NASA has announced its aspiration to launch astronauts on a ten-day lunar circumambulation as early as February.
While the U.S. space agency had initially targeted a launch by the end of April, it now aims to expedite the mission timeline.
Marking 50 years since the last crewed lunar mission, NASA’s Artemis II will send four astronauts on a round trip to rigorously evaluate critical systems.
Artemis II represents the second launch within the broader Artemis program, dedicated to establishing a sustained human presence on the Moon.
Lakiesha Hawkins, NASA’s acting deputy associate administrator, underscored the mission’s significance for human space exploration.
“We together have a front row seat to history,” she stated at a recent news conference.
“The launch window could open as early as the fifth of February, but we want to emphasize that safety is our top priority.”
Artemis Launch Director Charlie Blackwell-Thompson affirmed that the Space Launch System (SLS), the powerful rocket designed for lunar transport, is “pretty much stacked and ready to go.”
Remaining tasks include integrating the Orion crew capsule with the SLS and completing comprehensive ground testing.
The inaugural Artemis mission, launched in November 2022, involved an uncrewed spacecraft that successfully orbited the Moon and returned to Earth over a 25-day period.
While the mission was largely successful, minor heatshield anomalies during atmospheric re-entry have since been rectified.
The Artemis II mission will dispatch astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch of NASA, alongside Jeremy Hansen of the Canadian Space Agency, on a ten-day lunar voyage. While not landing, they will be the first crew to venture beyond low Earth orbit since Apollo 17 in 1972.
Artemis II Flight Director Jeff Radigan noted the crew’s unprecedented journey into deep space.
“They’re going at least 5,000 nautical miles (9,200Km) past the Moon, which is much higher than previous missions have gone,” he told reporters.
The mission’s overarching objective is to validate the rocket and spacecraft’s performance, paving the way for a future lunar landing.
The astronauts will inhabit the Orion capsule, positioned atop the SLS, throughout the mission.
Two solid rocket boosters will initially propel the assembly into Earth orbit before detaching approximately two minutes post-launch.
After eight minutes, the Core stage will separate, followed by the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion System (ICPS) and the Orion capsule. Orion’s solar arrays will then deploy to power the spacecraft.
Ninety minutes later, the ICPS will elevate the vehicle to a higher Earth orbit, followed by a comprehensive 25-hour systems check.
Pending successful evaluations, Orion will separate from the ICPS, initiating a “space ballet,” officially known as the Proximity Operations Demonstration.
Astronauts will manually operate Orion’s thrusters to rehearse docking procedures crucial for future lunar landings.
Twenty-three hours later, Orion’s service module will execute a Translunar Injection (TLI) burn, propelling it toward the Moon on a four-day journey covering over 230,000 miles.
Throughout the voyage, astronauts will continue to monitor and assess the spacecraft’s systems.
The crew will serve, in some respects, as human research subjects.
Experiments will meticulously track the physiological effects of space travel. Tissue samples, or organoids, derived from the astronauts’ blood will be grown before and after the mission.
Dr. Nicky Fox, NASA’s head of science, explained that the organoids will be compared to identify space-induced changes in the astronauts’ bodies.
“You may be wondering why we are doing all that when we have the actual astronauts, she told BBC News.
“We want to be able to study in depth the effect of the microgravity and the radiation on these samples. I’m certainly not going to dissect an astronaut! But I can dissect these little organoid samples and really look at the difference.”
Following a lunar slingshot maneuver, the astronauts will commence their four-day return journey, guided by Earth’s gravitational pull.
Upon arrival, the service module will detach, initiating the perilous re-entry phase. The crew will then parachute to a landing off the coast of California.
The success of Artemis II will directly influence the timeline for Artemis III, the mission slated for a lunar landing. However, Dr. Simeon Barber of the Open University suggests that even with a flawless Artemis II mission, NASA’s target of “no earlier than mid-2027” may be optimistic.
“‘No earlier than’ is familiar language for NASA, and it means just that. That’s the earliest possibility,” he said, adding that he deemed that optimistic due to the expense of keeping Artemis III on track.
“The Moon landing will require [Elon Musk’s] SpaceX Starship to take the astronauts to and from the surface, and we’ve seen in recent months that Starship itself still has a long way to go before it can even achieve an orbital flight around the Earth, let alone put astronauts on board.”
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