The American company Spacex on Friday received a contract from the US National Agency for Air Space and Space Study (NASA) for the amount of $ 2.9 billion for the development and creation of a lunar landing module for disembarking astronauts to the surface of the natural satellite of the Earth under the Artemis program (” Artemis”). This was reported to The Washington Post.
In the spring of 2019, NASA announced the project of the lunar program Artemis, which will consist of three stages. The first one (Artemis 1) provides for the unmanned flight installed on the ORION ship Space Launch System (SLS) of the SPACE Launch System (SLS) around the moon and his return to Earth. The second stage (Artemis 2) is the flight of the natural satellite of the Earth with the crew on board. At the third stage of the Mission (Artemis 3), NASA expects to carry out the disembarkation of astronauts on the moon in 2024, and then send them to MARS tentatively in the mid-2030s. The first stage of the program is scheduled for 2021, the second – for 2023.