Japan Plans Moon Mission In 2018
JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) recently announced plans to launch a unmanned probe on the surface of the moon in 2018. The probe, called SLIM for Smart Lander for Investigating Moon, expected to cost at around $ 100 million.
This is for the Japanese space agency a mission test, to demonstrate the operation and mastery in some space technologies. Then Japan officially planning to develop a suite of manned mission to Mars.
Japan would become the fourth country in the world after the US, Russia and China, to send and put down a robotic probe on our natural satellite.
Indeed, Japan is aligned with these Asian neighbors (China and India) which have recently demonstrated the will and the capacity to develop space missions.
If the race to the moon and space is not officially launched, many indications suggest his departure should be in the near future. All space actors methodically prepare their program, chess will soon be in place.
