With so many companies striving hard to make the journey to the Moon a reality, NASA gets closer to the dream. It is now accepting proposals for moon landers from companies involved in space exploration.
NASA aims to receive the human moon landers’ proposals by November 1, which is is the organization’s final call after two drafts issued on July 19 and August 30.
NASA’s Artemis Program
The moon landers that will carry humans to the Moon are part of NASA’s Artemis program which aims to send the first woman and the next man to the Moon in 2024.
As part of the program, the human moon landers will reside in a separate spaceship called the Gateway. Gateway will be present in an orbit around the Moon and enable close access to the Moon for the extensive exploration of the lunar surface.
The Artemis program primarily involves NASA’s spacecraft dubbed the Orion that will take the help of NASA’s SLS (Space Launch System) to land people on the moon.
Under the program, the first company to make its lander commercially available within less than five years will take its first flight in 2024 and the second company will do so in 2025.
Additionally, NASA will provide several awards for companies that will be in the works of developing and showcasing their own human moon landers.
Private Companies’ Moon Landing Initiative
Companies bringing in the proposals for the same could include private lunar landers such as SpaceX’s or Blue Origin’s landers.
For those who don’t know, Jeff Bezos showed off its Blue moon lander sometime back, along with Lockheed Martin’s design for a moon lander.
The most recent one is Elon Musk’s Starship that got announced a couple of days ago. While the spaceship will initially plan for non-human moon landings, it will eventually take humans to the surface of the Moon.
Artemis’ Further Goals
Apart from landing people on the Moon, NASA’s Artemis program aims to bring about ways for sustainable life on Moon by 2028. Furthermore, the program will be extended to a journey to Mars, which will be NASA’s next revolution.
