Earlier this month, Vice President Mike Pence made NASA’s new goal clear: the space agency is tasked with sending humans to the surface of the Moon again, this time to create a foundation for deep space missions.
Though it’s unclear exactly how the administration plans to pull this off, the new mission is a big change for NASA, which has been focused on going to Mars without a return to the lunar surface, The Verge reports.
Numerous international state agencies have ambitions to send either spacecraft or humans to the Moon’s surface, and various US space companies see the Moon as a way to make money. If NASA is looking for help to pull off its lunar ambitions — which it likely will need — then there are a lot of governments and companies who may be eager to pitch in.
