have stated that their second mission to the Artemis program is now delayed to April 2026.
Their initial plan was to send the astronauts around the Moon, however, they should have landed in September 2025. With that being said, a Moon landing mission would not be taking place until 2027, which translates into a year later than they originally had planned.
The delay was caused by an issue that occurred at the capsule’s heat shield. The capsule shield had returned from the previous mission eroded, with cracks and even with some of the fragments broken off. Bill Nelson also added that "the safety of our astronauts is our North Star".
“We do not fly until we are ready. We need to do the next test flight, and we need to do it right. And that's how the Artemis program proceeds." he stated.
The chief of the space agency also said that the root of the problem as started with engineers, and thought that the situation could have been fixed by modifying the trajectory of the capsule’s re-entry, yet this would take more time, as reported by BBC.
Even more so, NASA is in a competition with the Chinese space agency, as they do have their own plans of sending their astronauts to the Moon. Even more so, Bill Nelson stated that he is sure that they would be the first to reach the lunar surface first “double down to meet and improve this schedule”. Also, added, “We plan to launch Artemis 3 in mid-2027. That will be well ahead of the Chinese government's announced intention that they have already publicly stated is 2030.".
Meanwhile, Jared, was nominated to be the new head of Nasa. He is a billionaire and astronaut who might provoke a shock to NASA’s system, as Dr Simeon Barber, space scientist at Open University said.
“Isaacman is going to bring a new pair of eyes over how NASA operates. And it's hard to predict what this combination of Isaacman, Musk, and Trump might mean for NASA as we know it.".
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