This schedule is made possible by the success of the Artemis 1 mission, which ended in December after just over 25 days in space.

The Orion spacecraft, which had no one on board for this first test flight, had been propelled by the new SLS rocket - the most powerful in the world - and had successfully entered orbit around the Moon, before return to Earth.

The detailed analysis of this mission is continuing, Jim Free, associate administrator at NASA, said at a press conference.

But the first feedback should allow the second Artemis mission to take off towards "the end of November 2024", he said.

Or in more than a year and a half.

NASA must announce this year the four lucky winners who will form the crew of Artemis 2. We only know that a Canadian will be part of it.

They will go around the Moon – without landing there – during a ten-day mission.

Then will come Artemis 3, which must land astronauts on the lunar surface.

It is officially still scheduled for 2025, although this calendar could not be more uncertain.

"We have always planned approximately 12 months" between Artemis 2 and 3, repeated Jim Free on Tuesday.

But he immediately pointed out that the third mission would be on hold until many of the much-needed elements, currently in development, were finalized.

"We need a lander," and "we will need to have our 'space suits' for lunar surface exploration," Free said.

The lander will be a version of SpaceX's Starship, but whose first orbital flight has not yet taken place.

The space suits are developed by the company Axiom Space.

The Artemis program is to send the first woman and the first person of color to the Moon, when the Apollo program took 12 men there, all white.

Artemis, in Greek mythology, is the twin sister of Apollo (Apollo in English) and a goddess associated with the Moon.

NASA's goal is to establish a lasting presence on the Moon, with the construction of a base on its surface and a space station in orbit around it.

Learning to live on the Moon should make it possible to test all the technologies necessary for a journey of even greater complexity: the round trip of a crew to Mars.

© 2023 AFP