WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 09th August, 2023) NASA's planned Artemis II first deep space manned flight of its new Moon Mission spacecraft is not planned to enter into any orbit around the lunar satellite, Mission Commander Reid Wiseman told reporters at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
"I don't think we are going into lunar orbit on this one," Wiseman, the designated mission commander, told a press conference on Tuesday.
Artemis II is currently planned to make three ever more wide-ranging earth-orbiting flights including one that would take it beyond the orbit of the Moon, Wiseman acknowledged. But at no point would it make any on-course corrections to take it directly into orbit around the Moon, he said.
Artemis II is planned as a preparatory flight for Artemis III, which is scheduled to return US astronauts to the lunar surface in December 2025 for the first time in more than 53 years, including the first female US astronaut and first US astronaut of color to walk on the lunar surface, NASA officials have previously said.
