PEOPLE could be living on the moon by the end of the decade, a top NASA official has said.
The claim by Howard Hu followed the successful launch this week of the Artemis rocket after several failed attempts.
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The 25-day mission around the moon will pave the way for a later crewed flight test and future human lunar exploration.
Mr Hu, programme manager of Orion — the lunar craft carried by Artemis — said: “Certainly in this decade we are going to have people living [on the moon] for durations.
“We are going to be sending people down to the surface, they are going to be living there on the surface and doing science.”
The Artemis is carrying the Orion lunar spacecraft which is manned with a manikin – a model of the human body used to measure the impacts of the flight on the body.
Howard Hu, the Orion programme manager, said the launch was a “historic day for human space flight”.
He told the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg: “It’s the first step we’re taking to long-term deep space exploration, for not just the United States but for the world.
“I think this is an historic day for Nasa, but it’s also an historic day for all the people who love human space flight and deep space exploration.
“I mean, we are going back to the Moon, we’re working towards a sustainable programme and this is the vehicle that will carry the people that will land us back on the Moon again.”
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Named after the Greek goddess of the moon and sister to the god Apollo, namesake of Nasa’s first moon missions, the Artemis programme will see the construction of the Lunar Gateway – a new space station where astronauts will be able to live and work.
