NASA Confirms 2028 Moon Landing After Moving Docking to Earth Orbit
The agency shifted the Starship rendezvous point to high-Earth orbit at SpaceX's request, while Blue Origin's plan remains focused on four separate New Glenn launches.
By Noor Rossi ·
NASA has locked in a target for 2028 to return astronauts to the lunar surface, a date the agency confirmed during a detailed briefing on Friday. This timeline relies on a major structural change to how the spacecraft will meet in space.
The core of the new plan involves SpaceX's Starship. Instead of docking with the Orion spacecraft in a complex orbit around the Moon, the two vehicles will now rendezvous in high-Earth orbit. They will then travel together to the Moon. This shift removes the need for the difficult near-rectilinear halo orbit that previously strained the Starship design.
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman expressed confidence that the agency can execute this path. "This is an achievable path we are on right now," Isaacman said. "We have the mandate, we have the resources, and the support from our stakeholders to be able to execute, and that's what we intend to do."
The changes to the Starship architecture stem directly from requests by SpaceX engineers. During meetings in early 2026, the company asked NASA to drop the lunar docking requirement. That orbit demanded extra energy and caused technical headaches. The cancellation of the Lunar Gateway project earlier this year made the removal of that requirement possible.
Blue Origin is pursuing a different route. Its design calls for four separate launches of the New Glenn rocket. None of these launches involve refueling one spacecraft from another. The Blue Moon lander may still meet Orion in low-lunar orbit, a detail that remains open in their current plan.
The immediate next step is the Artemis III mission, scheduled for summer 2027. This flight will serve as a demonstration where Orion docks near Earth with both the Blue Moon and Starship landers. The actual surface landing is reserved for Artemis IV in 2028.
While the agency has reviewed every element of the Artemis program to speed up work for its partners, the success of these dates depends on keeping the revised schedules intact.
Source: Ars Technica
