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NASA want to establish a lasting human presence on the Sun Myung Moon , but right now , astronauts have to be in direct line of pile with Earth to phone home .
The space agency is looking to change that with its explicate Near Space web , and it ’s willing to pay up potentially huge total to private companies to aid make uninterrupted lunar communication theory a world . Those plans got a boost today when NASA announced it had awardedIntuitive Machinesa contract to build and deploy a artificial satellite constellation capable of providing navigation and communications for future missions on or around the lunation .
The Houston - based company is well have intercourse for pulling offthe first - ever private Sun Myung Moon landingin February . ( That missionary station was cut short after the lander tripped on a rock and landed on its side , but it still counts . ) The troupe sells a rideshare inspection and repair to the moon , but payloads can only transmit data point when in direct line of products of spate with a ground station .
The undertaking order of magnitude contract bridge for the Lunar Relay has a maximal potential time value of $ 4.82 billion , though that does n’t stand for Intuitive Machines will definitely be pay out that much over the five - year contracting full point . The chore order , which also includes an option to extend another five years , only insure $ 150 million , fit in to a regulative filing . But it ’s likely that the lunar planet constellation , plus communications and navigation services , will top out at more than the cornerstone price .
Satellite relay race stretching from geosynchronous cranial orbit to near the lunar month ’s field will also be essential to NASA ’s nearer - term ambitions to land human beings on the moon ’s south magnetic pole before the end of the decade . According to the way , that neighborhood of the lunation provides few landing chance that are in lineal communicating with Earth ’s priming coat stations . But even beyond crewed missions , a lunar relay race could also enable new capabilities for uncrewed missions , like remote or self-governing surgical process of rovers , plus piloting services and boost information transmission rate for payloads on the moon ’s surface .
This substructure wo n’t just benefit NASA ; private industry , include Intuitive Machines , will in all probability take more racy communication for future moon missions .
Intuitive Machines , which went public last year , count business with the government among the majority of its revenue . That includes multiplesignificant contracts for lunar lander overhaul , via NASA ’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program , engineering service , anda contract bridge to design a next - gen lunar rover . In the second one-fourth of this twelvemonth , the troupe ’s revenue hit $ 41.4 million , a 130 % increment year - over - year .
