NASA’s rocket finally embarks on Moon mission as Armetis 1 blasts off

NASA said it was expecting somewhere around 100,000 visitors to the area, eager to watch the historic rocket blast through the atmosphere on its maiden flight.

But this may not be the only time lucky spectators can catch a glimpse. If the Artemis I mission is successful, it will be followed up by Artemis II in around May 2024. This will see a four-person crew get taken 5,523 miles beyond the Moon — further than any human has ever been from the Earth — on an 8–10 day flight test.

And this is not the only planned future mission. NASA is also hoping to launch its Artemis III mission, which will see four astronauts travel in an Orion capsule to the planned Lunar Gateway space station in the Moon’s orbit, spending a total of 30 days in space. 

Two of these explorers will then be taken down to the lunar surface by the Gateway’s “human landing system”. The astronauts will spend will spend around a week exploring the surface of the Moon’s South Pole, which humans have never been to before. 

Dr Daniel Brown, an astronomy expert at Nottingham Trent University, said: “The early blast off of NASA’s Artemis rocket marks the end of a long wait to put the unmanned Orion spacecraft into orbit and on its way around the Moon. If we think the wait for the final go-ahead was a tense thing to go through, just wait for another 26 days when the Orion capsule returns to Earth.

“The big test will be to see how the new heat shield of that unmanned spacecraft withstands the high entry speeds into our atmosphere that are 32 times faster than the speed of sound. That matches the fastest speed a human has ever travelled, achieved during the re-entry of the Apollo 10 crew in 1968. This means that the heatshield will have to withstand temperatures close to 3,000 degrees – another nail biting moment.”

Article source: https://www.express.co.uk/news/science/1697213/artemis-i-live-nasa-moon-rocket-mission-pictures