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For the second time in as many months, NASA is flipping the script and changing its planned missions to the Moon. At the end of last month, the agency postponed its landing on the moon To the mission of Artemis IV While he pledged to complete lunar missions more quickly. This time, the agency said it would cancel the Lunar Gateway, a lunar orbiter scheduled to launch in 2027, in favor of building a lunar base.
NASA officially introduced the new initiative, It is called ignitionduring 3 hour press conference Tuesday. Ignition has many plans for NASA’s near and long-term future, including replacing its predecessor, the International Space Station It becomes unusable in 2030, and the construction of “SR-1 Freedom,” a nuclear-powered spacecraft scheduled to launch to Mars in 2028.
“NASA is committed to achieving the nearly impossible again: returning to the Moon before the end of President Trump’s term, building a base on the Moon, establishing a permanent presence and doing the other things needed to ensure American leadership in space,” said NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman. In a statement.
The new moon plan is scheduled to take place in three stages over the next few years. The first stage is to replace one-off tasks with a “model approach” to gain learning through experience. The second phase will see the construction of “semi-habitable infrastructure” on the moon. The third phase will add permanent infrastructure to that lunar base.
NASA has not set a specific timeline for any of these goals, but Isaacman said that “the clock is running in this great power competition,” referring to China’s goal is to send humans to the moon by 2030. During a speech he gave to various aerospace companies, international space agencies and Congress during an event at NASA headquarters in Isaacman He said The entire initiative will take seven years and cost $20 billion.
This new plan also includes halting construction of the Lunar Gateway station. The orbiter has been under construction for years and He was criticized Being a wasteful distraction from the real goal of returning humans to the moon. Isaacman Hint The orbiter will be repurposed for use on the lunar surface, which will undoubtedly come with its own set of challenges.
What else is NASA working on?
The ignition was accompanied by other announcements, including that the Nancy Grace Roman Telescope was ahead of schedule and under budget, and the success of DART mission To change the path of an asteroid by colliding with it, the continued success of the Parker Solar Probe in studying the Sun, and a group of additional projects that will be launched between 2026 and 2030.
Just as when it fixed the Artemis missions last month, NASA is continuing its mission to get things done as quickly as possible. While the lunar base and Artemis missions are at the forefront of NASA’s current plans, according to Isaacman, thousands of ideas are being worked on behind the scenes.
“The point of today wasn’t to come in and give you a bunch of great PowerPoints and sit back and wait for it all to come to fruition,” Isaacman said. “It’s about action now… We want to act.”