The Artemis lunar missions see NASA partnering with some of the biggest tech firms on the planet. Elon Musk’s Space X — a space travel company that has seen success in recent years with projects like Starlink — has been enlisted to provide cutting-edge aerospace technology, such as landing systems. As have the aerospace and arms companies Lockheed Martin and Blue Origin, owned by Amazon’s Jeff Bezos. Another private company, Axiom Space, is charged with delivering the next generation of spacesuits for crewed missions.
Much of NASA’s focus is related to the Orion module, which was planned to take a crew of four to the moon as soon as November 2024. However, a press release from the space agency has confirmed that the first uncrewed Artemis mission raised new issues regarding the technology planned for Artemis II after the craft’s heat shield unexpectedly lost a layer of protective material. With the craft deemed to require greater testing, NASA decided to allow the mission’s partners to further refine their technology.
“We are letting the hardware talk to us so that crew safety drives our decision-making. We will use the Artemis II flight test, and each flight that follows, to reduce risk for future Moon missions,” read a statement from Catherine Koerner, associate administrator for the Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington, per the release.
