Posted on 10/28/2020 4:21:45 PM PDT by BenLurkin
The European Space Agency (ESA) signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on Tuesday (Oct. 27) formalizing its collaboration on Gateway, a planned outpost in lunar orbit that NASA sees as key to its Artemis program of crewed moon exploration.
Under this new agreement, ESA will provide Gateway with a habitation module and a refueling module, both of which the European agency will operate once the hardware is up and running. ESA contributions will also include two additional service modules for NASA's Orion capsule, the spacecraft that will launch Artemis astronauts from Earth atop the agency's Space Launch System (SLS) rockets.
Gateway, which will be about one-sixth the size of the International Space Station, will serve as a staging ground and jumping-off point for trips to the moon's surface, for both crewed and uncrewed missions, NASA officials have said.
The European habitat module, known as I-Hab, will do more than simply augment HALO; I-Hab will be "the main habitat for astronauts when they visit the Gateway," ESA officials said in a statement today. I-Hab will incorporate contributions from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, and it will feature two docking ports for crewed human landers, NASA officials said.
Those human landers will be built by one or more American companies. Earlier this year, NASA awarded contracts to three private groups — Dynetics, SpaceX and The National Team, led by Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin — to develop crewed lander concepts. The agency is expected to select one or more of these ideas for further development in early 2021.
The ESA-provided refueling module, called Esprit, will sport a large window similar to the European-built Cupola on the International Space Station, ESA officials said. In addition to its refueling role, Esprit will enhance Gateway's communications capabilities.
(Excerpt) Read more at space.com ...
Ping.
Why?
Why do we have to keep inviting foreign govs into our stuff?
Biden will kill this and redirect NASA to Mars again with a laughably inadequate budget.
Crap, that means they’ll have to have two sets of tools on board, regular and metric.
> Why do we have to keep inviting foreign govs into our stuff?
On the bright side, it makes these programs a bit harder to kill if we’ve made commitments to international partners.
Biden will kill this and redirect NASA to Mars again with a laughably inadequate budget.
—
Sort of. But its Harris who will dedicate NASA to weather and muslin outreach - the rest will be scrapped so no one is tempted to leave Her area of absolute control. Space will be left to Her masters, the Chinese.
Most of this is NASA pipe dream - Musk will be there long before Artemis and Space Launch System (SLS) are an operational reality
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