Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin prepare to build a base on the Moon NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman recently shared an update on the launch of Artemis III indicating that the agency is on track to conduct docking exercises with the lunar lander Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin next year. “It’s about our own history. It’s a playbook that this agency knows very well, the same playbook that went from the landing of Apollo 7 to Apollo 11 in just nine months,” he said during a news conference at the Kennedy Space Center. Isaacman said the “new space race” to land astronauts on the moon will be “much closer than was ever necessary” because of the slow pace of recent years. Isaacman’s update came six months after the successful Artemis II flight around the moon by four astronauts. According to a Fortune report, the agency plans to keep options open as long as possible before choosing between SpaceX and Blue Origin for the Artemis IV lunar lander that is scheduled for 2028. Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin prepare to build a lunar base NASA plans to launch a lunar base near the moon’s south pole, nowhere near the most equatorial sites of Apollo. Both agencies: Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin will launch their landers next year for the three NASA astronauts and one Italian to practice docking, which will enter orbit aboard NASA’s Orion capsule. The mission will be completed with three launches in a row from Cape Canaveral. Orion will first dock with Blue Origin’s Blue Ghost about 270 miles (435 kilometers) above Earth, before docking with SpaceX’s Starship at a slightly lower altitude. “As a rocket nerd, it will be pretty awesome,” said Amit Kshatriya, NASA associate administrator. “It’s incredibly ambitious,” Rubio told The Associated Press earlier this month. “One thing I have always believed and learned is not to bet against the United States.”
