The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) announced this Thursday that it will delay the mission until mid-2027 Artemis III, which was scheduled for 2026 and plans to take astronauts to the lunar surface for the first time in more than 50 years.
Likewise, the previous Artemis II mission, which must send a manned mission to fly over the Moonwas delayed from 2025 to April 2026, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson announced at a press conference.
“We will not fly until we are ready, until it is possible to do so for the people on board. We must do it well”declared the head of the space agency, who pointed out some problems detected in the ship’s heat shield.
Nelson stressed that, despite these delays, the United States would continue to win the space race at Chinawhich has declared its intention to reach the Moon starting in 2030.
Last January, NASA already announced a delay to its initial schedule due to technical problems.
At that time, it decided to postpone its lunar missions by one year, delaying Artemis II to 2025 and Artemis III to 2026.
The Artemis lunar exploration program was designed as a first step for the arrival of humans to Mars and it started in 2022 with the flyby of the Moon by an unmanned mission.
The new delay is announced at a time of transition in the United States Government and in the leadership of NASA after the Republican donald trump won the elections on November 5.
Trump, who will succeed the Democrat Joe Biden On January 20, he announced this Wednesday that he will appoint millionaire Jared Isaacman, the first private astronaut to perform a spacewalk, as head of the space agency.
Isaacman, 41, is the founder and CEO of payment processing company Shift4 Payments and partnered with Elon Musk and your company SpaceX to test the company’s new space suits.