Posted on 01/09/2024 7:54:39 PM PST by Red Badger
The United States is pushing back its planned return of astronauts to the surface of the Moon from 2025 to 2026, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said Tuesday amid technical challenges and delays.
Artemis, named after the sister of Apollo in Greek mythology, was officially announced in 2017 as part of the US space agency's plans to establish a sustained presence on Earth's nearest space neighbor, and apply lessons learned there for a future mission to Mars.
Its first mission, an uncrewed test flight to the Moon and back called Artemis 1, took place in 2022, after several postponements.
Artemis 2, involving a crew that doesn't land on the surface, has been postponed from later this year to September 2025, Nelson told reporters.
Artemis 3, in which the first woman and first person of color are to set foot on lunar soil at the Moon's south pole, should now take place in September 2026.
"Safety is our top priority, and to give Artemis teams more time to work through the challenges," said Nelson.
NASA is also looking to build a lunar space station called Gateway where spacecraft will dock during later missions.
Elon Musk's SpaceX has won the contract for a landing system for Artemis 3 based on a version of its prototype Starship rocket, which remains far from ready. Both of its orbital tests have ended in explosions.
Delays to Starship have knock-on effects because the spacesuit contractor needs to know how the suits will interface with the spacecraft, and simulators need to be built for astronauts to learn its systems.
And the Artemis 1 mission itself revealed technical issues, such as the heat shield on the Orion crew capsule eroded in an unexpected way, and the ground structure used to launch the giant SLS rocket sustained more damage than expected.
As of March 2023, NASA has agreed to pay approximately $40 billion to hundreds of contractors in support of Artemis, the same watchdog found.
A key difference between the 20th-century Apollo missions and the Artemis era is the increasing role of commercial partnerships, part of a broader strategy to involve the private companies in space exploration to reduce costs and to make space more accessible.
Ping!......................
Let Elon Musk do it!
NASA, like every other agency has undoubtedly become a DIE cess pool. Let it die.
NASA Can Douche!
I think I see what the problem is here...
Ah, the irony. Elon Musk is charged with building the Human Landing System (HLS) for Artemis III! It will use the "HLS" variant of the Starship.
One of the biggest causes for the delay is that Starship HLS is way behind schedule, and certain critical items - like showing fueling of the vehicle in orbit - haven't even been attempted yet.
What I was wondering….are they not cutting it?
NASA needs to do a back-to-the-future type of thing.
IOW, they should just copy the technology from 1969-1972 they used to take men to the moon and land them and bring them back. Modern tech just makes things a lot more difficult, unnecessarily.
They should be ready right about the time nuclear fusion power is available.
I read a long time ago that we cannot remake a Saturn V rocket, as all the drawings were on paper vellum and were discarded......................
NASA’s priorities are making sure the woke sexual bits and wrapping paper are politically correct.
Its sad when you can’t root for your own country anymore. I don’t want anyone to get hurt, I just now am rooting for the mission to not be successful.
And before anyone says crap like I left my country, they left me first. My country would prefer me dead. I don’t appreciate that.
We wouldn’t want to make another Saturn V anyway. Most of the parts were hand made and included far more of them than modern rocket engines use.
This is a very mediocre country right now.
Too many incompetent DEI clowns “working” at NASA? My bet this is a big factor.
Aha. The DEMOGRAPHICS are much more important now than the science achievements. The new astronauts must be female, black, gay, and able to twirl a baton. Competence or experience? Meh!
So long as this libtard crap is ruling NASA, other countries will leave the U.S. in the dust as concerns space exploration. Libtards ruin EVERYTHING they touch.
And they will continue to because they cannot go to the moon
When are the Chinese going?
You sound Demoralized.
Where do you get your information on NASA and America from?
Have you ever considered that the sources of your information are what offend you rather than the objects of your information?
We’re most likely entering a multi-decade recession (Japan 1980s - 2020s). That’ll clean some stuff up -but the economy will be an Obamanation with possibly hyperinflation.
They need more time to work on all the things the woman will complain about.
It’s cramped.
Mirror is too small.
It smells.
No lip balm?
I don’t feel safe.
I don’t feel cherrished.
Then there is how to prevent the black guy from jumping up and down on the lunar module and setting it on fire, yelling “F NASA”.
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