The Artemis II mission marks the first manned mission to the moon in over 50 years. One of the biggest questions on everyone’s mind is what’s the purpose of going after so many decades.
Aditya G Nair, aerospace engineer at the University of Nevada, Reno, said the biggest reason is a new push for space exploration.
“We have a renewed interest in space, in space technology. We have our eyes set on Mars and other planets, and a lot of space exploration. These missions open us up to some of the bigger challenges. Understanding, satisfying our intellectual curiosity about space, they help us make bigger leaps,” he said.
Nair said that the main reason we didn't land on the moon on this mission is that NASA wants the Artemis team to become familiar with the technology.
“We want the astronauts to be familiar with these things. I'm sure when the astronauts come back, they will give feedback. Perfection in terms of space travel is gonna be difficult. There's gonna be a lot of small issues on the way, but that's what you want to navigate, and we would like to fix them for the next journey,” he said.
The astronauts on board Artemis II are expected to return to Earth on Friday, with splashdown off the California coast at approximately 5 p.m. PDT. While the flyby was the height of the mission, in many ways, it’s not over until the astronauts are on the ground.
