The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) announced the latest round of delays in astronaut missions on Tuesday, where the first moon crew in over 50 years - three Americans and one Canadian - will have to wait till next year before flying to the lunar surface and at least two years before landing on it.
In its Artemis mission, NASA had planned to send the four astronauts, which also include the first African American assigned to a lunar mission, aboard the Orion capsule in late 2024 in a prelude to a lunar landing by two others in 2025. However, this flight has now been pushed to September 2025. They were only supposed to fly around the Moon without entering lunar orbit.
The first human moon landing in more than 50 years - Artemis III - has also been delayed, from 2025 to September 2026. NASA cited safety concerns with its own spacecraft, as well as development issues with the moonsuits and landers coming from private industry.
NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said that the delays will “give Artemis teams more time to work through the challenges". This comes after Pittsburg-based Astrobotic Technology was forced to abandon its own attempt to land its unmanned spacecraft on the Moon due to a critical fuel leak. The Peregrine lander was supposed to study the Moon's surface environment ahead of human missions planned for later this decade. It carried five NASA payloads and 15 other components. The instruments were to measure radiation levels, surface and subsurface water ice, the magnetic field and the exosphere.
Astrobotic's Peregrine lander was supposed to serve as a scout for the astronauts. A Houston company will give it a shot with its own lander next month. "Given the propellant leak, there is, unfortunately, no chance of a soft landing on the moon," the company said in a statement.
NASA plans to resume astronaut missions
NASA is relying heavily on private companies for its Artemis moon-landing program for astronauts, named after the mythological twin sister of Apollo. The Peregrine lander was part of the first lunar project since the Apollo mission in 1972.
SpaceX’s Starship mega rocket will be needed to get the first Artemis moonwalkers from lunar orbit down to the surface and back up. But the nearly 400-foot (121-meter) rocket has launched from Texas only twice, exploding both times over the Gulf of Mexico. A third test flight is planned for February.
The Government Accountability Office warned in November that NASA was likely looking at 2027 for its first astronaut moon landing, citing Elon Musk’s Starship as one of the many technical challenges. The development of Houston's Axiom Space is another potential hurdle for the space agency. The longer it takes to get Starship into orbit around Earth, the longer NASA will have to wait to attempt its first moon landing.
According to CNN, NASA is still targeting 2028 for the launch of its Artemis IV mission, which will aim to send astronauts to a forthcoming space station that will orbit the moon, called Gateway.
Back in 1972, NASA competed in the global space race with the Soviet Union, which is known for launching the first man-made satellite in space, Sputnik, in 1957, and also sent the first animal, the famous dog Laika, the first man Yuri Gagarin and the first woman Valentina Tereshkova, into orbit. However, their main competitor now is China.
NASA has only one Artemis moonshot under its belt so far. In a test flight of its new moon rocket in 2022, the space agency sent an empty Orion capsule into lunar orbit and returned it to Earth, but scientists found some charred material coming off the capsule's heat shield during re-entry.
NASA’s moon-landing effort has been delayed repeatedly over the past decade, adding to billions of dollars to the cost. Government audits project the total program costs at $93 billion through 2025.
China's lunar exploration missions
Meanwhile, China's space agency said on Wednesday that its latest lunar explorer had arrived at the launch site in preparation for a mission to the moon in the first half of this year. The China National Space Administration said that pre-launch tests would be carried out on its Chang'e-6 probe. The mission's goals include bringing back samples from the far side of the moon.
China and the US are both pursuing plans to land astronauts on the moon in what has become a growing rivalry in space. The US plans to do so in 2026, and China's target date is before 2030. Four countries — the US, Russia, China and India — have landed spacecraft on the moon. Only the United States has previously put astronauts on the moon.
"I really do not have a concern that China’s gonna land before us. “I think that China has a very aggressive plan. I think they would like to land before us … but the fact is that I don’t think they will," said Nelson on Tuesday.
(with inputs from AP)
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