Скачать или смотреть New lunar training facility unveiled to prepare astronauts for future moon missions

(25 Sep 2024)
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NASA - MUST CREDIT
ARCHIVE : Moon - 20 July 1969
++4:3++
1. Neil Armstrong steps onto moon
UPSOUND (English): "It's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."
2. Astronauts on lunar surface

ASSOCIATED PRESS
Cologne, Germany - 17 September 2024
3. Tilt down of rocks and surface of LUNA facility
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Matthias Maurer, ESA astronaut: ++STARTS ON PREVIOUS SHOT AND PART COVERED BY SHOTS 5, 6 & 7++
"So this facility is worldwide the best facility to prepare missions to the moon. We have everything that we need to test and prepare ourselves for the moon. It's a facility that not even NASA has. It took like more than ten years. When I first came up with the idea, I initiated it and said like: 'we need to prepare for the moon'. Because currently we are only flying to low-Earth orbit, to the International Space Station, but the next missions will bring us to the moon."
5. Maurer inside Luna facility, outside surface, with helmet on, wearing protective suit, camera pan left to surface of Luna facility
6. Footprint in surface
7. Various of LUNA facility surface
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Alexander Gerst, ESA astronaut: ++STARTS ON PREVIOUS SHOT AND PART COVERED BY SHOTS 9 & 10++
"The unique feature of this facility here is that we have an integrated simulation of most aspects that we will encounter on the moon. It's the surface, it's the lunar dust, the rocks, the lighting, we will have a gravity offload system, we will work in spacesuits that limit our movement, limit our view. It's all coming together. It is crucially important for before we go to the moon that we train in a situation that is as close as possible to the real thing."
9. Various of LUNA facility in dark
10. Pan across facility

ASSOCIATED PRESS
ARCHIVE : Buenos Aires, Argentina - 14 September 2024
++NIGHT SHOTS++
11. Moon at night
STORYLINE:
It may be years before the European Space Agency's astronauts set foot on the moon, but preparations are well underway here on Earth.

At the European Astronaut Centre in Germany, a new state-of-the-art facility is bringing the lunar landscape to life, allowing astronauts to train for the challenges of moon exploration.

The new LUNA facility simulates the lunar landscape, complete with 900 tonnes of volcanic rock.

Here, astronauts can walk on a surface designed to mimic the moon, training for the unique challenges they'll face in space.

Equipped with lunar dust, rocks, and even gravity simulations, the LUNA facility is designed to replicate every aspect of a moon mission.

ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer helped bring this project to life.

"This facility is worldwide the best facility to prepare missions to the moon. We have everything that we need to test and prepare ourselves for the moon," Maurer says.

Plans are to use the facility, jointly operated by ESA and the German Aerospace Agency, to test lunar rovers, practice walking on the moon's surface in cumbersome space suits, and work with 3D printers that could turn lunar soil into shelter components for longer stays.

“We need to prepare for the moon because currently we are only flying to low-Earth orbit to the International Space Station," says Maurer.

“But the next missions will bring us to the moon," he adds.

The facility's lunar soil is made of volcanic rock mined in the Siebengebirge mountain range not far from where LUNA is located and then ground and sifted until it's as close to the moon's surface as possible.







The Artemis II mission plans to send four astronauts around the moon in 2025.

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