Material Planner III

The Next Space StationIn the history of space exploration, space stations have been an important milestone, as they allowed space agencies to develop and test countless systems required for long-term presence in space. They also gave us insight into the effect of weightlessness on the human body and provided a safe structure from which to perform many scientific experiments.With the ISS expected to begin de-orbiting in a few years, it might seem that the more recent Chinese space station Tiangong, now opening for non-Chinese astronauts , most likely first to Russian astronauts, will be the largest inhabited structure in space for the foreseeable future.China plans to double the station from 3 to 6 modules in the coming years. This would bring its mass to 180 metric tons, or just 40% of the ISS's 450 tons.But this is incorrect, as a much more ambitious project than the ISS is being built: the Lunar Gateway.Lunar Gateway is a keystone of the Artemis program, a series of deep space missions looking to bring back Western astronauts to the Moon. You can read an overview of the Artemis missions and the rationale behind them in “ The Artemis Mission: Fly Me To The Moon (Again) ”.The Lunar Gateway will eventually become an anchor point for future Artemis Moon landings and associated missions. It will also be the first deep space station, orbiting another celestial body than Earth, being located as far as ~350,000 km from Earth (210,000 miles), while the ISS was orbiting just 400km above us (250 miles).Why Build The Lunar Gateway?Fitting In Artemis DesignThe Artemis missions aim for long-duration stays on the Moon lasting days and weeks, and eventually, a permanent settlement of the place.You can read a detailed account of the Artemis program in the dedicated report we published recently.This means that a lot of material, spare parts, resupply, personnel, and potential help needs to be located in the immediate vicinity of the lunar missions, not a minimum of several days away, even when assuming a rocket is ready to launch immediately. This is why the Artemis mission IV will be, in large part, dedicated to building the Lunar Gateway, a space station orbiting the Moon.The exact date of Artemis IV is unclear, as the program has suffered repeated delays

Sierra Space announced in September a "Quick Start" R-GPS contract awarded by the U.S. Space Force Space Systems Command to produce design concepts for smaller, more cost-effective GPS satellites.