NASA announces three new Moon missions as agency races to build permanent lunar base by end of 2026

NASA announced three new Moon missions Tuesday as part of an ambitious push to establish a permanent American presence on the lunar surface, with all three missions targeted for launch by the end of 2026.

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said during a news conference that the agency is moving quickly toward what officials are calling "Moon Base," a long-term lunar outpost designed to support sustained astronaut missions and future exploration of Mars.

"America is returning to the moon," Isaacman said, "and this time to stay."

The missions are intended to help NASA test commercial landers, autonomous vehicles and lunar surface operations before astronauts begin spending longer periods on the Moon under the Artemis program.

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Moon Base I will use Blue Origin’s Blue Moon Mark 1 Endurance lander to deliver NASA science payloads to the Shackleton Connecting Ridge near the lunar south pole, a region NASA considers critical because of its potential water-ice reserves.

The mission is targeted to launch no earlier than fall 2026.

Moon Base II will send Astrobotic’s Griffin lander to the lunar surface carrying more than 500 kilograms of cargo, including Astrolab’s FLEX rover, which NASA hopes will help develop future astronaut mobility systems and autonomous operations.

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Moon Base III will carry NASA’s Lunar Vertex science mission to study mysterious lunar swirls — bright formations scientists believe may be linked to magnetic fields beneath the lunar surface — along with payloads from the European Space Agency and the Korean Space Agency.

Both Moon Base II and Moon Base III are targeted to launch before the end of 2026.

NASA officials said the three missions are the first of more than a dozen Moon Base missions expected to be announced this year as the agency builds toward a sustained lunar presence.

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Carlos Garcia-Galan, NASA’s Moon Base program manager, said the first phase of the effort includes 25 launches, 21 lunar landings and roughly four metric tons of cargo delivered to the Moon.

NASA also announced new lunar terrain vehicle awards for Astrolab and Lunar Outpost, along with development of "Moonfall" drones designed to scout landing zones, map the lunar surface and search for subsurface water ice near the south pole.

Isaacman said NASA is intentionally taking an iterative approach similar to the agency’s Apollo-era strategy, using repeated missions and commercial partnerships to rapidly test technologies before attempting permanent habitation.

"We are leveraging the NASA playbook from the 1960s," Isaacman said. "Figuring out what works and what doesn’t."

NASA officials said the Moon remains an extremely hostile environment, with extreme temperatures, radiation exposure and constant micrometeorite impacts, making repeated robotic missions essential before astronauts can establish a sustained presence.

"We are really just getting started," Isaacman said.