Humanity's return to the moon: Role of the Europeans still unclear

It is still not certain whether a European will set foot on the moon during one of NASA's upcoming Artemis missions. Josef Aschbacher, Director General of the European Space Agency ESA, explained this to dpa.

According to him, there are no plans for a representative from Europe to fly on the Artemis-2 mission scheduled for the end of 2024 or on the Artemis-3 mission planned for 2025, and it has not yet been determined whether Europeans flying on Artemis-4 and Artemis-5 will fly to the moon at all - and not remain in the space capsule. NASA does not want to make a decision on this until after Artemis-2 has been completed. One possible candidate for the flight is the German astronaut Alexander Gerst.

"Ten on a scale of ten"

Artemis-2 is currently scheduled for November 2024 at the earliest and is expected to last 10 days. Following the unmanned Artemis-1 mission, the Americans Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch and their Canadian colleague Jeremy Hansen will fly to the moon and become the first humans to orbit the Earth's satellite in more than 50 years. A landing is not planned; this is only to be achieved with Artemis-3. Even if this doesn't work out on schedule, Aschbacher is still certain that the USA will come out on top in the race back to the moon: "The next astronaut to stand on the moon will very likely be a US-American - pretty sure, in fact", dpa quotes him as saying.

For Alexander Gerst, it would be a "ten on a scale of ten" to be one of the next people to set foot on the moon and hold moon rocks in their hands. But that applies to all his colleagues, he told dpa. Gerst has been to the International Space Station twice so far, and in 2018 he was the first German to take command of the ISS. He is one of six active members of the European Astronaut Corps. Five others are currently being trained by the ESA for manned space missions. It has not yet been decided who will take part in the Artemis missions.

In addition to the United States, China and India are also preparing manned flights to the moon; one aim is likely to be to secure possible claims to the mining of raw materials. So far, the ownership claims there are largely unresolved, says Aschbacher. In the long term, the ESA chief sees real opportunities for economic growth generated there. However, the mineral resources available there are likely to be used first for the construction of lunar bases and the extraction of fuel. A return to Earth is unlikely to be worthwhile in the foreseeable future, "but this is about looking into the future, not just ten years, but 100 years or more".

(mho)