According to a head of one of the first private companies that may be able to successfully touch down on the lunar surface, the United States is getting ready for an exciting lunar mission, which is to take place on January 25, more than 50 years after the last Apollo mission.
In order to land on the moon’s surface, Astrobotic, an American company, has developed a spacecraft called Peregrine, designed to touch down on its surface. It is also important to note that this is a unique mission because the lander will be unmanned.
In a recent interview with the New York Times, Astrobotic CEO John Thornton confirmed that the lander will be carrying Nasa instruments with the intention of studying the lunar environment in anticipation of NASA’s Artemis manned mission.
In order to support the commercial lunar payload services program of NASA, this mission will be part of the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative, which aims to commission US companies to send scientific experiments and technologies to the moon on a fixed price basis.
It is expected that these contracts will contribute to the development of the lunar economy and lower the cost of transport services.
Thornton told reporters at his company’s base in Pittsburgh on Wednesday that one of the most difficult challenges of what we are attempting here is to launch and land on the surface of the Moon at a fraction of the cost that it would normally cost.”
It is estimated that only about half of the missions that went to the surface of the Moon have succeeded, according to him. The challenge is certainly daunting, and at every stage of this journey I am going to be terrified and thrilled all at the same time.”
During the launch of the new Vulcan Centaur rocket by ULA industrial group on December 24, the mission will be carried out aboard the rocket that will be the inaugural flight of the new rocket.
The mission is expected to reach lunar orbit a couple of days after launch, but it will not be able to land on the moon until January 25 due to optimal lighting conditions.
There will be no human intervention during the descent, but AFP reported that it will be monitored from the company’s control centre in the event that anything goes wrong.
A Japanese start-up called ispace had already come close to becoming the first private company to land on the Moon in the spring, but the mission ended in a crash, which meant that the mission could not continue. The year 2019 was also a difficult year for Israel as it suffered a setback.
The United States of America, Russia, China, and most recently, the Indian space program, are the only four countries to have launched a successful mission to the Moon.
Besides Astrobotic, NASA has signed contracts with other companies, such as Firefly Aerospace, Draper, and Intuitive Machines, which are also part of the astronaut program.
SpaceX is scheduled to launch the latter at the beginning of the year aboard a rocket built by SpaceX.
Despite the risks, NASA has accepted the possibility that some of these missions may not succeed, according to Chris Culbert, the manager of the CLPS program at NASA. “We are aware of the risks,” said Culbert.
Despite the fact that not all landings are successful, CLPS has already had a positive impact on the commercial infrastructure that will be required for establishing a lunar economy in the future, he said.
NASA is working on a program called the Artemis program with the goal of establishing a base on the surface of the moon.
That news provided by timenews.
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