Sawt Falasteen - NASA announces overhaul of Artemis lunar program amid technical delays

The US space agency will add missions between this spring's Artemis 2 and the ultimate lunar landing, a strategic revision that NASA administrator Jared Isaacman told a briefing would allow for improved launch "muscle memory."

That means Artemis 3, which was meant to send astronauts to the Moon's surface, will now have the alternate goal of "rendezvous in low-Earth orbit" of at least one lunar lander.

The next phase, Artemis 4, will aim for a lunar landing in early 2028. Isaacman said he hoped that mission could be followed relatively quickly by a second Moon landing within the year.

"We're not necessarily committing to launching two missions in 2028," he said, "but we want to have the opportunity to be able to do that."

The NASA chief said speeding up the cadence of Artemis launches would allow for building more institutional knowledge in the model of the Apollo program, which originally put Americans on the Moon.

"Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, through the shuttle program -- I don't think it would surprise many of the folks in the room that our average launch cadence was closer to three months throughout all those programs, not three years," he said. "We need to start getting back to basics and moving in this direction."

"Launching every three years, your skills atrophy, you lose muscle memory."

- 'Space race'? -

The revised architecture announcement comes in the wake of repeated delays to the Artemis 2 mission, which now will not launch before April.

It is meant to see the first flyby of the Moon in more than half a century.

Earlier this week, the US space agency rolled back its towering SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft off the launchpad to investigate its problems and make necessary repairs.

President Donald Trump announced he wanted Americans to once again set foot on the lunar surface in his first term.

The US space agency now hopes to put humans back on the Moon as China forges ahead with its own effort, which is targeting 2030 at the latest for a first crewed mission.

China's uncrewed Chang'e 7 mission is expected to be launched in 2026 for an exploration of the Moon's south pole, and testing of its crewed spacecraft Mengzhou is also set to go ahead this year.

Queried on the so-called "space race," Isaacman said Friday that "I think competition is good."

"We're here talking to you about what is a common-sense approach to achieve the objective, whether we had a great rival in the running or not."

Z.AlNajjar--SF-PST