NASA safety advisers raise fresh concerns over Artemis lunar landing plans

NASA’s safety advisers have expressed concerns about the maturity of the agency’s Artemis lunar landing plans, just hours before NASA leadership briefs reporters on an “Artemis acceleration” update, SpaceNews reported on Friday.

The briefing takes place at 2 p.m. EDT at Kennedy Space Center, where NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman will outline the path to a crewed lunar landing. He will be joined by associate administrator Amit Kshatriya and Artemis programme manager Jeremy Parsons, according to NASA media advisory M26-081, issued on 14 October.

The advisers’ concerns follow a major restructuring of the programme. Artemis III, targeted for the third quarter of 2027, will no longer attempt a lunar landing: four astronauts aboard Orion will instead rendezvous and dock with test versions of SpaceX’s Starship and Blue Origin’s Blue Moon landers in low Earth orbit, with the first crewed landing moved to Artemis IV in 2028. Acting Human Landing System programme manager Steve Creech outlined the revised architecture at the International Astronautical Congress in Antalya, Türkiye, on 5 October.

NASA’s inspector general has separately flagged schedule and technical risks for both the Starship HLS and Blue Moon landers, according to a Congressional Research Service report.