Washington: Human Returns to the Moon, has been postponed last week by NASA from 2024 to 2025, will actually take place in 2026 “earliest”, according to government audits published on Monday.
The artemis program to restore Americans to the moon faced “technical difficulties and increased delays by the Covid-19 pandemic and weather event,” NASA Audit Body, Office Inspector General, said in a report.
“NASA’s goal to land astronauts at the South Pole at the end of 2024 faced a significant challenge including the main technical risk, an unrealistic development schedule, and the funding rate requested from being requested,” said the report.
First, the new space clothing needed for the mission will not be ready “until the early May 2025,” he said, noting “technical challenges and lack of funds.” Second, the development of “human landing system” or HLS, which has been entrusted to the company, SpaceX will also “may” experience a delay.
Lander, named Starship, will transfer astronauts, traveling with capsules launched by NASA, from the orbit month to the surface of the moon.
The Office of Inspector General praised the “fast speed” of the production of SpaceX, thanks to a system that “produces many engine parts and components at home.” During a visit in August to headquarters in California and the factory in Texas, OIG said 20 prototypes of spacecraft and 100 Raptor machines had been built.
Whereas over the past 15 years, the average time between contracting and the first flight is eight and a half years, spacex should achieve this achievement in half the time, the audit said.
“Given the time needed to develop and fully test HLS and new spacesuits, we project NASA will exceed the current schedule for human landing on the moon at the end of 2024 times several years,” the report ended.
Mission, which will be the modern equivalent of Apollo 11, called Artemis 3.
It will be preceded by Artemis 2, which will take astronauts to the moon but without landing.
Before that, Artemis 1 will also go to the moon, but without astronauts on the ship.
This mission is scheduled to be nominally for February 2022, but the audit estimates that it will really occur “in the summer of 2022.” OIG reports also conclude the lunar program is too expensive.
It will cost as much as $ 93 billion in the 2025 fiscal year, according to estimated reports, with a cost per launch of $ 4.1 billion for the first four mission.
The wine body, which is funded by US taxpayers, must “identify ways to reduce costs”, he said.