NASA Acting Administrator Sean Duffy announced on Monday that the agency will reopen competition for lunar lander contracts due to SpaceX’s lagging progress in the Artemis III manned lunar mission. Let other US aerospace enterprises, including Blue Origin, participate in the bidding to ensure that the United States can maintain the lead in the new round of “moon landing race”. This news has become the latest news focus in the space field today, attracting high attention from the industry.
SpaceX has delayed the mission schedule, and NASA has re-evaluated the exclusive contract
In 2021, SpaceX received a contract worth approximately 2.9 billion US dollars to develop the Starship Human Landing System (HLS), which plans to send two astronauts to the South Pole of the moon. However, the latest internal review by NASA reveals that SpaceX’s key technology tests have been repeatedly postponed, including the Starship orbital flight and the moon landing fuel supply experiment, which failed to be completed as originally planned.
Acting Director Duffy said in an interview, “SpaceX holds the contract for the Artemis III moon landing, but their progress is clearly behind schedule, and the timetable has been forced to be postponed.” We cannot allow the United States’ moon landing goal to be hindered by the delay of one enterprise, especially against the backdrop of China’s accelerated advancement of its manned moon landing program.
He also emphasized that this adjustment is not to “punish SpaceX” but to ensure that NASA has sufficient redundancy and competition to reduce risks and accelerate the implementation of technology.
NASA has launched a new round of bidding
Duffy announced that NASA will issue a new Request for Information (RFI) in late October, allowing multiple companies to submit rapid development proposals, with a focus on feasibility and safety. Both SpaceX and Blue Origin have been required to submit updated schedules and acceleration plans for their lunar landing systems by October 29.
Originally, Artemis III was scheduled to be carried out in mid-2027, but NASA has now admitted that the mission may be postponed to “a few years later”. However, it still hopes to achieve the goal of manned lunar landing during the current president’s term.
NASA stated that the new assessment mechanism will give priority to design proposals that are “highly mature in technology, controllable in progress, and capable of being reused” to prevent projects from overly relying on a single contractor.
US competition mechanism reactivated: The space landscape may be reshaped
This move marks NASA’s reintroduction of a multi-party competition mechanism. Traditional aerospace enterprises such as Blue Origin, Boeing, and Lockheed Martin may rejoin the bidding.
Duffy said, “We are not just in a space race with China, but also competing among American companies to see who can get astronauts back to the moon the fastest and safest.”
Industry analysts point out that NASA‘s move is both a risk dispersion at the technical level and a strategic adjustment at the political level. The Biden administration hopes to maintain the United States’ dominant position in lunar and deep space exploration until 2030, and the “Artemis Program” is at the core of its space policy.
SpaceX responded: It will still lead the moon landing mission
In response to NASA’s decision, Elon Musk, the CEO of SpaceX, said on the social media platform X (formerly Twitter) :
No company can reach the moon faster than SpaceX. The Starship will complete the entire lunar mission.
SpaceX said that it is currently assembling the new-generation Starship prototype at its Boca Chica base in Texas and is expected to conduct a new round of orbital tests before the end of the year. The company acknowledged that there were technical challenges in the task, but said that the overall research and development was still “proceeding as planned”.
However, industry insiders point out that SpaceX still faces huge pressure in terms of giant fuel replenishment, lunar lander grading tests, and NASA certification processes. If the full system demonstration cannot be completed by 2026, the progress of Artemis III is bound to be frustrated again.
The uncertainty of the moon landing program and the global space race
NASA hopes to ensure that the moon landing program is not held back by single-point delays through a new competition mechanism. At present, the Artemis III mission remains the first planned mission by the United States to return humans to the moon since Apollo 17 in 1972.
Meanwhile, China’s “Chang’e-7 ‘e-7” and “Chang’e-8 ‘e-8” programs are in progress to achieve manned lunar landings and establish a lunar research station before 2028.
Duffy warns: “Time is a strategic advantage.” We cannot allow the United States to lose the upper hand in space exploration again.
Experts believe that NASA’s reopening of bidding may accelerate innovation, but it also increases the complexity of integration. For instance, if multiple companies develop landers in parallel, NASA must readjust the interfaces, orbital docking plans, and test schedules.
Summary
NASA’s decision this time is not only a wake-up call for SpaceX’s progress, but also a self-correction for the US space system.
By introducing competition, strengthening supervision, and optimizing resource allocation, NASA hopes to strike a balance between technological innovation and strategic security.
In the coming months, new tender evaluations, test flight plans, and political games will determine whether the United States can be the first to send humans back to the moon in the global space race.
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