European Space Agency ESA has shared its plans to create a satellite constellation that will orbit the moon and provide navigation and telecommunications services to lunar explorers.
If all goes according to plan, the new satellite system could arrive in the late 2020s, just a few years after NASA’s Artemis 3 manned mission is expected to land near the moon’s south pole.
The ESA believes that the natural satellite of the Earth in the coming years will become a busy place, turning into a kind of “eighth continent”, for which commercial companies and countries from all over the world have already begun to compete.
ESA’s Director of Telecommunications and Integrated Applications, Elodie Viau, explained:
Having a navigation and telecommunications network to transmit back to Earth what we learn on the Moon will be key to the sustainability of future missions. You can imagine astronomers opening observatories on the far side of the moon. And since we’re all used to virtual meetings, who knows? We could use Skype on the moon. “
To date, ESA has entered into contracts with two European industrial consortia to study the feasibility of such a project over the next year and a half.
ESA’s Director of Human and Robot Research David Parker said:
The idea is that this could be one of the projects that we will submit to the Council of ESA member countries in 2022 and propose for implementation. The project can start at full speed in early 2023 to ensure its operation for four or five years. “
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