WASHINGTON — The pilot of the Artemis 2 mission says NASA’s return to the moon should start with human landings in less challenging equatorial regions rather than go directly to the south pole.
Speaking at the NASA Exploration Science Forum at Ames Research Center on July 21, Victor Glover made a plea to NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman to reconsider plans to have the first Artemis crewed landings go to the lunar south pole because of the difficulties of accessing that region.
Asked in an extended discussion with conference attendees about his preferred landing site for the first crewed landing of the Artemis campaign, Glover emphasized the importance of “familiar” locations like those closer to the lunar equator used by the Apollo missions more than half a century ago.
“If you want to go fast, go familiar,” he said. “We want to get to the surface. If we want to land soon, familiar, daylight, equator.”
One reason he preferred equatorial regions is the ease of getting there and back. NASA’s plans for landings at the lunar south pole had involved the use of a near-rectilinear halo orbit, a highly elliptical orbit that would also have been used by the Gateway. However, that orbit would have required astronauts to spend up to a week on the lunar surface before Orion or the Gateway would be in position for them to depart.
