The next first step

Congratulations to the Astronauts that left Earth today. Good choice

— Andy Milonakis (@andymilonakis) May 30, 2020

While rioters and their enablers were wreaking havoc over the weekend, there was one bright spot: NASA put two astronauts in space, something it hadn't done since retiring the Space Shuttle in 2011.

A cynic would say we attained this capability in 1965 with the Gemini program, so we haven't progressed in 55 years. And he wouldn't be wrong. But the '60s featured NASA at its peak: lean, aggressive, risk-taking, and committed. Since then it has gone the way of most organizations and succumbed to bureaucratic laziness. Now it is gearing up for another moonshot. It's a hopeful reversal. (Ironically, the embarrassment of American astronauts having to hitch a ride to space on Russian Soyuz spacecraft may have been what kickstarted the present drive.)

So the launch of the Crew Dragon Demo-2 on Saturday was a great victory for SpaceX, whose innovations in rocket technology and manned space capsules have, for a time, taken attention off NASA's decades of idle talk about returning to the Moon or going to Mars. Now that this milestone has been reached, all eyes will turn to the Artemis program, whose goal is to reach the Moon in 2024.

However, this is not your grandpa's moonshot. The Artemis program is strikingly different from the Apollo program of the '60s and '70s. Here are the biggest differences:

• Fewer test flights: The Apollo program had a rapid testing schedule with a mission every couple of months before NASA finally went for it on Apollo 11. By contrast, the Artemis program has only two scheduled test flights over the next 3 years. If all goes well, Artemis 3 will be the one to land on the Moon. There are no planned missions after that. If there's a setback or, God forbid, an accident, I think Artemis 3 could be pushed back or canceled. The lack of testing is concerning because testing is how you learn to avoid and anticipate mistakes and malfunctioning equipment. The abbreviated testing schedule means the pressure will be on to execute flawlessly.
  
• Wrinkles in mission execution: The Apollo Moon missions were scattered across the near side, but Artemis 3 will land near the south pole. Targeting this area of the Moon calls for an unconventional orbit around the Moon that's perpendicular to the Moon's orbit around Earth. This has never been tried with people before. Waiting for the astronauts on the surface will be their equipment, launched on separate rockets, presumably weeks or months in advance.
  
• Longer missions, larger crew: The plan is for Artemis 3 to carry four astronauts. Two will stay in lunar orbit while the others, a man and a woman, go down to the lunar surface. They'll spend up to a week on the surface, double the 3 days the Apollo 17 astronauts spent there. It'll be interesting to see how the astronauts' equipment, especially on the Moon, holds up over that length of time. Moon dust is like pulverized glass. It's super-fine, sticky, and corrosive. You definitely don't want to breathe it in.
  
• Moon base or no? The intent right now is to establish some sort of consistent, if not permanent, human presence either in lunar orbit or on the surface. That the missions after Artemis 3 aren't greenlit yet suggests they're waiting to see how the test flights go. Yet putting off these decisions places an undue burden on Artemis 2 and 3, the manned missions. Groundwork for an orbital "gateway" or base could and should be started then. Do we really want a base in the out-of-the-way south pole? Ditto a gateway, whose unconventional orbit over the poles would be cumbersome to change once it's assembled. It's conceivable neither of those things will happen and the focus will shift to land men on Mars by 2030. Budget limitations foreclose an all-of-the-above approach. NASA will have to choose.

As always, let me know what you think in the comments. Apropos of exploring the Moon, I have written a hard science fiction book about the first commercial expedition to colonize the Moon. It's called Tendrils to the Moon. You can find an extended preview for it here.

UPDATE: I was wrong about the gateway's orbital limitations. According to this promotional video produced by NASA, it is possible to make changes to the gateway's orbit at apogee to position it virtually anywhere over the lunar surface.