Nasa on Friday said it would revise its Artemis lunar programme that has suffered multiple delays in recent years, in a bid to ensure Americans can return to the Moon's surface by 2028.

The US space agency will add missions between this spring's Artemis 2 and the ultimate lunar landing, a strategic revision that Nasa administrator Jared Isaacman told a briefing would allow for improved launch "muscle memory."

That means Artemis 3, which was meant to send astronauts to the Moon's surface, will now have the alternate goal of "rendezvous in low-Earth orbit" of at least one lunar lander.

The next phase, Artemis 4, will aim for a lunar landing in early 2028. Isaacman said he hoped that mission could be followed relatively quickly by a second Moon landing within the year.

"We're not necessarily committing to launching two missions in 2028," he said, "but we want to have the opportunity to be able to do that."

The Nasa chief said speeding up the cadence of Artemis launches would allow for building more institutional knowledge in the model of the Apollo programme, which originally put Americans on the Moon.

"Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, through the shuttle programme -- I don't think it would surprise many of the folks in the room that our average launch cadence was closer to three months throughout all those programmes, not three years," he said. "We need to start getting back to basics and moving in this direction." (AFP)



Edited by Robert Kemp