Lunar sortie

A lunar sortie (or lunar sortie mission) is a human spaceflight mission to the Moon. In contrast with lunar outpost missions, lunar sorties will be of relatively brief duration.[1]

NASA sorties

On 4 December 2006, NASA announced a "Global Exploration Strategy" and lunar architecture that would implement the Vision for Space Exploration. The planned lunar missions would begin with four-person crews making several seven-day sortie missions to the moon until the power supplies, rovers and living quarters of an outpost are operational.[2]

Private lunar sorties

As of 2010, Space Adventures is a NewSpace company offering advance booking to allow private individuals to take a future lunar mission involving travel to circumnavigate the Moon. Pricing has been announced at US$100 million per seat. This mission will utilize two Russian launch vehicles. One Soyuz capsule will be launched into low Earth orbit by a Soyuz rocket. Once in orbit, the manned capsule will dock with a second, unmanned, lunar-propulsion module which will then power the circumlunar portion of the trip.[3] No time frame for the first mission has been announced.

References
  1. "Lunar Orbit Insertion Targeting and Associated Outbound Mission Design for Lunar Sortie Missions" (PDF). NASA. 2007.
  2. "NASA Unveils Global Exploration Strategy and Lunar Architecture". NASA. 2006.
  3. Lunar Mission, SpaceAdventures website, undated, accessed 2010-05-24.


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