Expert explains importance of a ‘lunar outpost’ for intergalactic travel at Adelaide conference
THE creation of a lunar village will signal a bold new frontier of intergalactic travel — a prime point for missions to Mars and beyond, a leading space expert said in Adelaide.
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THE creation of a lunar village will signal a bold new frontier of intergalactic travel — a prime point for missions to Mars and beyond, a leading space expert said on Wednesday.
Professor Jan Woerner, the director General of the European Space Agency, told of his vision for a moon outpost at the International Astronomical Congress in Adelaide on Wednesday.
Prof Woerner stressed there was no firm plan or time frame, but said a trip to the moon would take up to seven days as opposed to about 24 months to Mars and back.
He said it was a much more viable option in the medium term.
He also suggested the moon’s South Pole, which had supplies of ice and ample sunlight, would be a natural place for such an outpost to be built.
Days earlier, European Space Agency colleague, Bernard Foing said by 2040 a hundred people could be living in a “moon village” where the first generation of space children could be born.
He said the intrepid explorers would melt ice for water, 3D print their homes and tools and eat plants grown in lunar soil.
And Australia is set to playa key role in the search for alien life, according to NASA.
The search for intelligent life in space is one of the most interesting and important missions NASA — the US space agency — has.
And now they will have Australia as a solid partner because we will be a partner agency.
As the acting administrator of NASA, Robert Lightfoot meets with the heads of the global space agencies and says up until now “Australia’s been missing”.
The Federal Government announced this week that Australia will have a national space agency.
There are scant details now, but the Government promises it will offer a portal for Australia to become a major player in space.
Mr Lightfoot said having a strategic plan would set up the pathway so space engineers and other experts would have a choice.
They will no longer have to move to the United States or Europe to be engaged in the global space industry; they’ll have a better chance of getting those jobs here because of a more co-ordinated industry.
He emphasised the importance of the Deep Space Network. Australia is one of three spots — the others are California and Madrid — that can always get signals from space.
“Australia is the perfect geographical location for us,” Mr Lightfoot said, because it gets so much outer space data.
“The data that comes down sometime could be the data that confirms life somewhere else,” he said.
“That’s a pretty awesome responsibility, to make sure it’s all working well.”
He declined to comment on what the chances were that alien life would be discovered anytime soon; the search itself throws up enough new research to make it worthwhile, he said.
“I’m a person who believes that our job is to continue to look and when we find life; we’ll find life,” Dr Lightfoot said. “It may not be but what we expect it to look like.
“But even if we don’t find life, we continue to learn. For every question we answer we have 10 more.”
Mr Lightfoot said it was important that, now that an agency will be created, the Government takes care to map out its specific tasks. “The top (piece of advice) would be to scope what you want — to do careful,” he said. “Don’t overcommit, don’t undercommit, find an area to come to in this international area with us.”
He said it was clear how much the international community welcomed the announcement of an Australian agency.
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