Tag: Human Landing System Program

NASA Announces Winners of Inaugural Human Lander Challenge

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4 Min Read NASA Announces Winners of Inaugural Human Lander Challenge NASA’s 2024 Human Lander Challenge (HuLC) Forum brought 12 university teams from across the United States to Huntsville, Alabama, near the agency’s Marshall Space Flight Center, to showcase their innovative concepts for addressing the complex issue of managing lunar dust. The 12 finalists, selected in March 2024, presented their final presentations to a panel of NASA and industry experts from NASA’s Human Landing Systems Program at the HuLC Forum in Huntsville June 25-27. NASA’s lunar exploration campaign Artemis is…

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Work Underway on Large Cargo Landers for NASA’s Artemis Moon Missions

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Early conceptual renderings of cargo variants of human lunar landing systems from NASA’s providers SpaceX, left, and Blue Origin, right. Both industry teams have been given authority to begin design work to provide large cargo landers capable of delivering up to 15 metric tons of cargo, such as a pressurized rover, to the Moon’s surface. SpaceX and Blue Origin Under NASA’s Artemis campaign, the agency and its partners will send large pieces of equipment to the lunar surface to enable long-term scientific exploration of the Moon for the benefit of…

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NASA Names Finalists to Help Deal with Dust in Human Lander Challenge

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NASA selected 12 finalist teams to compete in the next round of the Human Lander Challenge (HuLC) competition. In 2023, NASA invited undergraduate and graduate students from accredited colleges and universities in the United States to propose innovative solutions to manage the lunar dust a spacecraft stirs up when landing on the Moon. NASA’s Artemis campaign will establish a long-term human presence on and around the Moon for the benefit of all, and one of the challenges the agency and its partners must address is the particularly dusty aspect of…

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NASA Artemis Mission Progresses with SpaceX Starship Test Flight

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SpaceX launched the third integrated flight test of its Super Heavy booster and Starship upper stage from the company’s Starbase orbital launch pad at 8:25 a.m. CT on March 14. This flight test is an important milestone toward providing NASA with a Starship HLS for its Artemis missions. SpaceX As part of NASA’s Artemis campaign to return humans to the Moon for the benefit of all, the agency is working with SpaceX to develop the company’s Starship human landing system (HLS), which will land astronauts near the Moon’s South Pole…

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NASA Administrator, Leaders to Discuss Artemis Moon Mission Plans

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An illustration of a suited Artemis astronaut looking out of a Moon lander hatch across the lunar surface, the Lunar Terrain Vehicle and other surface elements. NASA will hold a media teleconference at 1:30 p.m. EST Tuesday, Jan. 9, to provide an update on the agency’s lunar exploration plans for the benefit of all under Artemis. Audio of the briefing will stream live on NASA’s website. In addition to NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, agency participants will include: NASA Associate Administrator Jim Free Catherine Koerner, associate administrator, Exploration Systems Development Mission…

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NASA Astronauts Test SpaceX Elevator Concept for Artemis Lunar Lander

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SpaceX NASA astronauts Nicole Mann and Doug “Wheels” Wheelock participated in a recent test of a sub-scale mockup elevator for SpaceX’s Starship human landing system that will be used for NASA’s Artemis III and IV missions to the Moon. The Starship human landing system will carry two astronauts from the Orion spacecraft in lunar orbit to the surface, serve as a habitat for crew members’ approximately one week stay on the Moon, and transfer them from the surface back to Orion. The elevator will transport equipment and crew between Starship’s…

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