Nasa has dropped its longstanding public commitment to land the first woman and person of color on the moon, in response to Donald Trump’s directives to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) practices at federal agencies.
The promise was a central plank of the space agency’s Artemis program, which is scheduled to return humans to the lunar surface in 2027 for the first time since the final Apollo mission in December 1972.
The Artemis landing page of Nasa’s website previously included the words: “Nasa will land the first woman, first person of color, and first international partner astronaut on the Moon using innovative technologies to explore more of the lunar surface than ever before.”
The version of the page live on the website on Friday, however, appears with the phrase removed.
The development was reported by the Orlando Sentinel.
Nasa spokesperson Allard Beutel said in a statement emailed to the Guardian: “In keeping with the president’s executive order, we’re updating our language regarding plans to send crew to the lunar surface as part of Nasa’s Artemis campaign. We look forward to learning more from [and] about the Trump administration’s plans for our agency and expanding exploration at the moon and Mars for the benefit of all.”
The move by Nasa is particularly notable because the creation of the Artemis program, and decision to land the first woman and person of color on the moon, were made in 2019 during the first Trump administration, according to the science journal Ars Technica.
Posted by John3262005
3 Comments
You think they’ll still put a woman and POC on the moon, or should I quote the Gil Scott-Heron song?
Sending this to Elon Musk to distract him from Amtrak
Probably won’t make much of a difference given I don’t see any way we are getting back to the moon in the next four years.