Artemis III set for June 2027 launch campaign – NASA chief

(SpaceEnergy) NASA is targeting no earlier than June 2027 for Artemis III, a three-launch campaign designed to test two commercial lunar landers alongside the Orion spacecraft in Earth orbit.

Speaking at the Farnborough Air Show on 20 July, NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said Blue Origin’s New Glenn, NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) and SpaceX’s Starship would launch within about a week of each other.

New Glenn is expected to launch first, placing a Blue Moon test lander into low Earth orbit, followed by SLS carrying Orion and then Starship.

The campaign will allow Orion to rendezvous and dock with both landers and conduct tests including vehicle controllability and systems integration. Isaacman said the results would inform Artemis IV, currently planned for 2028, when NASA intends to return astronauts to the lunar surface.

Preparations for Artemis III are under way at Kennedy Space Center. Isaacman said the first two aft assemblies of the SLS solid rocket boosters had been integrated with the mobile launcher, while three of four RS-25 engines had arrived. Integration of Orion’s crew module with the European Service Module was also beginning.

Isaacman said the multi-launch approach had implications beyond Artemis, allowing future spacecraft and infrastructure to be assembled through multiple commercial launches rather than requiring a single launch vehicle.