With one date already established for Artemis II in 2026the eyes begin to put on the following mission of the ambitious program with which the NASA wants to return to the moon. But as it approaches, it becomes evident that Artemis III has a serious problem. Currently scheduled for 2027there is increasingly a greater concern about whether Starship HLS landing modulewhich must take astronauts to the lunar surface, will be ready on time.
Starship HLS It is one Variant of the upper stage of the Spacex Starship rocket which was selected by NASA as a moon landing module (Human Landing System). Its purpose is not return to Earthbut remain in the lunar orbit and serve as a transport to the surface and back to the orbit for astronauts. It is still in development, so it begins to even consider 2028 as a date too optimistic.
According to Ars Technica, NASA would be working on a Blue Origin contingency plan To develop a new module option, Adapting your Mark 1 load vehicle so that I can support a manned mission.
The gigantic -124 meters high- Spacex Starship has recently achieved some hits when reaching suborbital trajectories, but she still has a long way to go to be viable. Is far from achieving a stable orbit and to be able to perform a Restaging in spacetwo key aspects for its future lunar mission. And that without counting on the Complexities of the landings and takeoffs from the moon With a sized ship. No one knows how many flights would be necessary to refuel effectively in orbit -some estimates speak of up to 20 -, which adds more uncertainty to the NASA calendar.
The alternatives to Starship HLS
In this context, the space agency is valuing alternatives. A proposal would be convert Starship HLS into a smaller and easier vehicle to land which would also require less fuel. Another would be Develop your own landing module with the help of previous partners as Northrop Grummanalthough achieving it in just a couple of years seems unrealistic.
Thus, NASA is studying if the Blue origin lunar lunar module It could be modified to offer a certain transportation and housing capacity for the crew. Blue Origin is also developing a Mark 2 capsule For manned missions, but the Mark 1 could adapt taking advantage of part of the research carried out for the design of Mark 2.
He Mark 1 would not need replacement and the basic tests would have already been completed in a sufficient degree for the sources of Technica to consider that it could be operational Before the end of 2028. If so, NASA could get ahead of the Chinese manned mission to the moonscheduled for 2029.
We will see the Mark 1 in action for the first time in 2027when traveling to the moon as part of the Pathfinder mission. If everything goes well, it will transport a lunar rover that same year, and later they could occur Credulated launchesincluding one, if Starship HLS is not ready on time, within the Artemis III mission.