NASA announced a Friday visit to Alabama by Administrator Jim Bridenstine and members of Alabama’s congressional delegation late today amid reports that Huntsville’s Marshall Space Flight Center has won another important job in the Artemis program to return Americans to the Moon in 2024.
NASA sent a press release announcing the visit saying Bridenstine will “discuss the center’s role in launching astronauts to the Moon and landing them safely on the lunar surface.”
Marshall will manage the development of the lunar landing system that will take the first woman and next man down from the Space Launch System booster to low-lunar orbit and then to Moon’s surface, according to the science website ars technica. Marshall will oversee commercial companies developing the low-lunar orbit craft called the Transfer Element and the moon lander called the Descent Element, the report says.
NASA has already announced that Lisa Watson-Morgan, a top engineer at Marshall, will lead the lander program.
There is a third piece of critical hardware for the mission that NASA still doesn’t have. It is called the Ascent Element and will be developed by the Johnson Space Center in Houston, according to the ars report. This vehicle is where astronauts will stay on their trip down to the Moon’s surface and back to SLS for the return home.
Bridenstine is also expected to give an update on the Space Launch System booster that will launch the first test flight of an uncrewed Orion capsule around the Moon and the later mission carrying astronauts. NASA has said the SLS booster is approximately 80 percent complete at its Michoud Assembly Center outside New Orleans.
https://www.al.com/news/2019/08/report-nasas-marshall-center-in-alabama-gets-big-role-in-lunar-lander.html
2019-08-13 23:49:00Z
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