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CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida – NASA has accepted the delivery of a key European coin needed to power the next generation of the world.
US and European leaders gathered Friday at the Kennedy Space Center to mark the event.
The new power station, or service module, will power NASA's Orion capsule to the moon on a non-passenger test flight scheduled for 2020. A mega-rocket being developed by NASA, called SLS for Space Launch System, will launch the combo.
The European component "allows us to take people further into space than ever before, so this is a very important event for the entire Orion program," said Mark Kirasich, NASA's Orion Program Manager.
Orion and the attached service module are designed to fly near the moon, but not to land. Future missions will embark astronauts with the goal of building an outpost located just beyond the moon, which could allow lunar landings and expeditions on Mars.
The director general of the European Space Agency, Jan Worner, stressed to the crowd: "We will not go back to the moon, we will go from the front to the moon." This is because it will be "in a totally different way" involving cooperation rather than competition, as was the case during NASA's Apollo moon landing program in the 1960s and 1970.
In its only space flight to date, the Orion capsule has climbed more than 3,600 km above the Earth in 2014. The second demo, much more distant, will take place in 2020 with the module Orion and service. which will mark the beginning of the launch of SLS. This mission has been delayed several times.
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