Thomas Pesquet walked on Luna, an ESA simulation surface

These are astonishing images that conspiracy theorists will no doubt use, still convinced that the six Apollo missions that touched the lunar surface never took place. Here, everyone will nevertheless agree: this moon is fake and very realistic. Thanks to it, European astronauts (or astronauts) will be able to train to work on the Moon! At least on Luna, a surface ad hoc recreated in a large hangar in Cologne, Germany.

Several of these sites exist around the world, notably in the United States and Japan, but none have pushed realism this far. Luna offers 700 m² of a geological reproduction of our natural satellite using basalt dust as a replica of the lunar regolithcommunication conditions identical to real missions in the making, a background screen simulating the Sun seen very low on the horizon, as it will be seen during the missions Artemis. By 2026, a mechanism made of ropes will simulate lunar gravity with its gravity six times weaker than on Earth! The overall cost of the investment is approximately $45 million shared between the German federal government, the Over-the-Rhine Aerospace Center DLR and ESA.

Lunar regolith is very fine dust made from crushed meteorites over several billion years.

The Moon, the real one, is covered with a thick layer of regolith, fine grains (10/50 micrometers), sharp, capable of infiltrating everywhere and radioactive. They were deposited over billions of years by the impact of meteorites on the lunar surface. For Luna, ESA used 900 tonnes of terrestrial basalt dust in order to reproduce this environment as best as possible at a depth of 50 cm!

The hangar is large enough to train astronauts, but also robots and rovers which will sooner or later set foot on the surface of our nearby star. As a reminder, ESA is participating in the American Artemis program to return to lunar soil, having notably designed the Orion capsule. The hope still exists that a European will one day walk on our satellite. And if that were the case, Thomas Pesquet would have every chance of being selected.