Three rival missions raise tricky questions about who owns lunar resources
Save time by listening to our audio articles as you multitaskThat seems likely to change in the next few weeks, when an uncrewed lander becomes the first commercial vehicle to touch down on the Moon. But which lander—and which company—will claim that accolade remains unclear. One vehicle,operated by ispace, a Japanese firm, is already on its way and is scheduled to land in late April. But two others are preparing to launch shortly and could still get there first.
should launch in March—the announcement of an exact date is expected shortly—on a Falcon 9, and will take about six days to travel to the Moon and touch down. The company’s boss, Steve Altemus, says a direct trajectory minimises the radiation risk to the craft. Nova-, America’s space agency. This includes hazard-detection systems for landing, a novel engine design and the option for future landers to deploy a smaller vehicle that can “hop” by taking off and landing again.
The Outer Space Treaty of 1967, space law’s foundational text, is showing its age. It dates back to the era when only governments had access to space. And it states that no claims of sovereignty can be made, on the Moon or elsewhere. Efforts to update the treaty to establish rules around resource extraction have run into the lunar regolith.
The debate over who owns the Moon has been the subject of speculation since long before the space age. Lucian, a Greek satirist of the 2nd century, described a lunar voyage in which he claimed to meet Endymion, the king of the Moon. As the trio of landers now hoping to reach the lunar surface illustrate, cheap rockets and new technology mean that the previously fantastical question of the Moon’s ownership is about to get very real.
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