The Bergren mission vehicle, developed by the American company Astrobotec, which was intended to reduce its cost (NASA)

The US space and aviation agency NASA decided to launch its new mission to the moon, called "Bergerin", on December 24, and to land on the moon during the last week of December 2024, for the first time in nearly half a century.

Bergren Mission

The Bergeren mission was developed by the American company Astrobotec, which aimed to reduce costs so much that several years ago it was awarded a $79.5 million contract to deliver 14 NASA payloads to the moon.

The current mission carries about 10 payloads of various types, all of which have a mass of about 90 kg, and will include instruments sent by NASA to study the lunar environment, in particular the outer shell of the moon, the thermal properties of the lunar riches and the abundance of hydrogen in it, and the magnetic field of the moon.

The experiments to be conducted by the mission are followed by NASA, with the exception of one, the radiation detector, which follows German research teams, and these detectors will accurately measure the level of radiation that the human body will encounter on a journey to the moon and back.

All of these scientific missions are side steps in NASA's manned Artemis mission, which will launch over the next few years to put humans on the moon again, expected in December 2024.

Bergren's mission takes off aboard a SpaceX rocket (Shutterstock)

The private sector in space

If the mission succeeds in achieving its goals, Astrobotec will be the first private company to land a vehicle on the moon in history, and with the success of the mission, the United States will continue to contract with the same company to convert a number of instruments to the moon before American astronauts arrive there.

This comes in the context of NASA's shift towards private companies in developing a number of missions, and in fact this entire version will be managed by private companies, as the mission itself belongs to the Astrobotec company while the mission will be launched on board a rocket belonging to the American company SpaceX.

In recent years, a series of problems have emerged on the International Space Station, and it is clear that it will be out of work soon, and NASA has already begun its plans to build a new space station, but unlike the previous station, the private sector will contribute strongly this time.

The agency reached an agreement with Axiomspace late last year to send a module from its space station to connect it to the International Space Station as an initial experiment, and NASA also awarded contracts to develop commercial space stations worth a total of $415.6 million to Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin, among other companies.

Source : Websites + NASA