected to be the next mission which will actually land a crew on the Moon.
The Artemis II mission will launch no sooner than November 2024, and Artemis III isn’t expected to happen until sometime after or around 2025.
NASA's Artemis Crew
NASA plans for the first several Moon landings to be short trips, but they’ll steadily increase the duration and crew members over time. In later Artemis missions, NASA intends to create permanent habitation on the Moon, which would house rotating crew members as trips to the Moon increase.
The Artemis program will be a gateway to further knowledge of space and habitation of a planet other than Earth. In the coming years this program will hopefully uncover knowledge never before available, and open new doors to further space exploration, such as Mars.
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