NASA HEADING BACK TO THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
CAPE CANAVERAL: Nearly 50 years since the last of the Apollo missions splashed down in the Pacific, NASA is taking one giant leap back to the moon. NASA’s Artemis 1 mission is due to launch from the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida at 10.33pm tonight AEST on a 42-day unmanned voyage beyond the far side of the moon and back.
And Australia will again play a role in space exploration, with the Canberra Deep Space Communication Complex at Tidbinbilla one of three facilities around the world used to track communications from all crewed and uncrewed Artemis missions. “As the Earth turns it means that the US tracking station Goldstone (in California) can no longer see the spacecraft, so it hands over to Spain or it hands over to Tidbinbilla,” said Professor Alan Duffy, lead scientist of the Royal Institution of Australia.Prof Duffy.
Australia is also one of 21 countries in the Artemis Accord, a framework for how exploration and mining operations on the moon will be managed.
Four Artemis missions are planned between now and 2027. Artemis 2 in 2024 will be a crewed flight that will orbit the moon, while the third mission, planned for 2025, will be the first to put astronauts on the moon since Apollo 17 in 1972. After Artemis 3, NASA plans to launch crewed missions about once a year.
If the weather proves unfavourable for a launch today, there are opportunities later in the week. It will take several days to reach the moon, flying around 100 kilometres at closest approach. The capsule will carry a mannequin called “Moonikin Campos,” equipped with sensors to record acceleration and vibrations, and two other dummies: Helga and Zohar, who are made of materials mimicking bones and organs and will test the impacts of radiation in deep space.