Elon Musk on Tuesday said his aerospace company SpaceX could help NASA produce spacesuits for its Artemis Moon mission after the US space agency’s military officer reported that it had been facing significant challenges, making the manned lunar landing impossible in 2024. Among the most important challenges was the delay within the production of the primary two flight-ready Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit (xEMU) spacesuits. The agency was scheduled to organize these spacesuits by November 2024, but now NASA Office of military officer says that there is getting to be a delay and therefore the suits won’t be ready for the flight until a minimum of April 2025.
On Tuesday, CNBC’s space reporter Michael Sheetz quoted from the military officer report titled, “NASA’s Development Of Next-generation Spacesuits,” saying, “NASA’s military officer says delays in spacesuit development are another factor making a 2024 astronaut Moon landing impossible.” He added that with $420 million (roughly Rs. 3,125 crores) spent and another $625 million (roughly Rs. 4,650 crores) expected, the spacesuits won’t be ready for flight until April 2025 at the earliest.
Responding to Sheetz’s tweet, Musk, himself an area enthusiast, wrote: “SpaceX could roll in the hay if need be.”
NASA says in its report that these delays — attributed to funding shortfalls, COVID-19 impacts, and technical challenges — left no schedule margin for delivery of the 2 flight-ready spacesuits. Given the mixing requirements, the suits won’t be flight-ready until April 2025 at the earliest, says the report. Moreover, by the time two flight-ready xEMUs are available, NASA will have spent over $1 billion (roughly Rs. 7,445 crores) on the event and assembly of its next-generation spacesuits, it further said.
Delay precludes 2024 Moon landing
In another section of the report, the military officer said that before 2019, NASA was expected to style , test, and develop the xEMU and supply flight-ready spacesuits to the ISS by 2023. Back then, NASA was expected to supply suits for Artemis III Mission by 2028, consistent with the report, but when the mission was accelerated to 2024, the space agency was also required to fast-track its work by an equivalent time.
