• The small town of Matjiesfontein will serve as the perfect location for a Lunar Exploration Ground Site.
• These sites are used by NASA for communications as far as two million kilometres away.
• Lunar Exploration Ground Sites will be placed in the US and Australia to support Artemis missions.

Along the N1 between Laingsburg and Touws River is the small town of Matjiesfontein with a population of 422 people. As you might imagine, it’s a quiet town away from the hustle and bustle of the city.

More importantly, it’s far away from radio noise and that might be one of the reasons as to why NASA selected this town as the location of one of three Lunar Exploration Ground Sites (LEGS).

On Tuesday this week the Department of Science and Innovation, together with NASA, signed a letter of intent to formalise a space exploration partnership. This includes the construction of the LEGS.

These sites are used to support communication and navigation services for missions as far out as two million kilometres away. They are placed at strategic locations around the world to insure constant communication. These LEGS will be used to support the forthcoming Artemis missions.

There are two other LEGS with one in White Sands USA and the third yet to be determined in Australia. While NASA did provide GPS coordinates for the site in South Africa, these are yet to be set in stone.

“We really couldn’t have asked for a better spot on Earth than here in South Africa, with whom we first partnered six decades ago to land the first humans on the lunar surface,” deputy administrator for NASA’s Space Communications and Navigations programme, Dr Badri Younes, said in a statement to SA News.

This is not the first time NASA has placed a communications facility in South Africa. Just West of Johannesburg located between a few hills is the Hartebeeshoek Radio Astronomy Observatory. Originally constructed by NASA in 1961 as the Deep Space Station 51, it was used to assist in tracking uncrewed missions. The station also received the first images of the surface of Mars.

While the observatory is now operated by the National Research Facility under the auspices of the National Research Foundation, NASA does still contract the facility from time to time.

“We see this partnership as mutually beneficial. The Matjiesfontein ground station will alleviate increased demand for NASA’s Deep Space Network, allowing Artemis to meet its goals and expand our scientific knowledge,” said director of the Department of Science and Innovation, Dr Phil Mjwara.

In Artemis news, following a delay in launch, the Space Launch System and Orion spacecraft are now tentatively set to launch on 16th November. Let’s hope that launch happens this time.