The U.S. is going back to the moon!

NASA recently named the four astronauts who will fly around the moon late next year. The first moon crew in 50 years — three Americans and one Canadian — was introduced during a ceremony in Houston, home to the nation’s astronauts as well as Mission Control.

The four astronauts will be the first to fly NASA’s Orion capsule, launching atop a Space Launch System rocket from Kennedy Space Center no earlier than late 2024. They will not land or even go into lunar orbit, but rather fly around the moon and head straight back to Earth, a prelude to a lunar landing by two others a year later.

It almost seems surreal that it has taken this long to return to the moon. Our space program switched from moon exploration to creating a space station and returnable flights with reusable craft — the space shuttle. But after two devastating accidents that took the lives of space shuttle astronauts, the space program seemed to go into atrophy.

This new foray into moon exploration most likely will center around eventually setting up some kind of physical presence on the moon that could be used as a launching point for even further human exploration, such as Mars.

This will be an expensive endeavor. One of the criticisms of previous space exploration was the cost. However, there are opportunities now for more private-public partnerships to build the technology needed to advance space exploration.

It’s an exciting and inspirational opportunity to achieve excellence and forge new ground and new possibilities — something we desperately need.