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Preparation for manned lunar exploration ‘No abnormality’… NASA to launch Artemis 2 next year

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The US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)’s lunar exploration project ‘Artemis’ will embark on a second-stage plan to send a manned spacecraft to the moon at the end of next year. NASA successfully completed the unmanned lunar exploration mission of ‘Artemis 1’ in December of last year.

According to AFP on the 8th, NASA plans to send four crew members to lunar orbit through the Artemis 2 mission at the end of November 2024.

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“We are looking forward to the Artemis 2 mission,” NASA Deputy Director Jim Free said. “Based on what we learned from the Artemis 1 mission, nothing is holding us back.

The Orion lunar probe, which was launched on November 16 last year on board Artemis 1, embarked on the Pacific Ocean near Baja California, Mexico at 9:40 am (local time) on December 11, completing a 25-day lunar exploration trip.

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Orion went directly into lunar orbit, which will be followed by future manned probes, and flew about 2.25 million km (about 1.4 million miles) in this mission. Orion also had mannequins made similar to the human body and attached with various sensors. The goal is to verify the performance of the spacecraft hull during the flight period of about a month, and to understand the effects of long-term space flight on the human body.

In the Artemis 2 plan, four real people, not mannequins, are put on a spacecraft to attempt a manned flight in lunar orbit. In particular, in the second stage, the ‘manned moon swing by’, which uses the moon’s gravity to adjust the flight path with a crew member on board, will be attempted 56 years after Apollo 8.

NASA plans to unveil the crew aboard Artemis 2 later this year. The identities of the crew members have not yet been revealed, but some speculate that one in four crew members will be Canadian.

In the Artemis 3 mission, which is being promoted in 2025, about 12 months after the Artemis 2 mission, mankind will finally step on the moon again after 53 years. The goal is for astronauts composed of women and people of color to land on the south pole of the moon. If the lunar landing is finally successful, astronauts will conduct scientific exploration activities on the lunar surface for six days.

According to NASA, some equipment to be used for lunar landing missions, such as the lunar lander and space suit being built by SpaceX, a private space company, are still in the development stage.

Source: Donga

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