NASA Wants To Build A 'Gateway' To Shoot Astronauts To The Moon And Beyond A Bit More Easily
NASA wants to take humans to the Moon, not just to revisit but also to establish it as a forward base to access the rest of the solar system. To do that, they need to first establish a forward base to get to the Moon, and that¡¯s what The Gateway i
NASA wants to take humans to the Moon, not just for a revisit but also to establish it as a forward base to access the rest of the solar system. To do that, they need to first establish a forward base to get to the Moon, and that¡¯s what The Gateway is.
Images courtesy: NASA
The US space agency is attempting to convince Congress and the White House to allow it to build the proposed station in the 2020s. They want it to be a like a port of call for spacecraft on their way out from Earth, whether the destination is the Moon or even beyond.
Over the last three years, NASA has been crafting and refining its plans for the Gateway, and especially solidifying a case to present to lawmakers for funding the project. So far, NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine and Vice President Mike Pence have both endorsed it.
¡°There¡¯s no other architecture that I¡¯ve been presented with, given the current budgets we have, that enables all of what we want to do,¡± Bridenstine told ArsTechnica. ¡°And so I came to the conclusion that the Gateway is the right approach.¡± Even most aerospace contractors are onboard, given that NASA has offered six different contracts to build the Gateway¡¯s habitat module. In addition, they intend to partner with private space agencies like SpaceX to deliver cargo and other goods and services for the station.
Make no mistake, it¡¯s a highly ambitious and expensive project. The Gateway is expected to cost well upwards of $10 billion to build. If it goes through though, the station is expected to be ready by 2025, allowing NASA to make jump offs from it to the Moon, Mars, and even large asteroids. Most importantly though, it would finally give the agency¡¯s giant Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft something to do.
These two spacecraft were built by aerospace firms for NASA for close to $20 billion, but they¡¯re still not powerful enough to go to either the Lunar or Martian surface. A halfway point between the Earth and Moon would instead allow them to launch with smaller fuel stores and then stock up at the Gateway.
It¡¯s still a work in progress, but you never know. In another five or more years, astronauts could be camly stepping out of their rocket hatches and into a station floating above the Moon right below.
