![]() Therefore Lockheed Martin has to develop a kind of shuttle to refuel Blue Moon around the Moon.īlue Origin plans to use its New Glenn rocket, which has never flown before, to launch both its lander and this refueling shuttle.Īrtemis 4, scheduled for 2028, and Artemis 5 a year later will both land on the Moon, but will first pass through a new space station in lunar orbit, called Gateway, which has yet to be constructed. Once in lunar orbit, Blue Moon will need to be refueled before it can descend and collect the astronauts from the surface of the Moon. The latter will be responsible for developing a crucial element. You have backups."īlue Origin's lander, dubbed Blue Moon, is being developed with several partner companies, including Draper, Boeing, Astrobotic, Honeybee Robotics, and Lockheed Martin. We want two landers," NASA boss Bill Nelson said on Friday. NASA in 2022 also chose the SpaceX lander for its Artemis 4 mission, but at the same time requested submissions from other companies for the rest of the program. The space agency had originally intended to offer two contracts, a practice commonly used to guard against the possibility one fails, but said it had been constrained by budget concerns. The contract was worth $2.9 billion, although SpaceX is supplementing that amount with its own funding.īlue Origin had also competed for the first contract, and filed an unsuccessful lawsuit against NASA when SpaceX was chosen as the sole lander provider. ![]() In 2021, the US agency chose SpaceX to build a lander for Artemis 3, the first mission in the series to have actual astronauts set foot on the lunar surface. The Artemis program marks NASA's return to the Moon after more than 50 years and is made up of several missions, each with increasing complexity. ![]() The contract amounts to $3.4 billion, but John Couluris, vice-president in charge of lunar transport at Blue Origin, said during a press conference that the company would itself contribute "well north" of that amount to develop the craft. The company will first have to demonstrate it can safely land on the Moon without a crew.īezos, the founder and former CEO of Amazon, said on Twitter he was "honored to be on this journey with to land astronauts on the Moon - this time to stay." That’s no guarantee that Nasa might not face the same situation of having to choose between SpaceX and other proposals.Blue Origin's lander was selected for the Artemis 5 mission, currently scheduled to take place in 2029. “The President certainly has the prerogative to announce his own budget, and it's my understanding … that that's coming next week, early in the week.” “It was Congress that agreed with my position that we ought to have competition,” Mr Nelson said. But Nasa also noted in the source selection document that while it would have preferred to offer two contracts, Congress did not provide the necessary funding in 2021 to do so.Īsked about the possibility Congress could pull the rug out of this new lunar landing competition as well, Mr Nelson said he had spoken with people in Congress that supported the new lunar lander program, but deferred to an upcoming announcement of a proposed federal budget by US President Joe Biden rather than provide details. ![]() Part of Blue Origin’s argument included the idea that Nasa should use competition to maintain redundancy, in case Starship - which has yet to fly in space - falls short of the task of safely landing astronauts on the Moon and returning them to lunar orbit.
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