Hello and welcome back to Max Q! Last week was a week of milestones and landmarks. This week I was going to add Rocket Lab’s first Virginia launch to the list, but (sigh) they scrubbed the Sunday attempt because of high winds… we’ll see if they can nail it today. In this issue: A first for NASA’s Artemis program… …and Japanese firm ispace News from Quantum Space, and more It was a landmark day for both commercial and public space ventures, with NASA’s Orion capsule returning to Earth just hours after the launch of a privately funded and built lunar lander by Japanese company ispace. The two missions — the conclusion of NASA’s Artemis I and ispace’s Mission 1 — are some of the clearest signs yet that the moon will likely become a permanent site for scientific missions and commercial activity. Click the link above to learn more about each mission and click here to watch my interview with ispace CEO Takeshi Hakamada at TC Sessions: Space earlier this month. Image Credits: NASA More …

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