Testing Of NASA’s Artemis Program:
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) rolled out its Artemis I moon mission to the launchpad for testing at the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida, United States.
- NASA’s Artemis mission is touted as the next generation of lunar exploration, and is named after the twin sister of Apollo from Greek mythology.
- Artemis is also the goddess of the moon.
- It is the first in a series of increasingly complex missions that will enable human exploration to the Moon and Mars.
- With the Artemis programme, NASA aims to land humans on the moon by 2024, and it also plans to land the first woman and first person of colour on the moon.
- NASA will establish an Artemis Base Camp on the surface and a gateway (the lunar outpost around the Moon) in lunar orbit to aid exploration by robots and astronauts.
- The gateway is a critical component of NASA’s sustainable lunar operations and will serve as a multi-purpose outpost orbiting the moon.
- Other space agencies are also involved in the Artemis programme.
- Canadian Space Agency has committed to providing advanced robotics for the gateway,
- The European Space Agency will provide the International Habitat and the ESPRIT module, which will deliver additional communications capabilities among other things.
- The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency plans to contribute habitation components and logistics resupply.
