Europe plans sat-nav and telecoms network at the Moon
image captionArtwork: Europe will work with the US on its Artemis project
The European Space Agency is proposing a precise navigation system at the Moon, much like the sat-nav technology we have here on Earth.
It would enable spacecraft and astronauts to know exactly where they are when moving around the lunar body and to land with precision.
The initiative, known as Moonlight, would also incorporate a telecommunications function.
A large flotilla of lunar missions will be launched this decade.
Chief among them will be the US space agency-led successor to Apollo. Called Project Artemis, this will put crews on the Moon for the first time in more than 50 years.
Europäische Weltraumagentur stellt Pläne für Mondsatelliten vor futurezone.at - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from futurezone.at Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
4th May 2021 - 08:00 GMT | by Charles Portal in London RSS
Skynet satellite. (Photo: UK MoD/Crown Copyright)
Why has the space domain become so important and moved up the defence agenda?
Fundamentally, modern warfare is increasingly reliant on satellite constellations for beyond line-of-sight communications, data links to unmanned systems, intelligence gathering and surveillance activities. Moreover, many national agencies rely on these assets, thereby increasing the complexity of priorities, management, command and control.
From the Global Positioning System in the 1980s, satellite technology has advanced to the point where the control of UAV swarms is possible, as proposed in the UK’s emerging Tempest programme, providing a network ‘matrix’ that will enabl