SEOUL (The Korea Herald/ANN): South Korea is seeking to move up its planned 2032 lunar landing, as the government said on April 5 that it hopes to complete a civilian-led rover project by 2030.
The planning for the Moon lander development project has been selected as a target for the preliminary feasibility study by a recent review committee for state projects, according to the Korea AeroSpace Administration (KASA) and its affiliated Ministry of Science and Information and Communications Technology.
The plan supports the civilian sector’s development of a rover that will land on the Moon by 2030.
The review process assesses the necessity, feasibility, requirements and other elements related to government projects, and effectively launches the plan to make South Korea the fifth nation to complete a soft landing on the Moon.
The plan, if confirmed, will run parallel with the ongoing lunar lander mission by the state-run Korea Aerospace Research Institute to be completed by 2032.
Officials of KASA said, in addition to the government project, a civilian-led project is being pushed to motivate companies’ contributions to lunar and deep space exploration. Companies selected for the project will be entrusted with the entire process of the lunar landing mission, from designing the spacecraft to touching down on the Moon’s surface.
It reportedly will use the Korean Space Launch Vehicle-II Nuri rocket, which was developed by the Korea Aerospace Research Institute and is the first orbit launch vehicle entirely developed and manufactured in South Korea.
Several local corporations have thrown their hats in the ring to develop a civilian lander, the space agency said. Multiple versions of the landing plan have been proposed, and the infrastructure for the existing space-related projects will be put to use, KASA said.
The news of the new Moon lander project comes after the US Artemis II mission took off on April 1 for a 10-day fly-by around the Moon and back to Earth. The highly anticipated launch happened at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, renewing public and governmental interest in space programmes worldwide.
The South Korean government’s move to involve civilian companies in its space missions is in keeping with other countries, including the US, where the SpaceX programme was launched in 2002 by US billionaire Elon Musk.
In 2024, the Intuitive Machines Nova-C lander Odysseus became the first American spacecraft to conduct a soft landing on the Moon in more than 50 years. -- THE KOREA HERALD/ASIA NEWS NETWORK
