NASA says it is now targeting April 2026 for Artemis II launch and mid-2027 for Artemis III launch. The space agency provided an update on the Artemis campaign and its lunar exploration plans early on December 6, 2024 (AEDST). It said the next US astronauts and first international astronaut will land in the Moon’s South Pole region.
NASA experts also discussed the results of the agency’s investigation into its Orion spacecraft heat shield after it experienced an unexpected loss of charred material during re-entry of the Artemis I uncrewed test flight.
For the Artemis II crewed test flight, engineers continue to prepare Orion with the heat shield already attached to the capsule. The updated mission timelines also reflect time to address the Orion environmental control and life support systems. The most recent timelines had NASA Artemis III astronauts landing on the Moon in September 2026.
“The Artemis campaign is the most daring, technically challenging, collaborative, international endeavor (we have) ever set out to do,” said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson. “We have made significant progress on the Artemis campaign over the past four years… We need to get this next test flight right. That’s how the Artemis campaign succeeds.”
The agency’s decision to further delay the launches comes after an extensive investigation of an Artemis I heat shield issue showed the Artemis II heat shield can keep the crew safe during the planned mission with changes to Orion’s trajectory as it enters Earth’s atmosphere and slows from nearly 25,000 miles per hour to about 325 miles per hour before its parachute-assisted splashdown in the Pacific Ocean.
“Throughout our process to investigate the heat shield phenomenon and determine a forward path,” said Catherine Koerner, associate administrator, NASA Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate. “The updates to our mission plans are a positive step toward ensuring we can safely accomplish our objectives at the Moon and develop the technologies and capabilities needed for crewed Mars missions.”
NASA will continue stacking its SLS (Space Launch System) rocket elements, which began in November, and prepare it for integration with Orion for Artemis II.
In recent months, NASA, along with an independent review team, established the technical cause of an issue seen after the uncrewed Artemis I test flight in which charred material on the heat shield wore away differently than expected.
Extensive analysis, including from more than 100 tests at unique facilities across the country, determined the heat shield on Artemis I did not allow for enough of the gases generated inside a material called Avcoat to escape, which caused some of the material to crack and break off.
Avcoat is designed to wear away as it heats up and is a key material in the thermal protection system that guards Orion and its crew from the nearly 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit of temperatures that are generated when Orion returns from the Moon through Earth’s atmosphere. Although a crew was not inside Orion during Artemis I, data shows the temperature inside Orion remained comfortable and safe had crew been aboard.
Engineers already are assembling and integrating the Orion spacecraft for Artemis III based on lessons learned from Artemis I and implementing enhancements to how heat shields for crewed returns from lunar landing missions are manufactured to achieve uniformity and consistent permeability. The skip entry is needed for return from speeds expected for lunar landing missions.
Artemis II Commander Reid Wiseman, along with NASA astronauts Victor Glover and Christina Koch and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen, will fly aboard the 10-day Artemis II test flight around the Moon and back. The flight will provide valuable data about Orion systems needed to support crew on their journey to deep space and bring them safely home, including air revitalization in the cabin, manual flying capabilities, and how humans interact with other hardware and software in the spacecraft.
With Artemis, NASA will explore more of the Moon than ever before and prepare for future human exploration of Mars. NASA’s SLS, exploration ground systems, and Orion spacecraft, along with the human landing system, next-generation spacesuits, Gateway lunar space station, and future rovers are NASA’s foundation for deep space exploration.
