Following the successful launch of the first Artemis mission, Nasa officials have spoken about their ambitions for the agency's lunar programme, which could send astronauts to live on the Moon before the end of the decade. 

Howard Hu, the Orion programme manager, said the Artemis launch was an “historic day for human space flight” and called it "the first step we’re taking to long-term deep space exploration". 

“Certainly, in this decade, we are going to have people living for durations, depending on how long we will be on the surface. They will have habitats, they will have rovers on the ground,” he told the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme.

“We are going to be sending people down to the surface and they are going to be living on that surface and doing science,” he added.

After several failed attempts, Nasa’s ‘Space Launch System’ (SLS) rocket launched from the agency’s Kennedy Space Centre in Florida last week, propelling...