NASA's plan to return to the moon is already on the agenda, relying on billionaire founder Elon Musk's SpaceX super rocket. Without Russian air launch support, NASA will rely heavily on SpaceX rockets to enable astronauts to land on the moon and complete their missions.
NASA will send humans back to the lunar surface through the Elthenians program by 2024. The purpose of this mission is much more than just to restart the Apollo program, it will be the first time that black astronauts and female astronauts will land on the moon, and astronauts will stay on the lunar surface for several weeks, and humans will spend more time on this natural satellite of the earth than ever before, and they will eventually build a lunar base and one day practice with the technology and operations required for a human landing on Mars, with the ultimate goal being a destination farther than the moon - Mars.
NASA has commissioned a new powerful lunar launch rocket SLS and a new spacecraft, the Orion capsule. However, the two vehicles will only take astronauts into lunar orbit. In fact, the work of landing them on the lunar surface will be done by the human landing system HLS, and not only that, but HLS will also bring astronauts from the lunar surface to lunar orbit.
The HLS is an absolutely retro-looking starship with a tail that resembles a silver rocket on the cover of a 1950s science fiction novel, but it carries a variety of future aircraft to work together, when Elthenians's project astronauts will travel to lunar orbit aboard NASA's Orion spacecraft. The Starship HLS is just a variant, and a Starship heading to the Moon will remove the typical aerodynamic fins and thermal shielding of the HLS Variant spacecraft, as it will not return to Earth once launched, and the conditions for landing on the Moon vary, so there is no need to add any thermal protection to the spacecraft. The HLS starship will also have a wide landing frame for landing on the rocky lunar surface, and there will also be some form of lift for landing astronauts and materials up and down.
It is understood that starships can carry up to 100 astronauts into space, so NASA could theoretically easily take astronauts to the moon. NASA's astronauts and Artemis project leader visited SpaceX's South Texas Starship Factory and visited part of the base facilities of Spacex's launch pad for massive stars to get a closer look at Spacex's progress with Starship at the orbital launch site, including a skyscraper-sized launch tower, three massive booms, the most complex launcher in spaceflight history, and the largest cryogenic tank area built for a rocket since launch. SpaceX has completed many of the components at the launch site, installed six tanks for liquid oxygen, methane and nitrogen, and added two arms for connecting super-heavy boosters to send the starship into orbit. In addition to this, Starship also includes a Quick Disconnect Arm, which will provide fuel and power to Starship before launch.
SpaceX also continues to develop starships designed to land humans on Mars, but the moon may not be the real target of Spacex, Musk once said that his dream is to colonize Mars now, that is to say, Mars is the real goal, the moon is just a jump, do you think Musk's Mars dream can be realized? Feel free to leave your thoughts!