Europe must play to win—not just play nice—in a new space race, argues ESA’s boss
Josef Aschbacher, the European Space Agency’s director-general, says keeping up is not enough
SEEING SPACEX’s super-heavy-lift Starship soar into the skies on October 13th, and then its reusable booster fly back to the launch pad in a world first, filled me with awe. NASA, America’s space agency, plans to use a human-rated version of the rapid-launch vehicle to return astronauts to the Moon in a couple of years. China—which has made astonishing strides—aims to put people on the lunar surface by 2030. India hopes to do the same by 2040. A new space race is under way.
From the October 19th 2024 edition
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