SpaceX could have Artemis competition. What to know as NASA revisits moon landing plans
NASA is looking for new ideas for moon landers to help its astronauts return to the surface of the moon as progress for SpaceX's Starship megarocket has come slower than hoped.
Sean Duffy, NASA's acting administrator, has recently made the rounds on network news stations to indicate his intention of reopening a contract awarded years ago to SpaceX.
The contract in question? A lucrative agreement for the commercial rocket company founded by billionaire Elon Musk to develop a vehicle to ferry Artemis III astronauts to the lunar surface before the decade is out .
The move would subject SpaceX to competition from space technology rivals like Blue Origin and Lockheed Martin. The U.S. is also in the midst of a heated international space race with China to return humans to the moon and set up a permanent base of operations ahead of planned expeditions to Mars .
Here's evertyhing to know about NASA's moon landing plans , and SpaceX's now-threatened role in a potentially historic lunar return for the first time in half a century.
What is NASA's Artemis lunar program?
NASA's Artemis campaign is the agency's ambitious campaign to return Americans to the surface of the moon for the first time in more than 50 years. The last U.S. astronaut to land on the moon was on Dec. 19, 1972, during NASA's Apollo 17 mission.
The first Artemis mission got off the ground in November 2022, when an uncrewed Orion capsule launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on a moon-orbiting mission to test the vehicle.
When does Artemis II, Artemis III launch?
Before a lunar landing mission is attempted , NASA is planning to launch four astronauts on its Artemis II mission in 2026 on a 10-day mission circling the moon. While no moon landing is in store for the Artemis II astronauts, the mission serves a vital role in testing the systems and hardware on the spacecraft needed for future expeditions to the lunar surface.
The first of those could happen no earlier than 2027 with the much more ambitious Artemis III mission.
Both the Artemis II and Artemis III missions will get off the ground from NASA's Kennedy Space Center along Florida's Space Coast near Cape Canaveral. The astronauts themselves will be aboard an Orion capsule that will hitch a ride out of Earth's atmosphere atop NASA's Space Launch System rocket , built by Boeing and Northrop Grumman.
Why is NASA interested in the moon?
This time, NASA isn't looking to simply plant the U.S. flag before having its astronauts head back to Earth. Instead, the plan is for NASA astronauts to help establish a permanent lunar settlement that would be a catalyst in making future human missions from the moon to Mars possible.
The moon's south pole region, which is largely unexplored except for a few uncrewed robotic missions , is believed to be home to subsurface water ice that could be a valuable resource for astronauts living and working at a lunar base. If water could be extracted , humans could use it for drinking, breathing and as a source of hydrogen and oxygen for rocket fuel.
What is SpaceX's Starship? Its role in lunar landing
Starship, the approximately 400-foot megarocket that SpaceX is testing for future spaceflight, is due to play a vital role during the Artemis III lunar landing.
Composed of a lower stage Super Heavy rocket booster and the upper stage Starship vehicle, the spacecraft is regarded as the world's largest rocket when fully stacked.
SpaceX, which is developing Starship to be fully reusable, recently completed flight tests for its second version of the rocket. The company has indicated that demonstrations for its third version of Starship , or V3, could begin either before the end of 2025 or early in 2026.
NASA has contracted Musk and SpaceX to develop a proven configuration of Starship that would be capable of ferrying astronauts to the moon's surface. Under the U.S. space agency's lunar exploration plans , Artemis III astronauts aboard the Orion capsule would board the Starship while in orbit for a ride down.
Starship development lags
But Starship's progress has not come quite as fast as NASA has hoped – or Musk has promised.
The rocket/vehicle combo has launched a total of 11 times since April 2023 from SpaceX's Starbase headquarters and company town in South Texas near the U.S.-Mexico border. Early on, each test had generally improved upon previous demonstrations until SpaceX hit some setbacks at the beginning of 2025 with a series of three failed tests ending in explosions .
Starship's upper stage also exploded in June while sitting on a test stand at Starbase.
What's more, the vehicle has yet to reach orbit in any of its tests and still has not attempted to refuel midflight, which is necessary to reach distant destinations.
During the past two Starship flight tests in August and October, though, SpaceX got things back on track with two successful missions that reached new objectives.
NASA reopens SpaceX contract
Still, progress for Starship has been slow enough that NASA has opted to reopen its moon landing contract to other bidders.
NASA advisors have estimated that Starship, selected by NASA in 2021 under a contract now worth $4.4 billion, could slip years behind schedule, Reuters reported .
NASA Acting Administrator Sean Duffy has recently suggested in a series of network news interviews that President Donald Trump wants to see the lunar landing take place before his White House term ends in January 2029.
"I'm in the process of opening that contract up," Duffy, who also serves as U.S. transportation secretary, said on Fox News' "Fox & Friends" program. "They do remarkable things, but they're behind schedule."
Duffy later added on social media site X that, "We are in a race against China so we need the best companies to operate at a speed that gets us to the Moon FIRST."
Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin, others, could compete for moon landing
Blue Origin, the space technology company owned by billionaire Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, is among the companies widely expected to compete for the mission, Reuters reported.
Lockheed Martin also confirmed to the USA TODAY Network that it would convene an industry team to discuss providing human lunar lander options to NASA.
Blue Origin also already has a roughly $3 billion Blue Moon lander in development as part of a similar lunar landing contract awarded by NASA in 2023 for later Artemis moon landing missions.
"Blue Origin is ready to support," a Blue Origin spokesperson said in a statement to the USA TODAY Network.
Elon Musk wants to send Starship to Mars, deploy Starlink satellites
Part of the concern has to do with SpaceX's competing priorities for Starship, Reuters reported.
Starship is the centerpiece of Musk's vision of sending the first humans to Mars , with plans for the first uncrewed Starship to head straight from Earth to the Red Planet as early as 2026. Human missions, Musk has claimed, could then begin in the 2030s.
Musk also plans for Starship to one day send larger batches of Starlink internet satellites into space.
In fact, in the past two Starship flight tests, SpaceX has finally succeeded in having the vehicle deploy eight mock Starlink satellites above Earth's atmosphere, where they eventually burned up.
For years, SpaceX's workhorse Falcon 9, a two-stage 230-foot rocket, has been the primary rocket capable of launching and deploying Starlink satellites into a rapdily growing constellation essential to the company's lucrative internet business.
Musk reacts on social media: SpaceX 'moving like lightning'
Musk, the CEO of SpaceX, didn't appear concerned about the prospect of competition in a post on social media.
"SpaceX is moving like lightning compared to the rest of the space industry," Musk wrote on social media site X, which he owns, in a reply to a user. "Moreover, Starship will end up doing the whole Moon mission. Mark my words."
Contributing: Reuters
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Could NASA replace Starship for moon landing? SpaceX contract reopened
