What a great time to start
the new season. Hi, I’m your host Maanvinder and today we’re going on a journey
to the moon. Not physically but just use your imagination and let it run wild.
I hope you have already gotten your boarding pass
from NASA because I have already got mine. Today’s topic is the Artemis
Mission. I have talked about this previously but it was for a blog I no longer contribute
to. Sad, right? So, tight your seatbelts because it’s time to take off again.
With Artemis, NASA marks its
return to the beautiful moon parked in the orbit of our planet Earth. This is a
mission that is to be carried in 3 different programs: Artemis-I, Artemis-II,
Artemis-III. Sadly, I was not here to talk about Artemis-I, which had already
happened back in the year 2022. It was an uncrewed flight around the orbit of
moon. But now I’m here at the right time for Artemis-II. The reason why this
mission is called Artemis is because in the Greek mythology Artemis is the goddess
of Moon and Apollo is the twin sister of Artemis. Since Apollo was a mission to
Moon, NASA decided to call their new mission as Artemis, to keep remembering
the contribution from Apollo missions. The main goal of the Artemis mission is
to land the first woman and first person of color on the lunar South Pole to
study the lunar surface. It is NASA’s first mission in more than 50 years that
involves humans and lunar surface. To be exact, the first crewed mission since
Apollo 17 in 1972. Before you understand what this Artemis-II mission is about,
you need to understand what Artemis-I was about.
Artemis-I which was launched
in November 2022 was an uncrewed mission to the Moon, in which NASA tested the
Space Launch System- a rocket capable of carrying more than 180,000 kg of
weight and Orion Module, which is the most important part related to
Artemis-II. It is because this Orion is a spacecraft attached to the Space
Launch System (SLS) that will carry the astronauts to the Moon. It will have
life support system for the crew of the mission. So what really happened in the
Artemis-I? When this mission was first launched, it was to test the SLS and
Orion Spacecraft. What happened really was once it was launched into the space;
SLS detached itself from Orion, then Orion went on a journey around the Moon
and finally ended with its splashdown into the Pacific Ocean. It was a test
flight, which means there were no humans onboard. This was a major step to
guarantee the success of Artemis-II, since it involves a group of astronauts
who will stay in orbit around Moon to study and gather flight data. You should
not confuse Artemis-II with humans landing on Moon because it will take time.
In simple terms, it is another test flight but with humans onboard. The landing
of humans will only happen in Artemis-III program, which is yet to happen based
on the results of Artemis-II. The initial date of launch for Artemis-II is February
6, 2026 which might change depending on weather conditions. The mission will
last about 10 days by ending the flyby around Moon with a splashdown of Orion
into pacific again, while carrying the crew.
Now you might think we are
doing this all just to carry some humans into orbit around Moon who won’t even
land on surface. But here is the real twist, with this mission NASA is aiming
much higher that is a mission to Mars. That is why, after the success of
Artemis-II mission, NASA plans to build a station around the orbit of Moon. It
will be called “Lunar Gateway, and European Space Agency is working on it with
NASA. The main work of this small space station will be to act like a platform
for the missions to the Moon or possibly even to the Mars. In this, Astronauts
will use Orion to fly and dock with the space station in the orbit and then later
transfer into the Lunar Landing Module to get onto the surface of the Moon.
Lunar Landing Module is basically a vehicle that will carry astronauts to the
surface of the moon. This is basically how Artemis-III will happen. The landing
module that was designed for Apollo missions was for only one journey to the
Moon’s surface but this one will be used for multiple missions.
Back to Artemis-II, the four
astronauts that are set to onboard this are: Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover,
Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen from the Canadian Space Agency. With this
Christina will become the first woman to travel to the Moon and Glover will
become the first person of color who traveled to Moon. Apart from carrying
astronauts, Artemis-II will also be carrying 4 CubeSats from different
countries. A CubeSat is a small satellite that is about the size of a shoe-box and is capable of studying the environment of space. The main goal is to deploy
these into High Earth Orbit when SLS and Orion are separated.
To summarize this,
Artemis-II will be the first mission of NASA in more than 50 years that will
carry humans to the Moon. It will be a flyby around our natural satellite that
will end with the splashdown into the Pacific Ocean. The success of this
mission will decide the trajectory of Artemis-III, which involves landing on
the surface of Moon. This is all I have to share with you now. Until we meet
again. Stay tuned in.
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