The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) announced that it will carry out a number of new missions to the lunar south pole region this year to lay the foundation for the planned Artemis manned lunar landing in 2028 and the construction of a permanent lunar base. Among them, three launches collectively known as "Moon Base Missions" will become the first of more than a dozen related missions announced this year.
According to the latest plan released by NASA, Moon Base I is scheduled to be launched "no earlier than the fall of 2026" and will be carried by Blue Origin's "Blue Moon" Mark 1 Endurance lander. The mission will deliver multiple NASA science payloads to the moon, including the "Stereo Camera for Lunar Plume-Surface Studies" to study the interaction between the lander engine plume and the lunar surface, and the "Laser Retroreflective Array" to provide a laser reflection benchmark. NASA said these devices will help researchers better understand how thruster jets affect the lunar soil environment and provide data support for lunar spacecraft to accurately determine their position using reflected lasers.
The follow-up Moon Base II (Moon Base II) is planned to be launched "later this year" and will carry more than 1,100 pounds (about 500 kilograms) of cargo to the lunar surface via Astrobotic's "Griffin" lander. This mission will carry Astrolab’s FLIP lunar rover to provide data and experience for future Lunar Terrain Vehicle (LTV) operations. These LTVs will be a new generation of manned or cargo lunar vehicles used by astronauts in the future when performing missions on the lunar surface.
Moon Base III is also "locked for launch this year" and will deliver several scientific payloads to NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Korea Academy of Astronomy and Space Science. The most core payload is the "Lunar Vertex" experiment, which will be mounted on Intuitive Machines' Nova‑C Trinity lunar lander. It will focus on studying "bright spots" on the lunar surface - so-called "lunar swirls" - to deepen our understanding of the evolution process of the lunar surface and the behavior of matter in extreme environments. NASA also released a mission timeline information map, sorting out the timing and key content of each lunar base mission.
While announcing the three lunar base missions, NASA also released several latest developments related to lunar rover and exploration missions. Among them, NASA awarded a US$219 million contract to Astrolab, a US$220 million contract to Lunar Outpost to develop two new lunar rovers, and provided US$188 million to Blue Origin to transport these lunar rovers to the moon. The "Crewed Lunar Vehicle (CLV‑1)" being developed by Astrolab is positioned as a manned lunar vehicle that can carry astronauts, transport supplies and support remote operation, while Lunar Outpost's "Pegasus" lunar vehicle is a lightweight evolved version of the company's "Eagle" lunar vehicle, which can support multiple modes such as manual driving, fully autonomous and remote driving.
According to NASA's schedule, Astrolab and Lunar Outpost will complete the design and finalization of the lunar rover, conduct manned evaluation, and qualify the vehicle in the next 18 months to meet the requirements for formal mission execution. These vehicles will become important tools for manned scientific research and infrastructure construction in the lunar south pole region in the future, providing astronauts with longer-distance and higher-frequency mobility capabilities. Facing longer-term lunar exploration, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) also announced the key progress of the "MoonFall" drone mission. JPL selected Firefly Aerospace to build a spacecraft to carry four MoonFall drones to the moon, scheduled to be launched in 2028. After successfully landing on the lunar surface, these drones will acquire high-resolution images within a one-month day cycle, focusing on covering complex terrain that is difficult for humans and traditional landers to reach. In the following months, they will carry and operate a set of "survive-the-night" payloads to verify the ability to continue operating in extreme temperature differences and long periods of darkness.
NASA emphasized that this year's three lunar base missions are just the beginning of its long-term lunar exploration and base construction plan, and more than ten related missions will be announced in the future. Through the coordinated operation of landers, lunar rovers and drones, NASA hopes to establish a relatively complete detection network and infrastructure in the lunar south pole region before the manned moon landing in 2028, so as to accumulate key experience and technology for humans to stay on the moon for a long time and carry out deep space exploration.