This one, that you see in the title, is Jim Bridenstine’s goals for NASA’s future. Longs debated mission Artemis has become “a mission we cannot afford to postpone.” Artemis is the next manned mission on the Moon, planning to build a lunar base that would fly humans to Mars.
And the Trump government had doubts and changes of heart about it, feeling that Mars is much more of a stringent subject. But it looks like Artemis’s fate was sealed.
Besides taking the first couple made of a male and a female on the Moon, Artemis included the president’s needs for Mar to be explored with the new Artemis Base Camp. The US Space Agency reported that the agency’s new goal is to explore Mars from a lunar base.
To build the so-called Artemis Base Camp would allow astronauts to live on the Moon for short periods and conduct missions to Mars from there.
NASA eyes Mars from its lunar base, the Artemis Base Camp
The new strategy is to create long-termed exploratory missions on three dimensions: low-Earth orbit, the Moon, and Mars. The Moon will be the base from which robots will be sent to explore and then come back.
The first steps are a permanent lunar habitation structure, mobile habitation that would allow astronauts to make 45 days travel across the Moon, and transport means so the astronauts can travel long distances.
Bridenstine is calling for private financial support to create some sort of space economy. By promoting the commercialization of low-Earth orbit, Bridenstine is calling the private sector to invest in space research.
Once that’s achieved, the actual mission can start: Moon’s exploration by robots, landing astronauts on the Moon, creating the staging area for Mars exploration, robotic exploration of Mars, and finally manned mission on Mars.
“For years to come, Artemis will serve as our North Star as we continue to work toward even greater exploration of the moon, where we will demonstrate key elements needed for the first human mission to Mars,” said NASA’s Administrator Jim Bridenstine.
