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NASA has spent years working on the Space Launch System (SLS) and Orion capsule that will return humanity to the Moon in the coming years, but it will take more than one spacecraft to take “one small step.” SpaceX is building the initial lander for Artemis as a special variant of the Starship rocket. Among the customizations for that mission is a docking system that will allow astronauts to move between vehicles, and NASA says the first test of that hardware is now complete.
While Elon Musk is fond of waxing philosophical about the possibility of sending humans to Mars with the Starship, NASA won’t be using the SpaceX vehicle to send astronauts to the Moon. The launch and transportation will be up to the SLS and Orion capsule, which have completed one mission so far. That flight, Artemis I, went off without a hitch in late 2022. SpaceX’s contribution to Artemis III and IV will be the Starship Human Landing System (HLS). NASA aims to have astronauts transfer from Orion to Starship for the trip to and from the lunar surface.
There’s no infrastructure on or around the Moon, but NASA hopes to change that. Throughout several Artemis missions, NASA plans to build the Gateway lunar station, which will serve as a long-term base of operations for human activities on the Moon. During later Artemis missions, astronauts will transfer between Orion and one of several landers via the station. Before that facility is online, the crew must move directly from Orion to Starship, so the vehicles need a compatible docking system. This is a vital and challenging piece of the mission—not only does the ring need to latch reliably but the connection must be perfectly sealed to prevent loss of atmosphere inside the vehicles.
According to NASA, the docking system is based on SpaceX’s flight-proven Dragon 2 docking adapter. The tests took place at NASA’s Johnson Space Center over 10 days. Johnson has a test platform that can simulate more than 200 docking scenarios with varying approach angles and speeds. The agency will use the experimental data to validate computer models that can demonstrate even more docking scenarios.
NASA and SpaceX tested a full-scale demo of the HLS docking system at Johnson Space Center.
Credit: SpaceX
The tests showed that Starship HLS could perform a “soft capture” while in active docking mode. That means the SpaceX rocket would do the hard work of extending its docking ring while Orion maintains course with its docking system retracted. NASA is optimistic about the HLS, noting that SpaceX has completed over 30 mission-specific milestones since being selected to build the Artemis lander. For example, SpaceX has worked with NASA to develop an elevator that will get astronauts from the crew compartment down to the lunar surface.
NASA recently pushed the Artemis III landing back to 2026, which is good news for SpaceX. The company is still working to get Starship into orbit and has yet to start building the HLS variant. The first two sub-orbital Starship tests have ended with “rapid unplanned disassembly” of the vehicle following engine failures and other glitches. The company is currently in the final stages of validating its engineering fixes for a third test, which could happen in the coming weeks. Blue Origin has also been tapped to manufacture Artemis lunar landers. Still, the Blue Lander won’t be used until Artemis V.