By Kurtis Archer | 2025-10-22

NASA's Artemis program aims to further scientific discovery, advance technology, and learn how to live and work on the moon. In this three-part series, BlueShift takes a deeper look at the program's plans and ambitions.

As the first major spaceflight of NASA's Artemis program, the uncrewed orbiting mission Artemis I marked the US government agency's return to lunar exploration after a five decade hiatus.

After launching from the Kennedy Space Center in the US state of Florida aboard the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket on November 16, 2022, the Orion spacecraft completed one flyby of the moon on November 21.

Orion then entered a six-day distant retrograde orbit of the moon, completing a second lunar flyby on December 5, testing the spacecraft's heat shield in preparation for future crewed flights.

The first of these crewed flights -- Artemis II, set for April 2026 -- will send four astronauts from NASA and the Canadian Space Agency on a 10-day trip around the moon.

The voyage is intended to validate the life support, navigation and communication systems needed for deep space exploration.

"The Artemis campaign is the most daring, technically challenging, collaborative, international endeavor humanity has ever set out to do," NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said in a December 2024 statement.

"We need to get this next test flight right. That’s how the Artemis campaign succeeds."

Artemis III, which will see astronauts walking on the moon for the first time in over half a century, is currently scheduled for mid-2027. The astronauts will be exploring the surface near the lunar south pole.

Further missions for the Artemis program include the planned Lunar Gateway space station, which will be the first-of-its-kind to orbit the moon.

The Artemis IV mission will send astronauts to live and work in the station, according to NASA.

"The mission will bring together an intricate choreography of multiple launches and spacecraft dockings in lunar orbit, and will feature the debut of NASA’s larger, more powerful version of its SLS rocket and new mobile launcher," it said.

As with many ambitious enterprises, the planned Gateway space station does have its critics, among them Mars Society founder Robert Zubrin, an aerospace engineer, space exploration advocate and author.

In Zubrin's view, lunar orbiters take resources away from direct missions to the lunar surface, which he believes have greater scientific utility.

Gateway space station

Gateway, a collaborative effort between the United States, Europe, Japan and Canada, will be about an eighth the size of the International Space Station (ISS) and will be able to house human residents for up to three months.

The European Space Agency (ESA), the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) are developing key modules and systems for the station, including robotics and life support.

NASA has pledged astronaut participation in Artemis moon missions for these international partners, in exchange.

Many of the space station’s features will be based on systems from the ISS, with research activity in areas such as lunar science, heliophysics and astrophysics planned even for periods when there are no human residents aboard.

Every six and a half days, the station will complete its orbit in an elliptical path that brings it within 10,000km of the lunar surface at its closest point and within about 70,000km at its farthest.

When complete, Gateway will provide four astronauts with the space of about a double-decker bus, according to NASA. Its orbit is designed to have a constant line of sight to Earth, which will allow for uninterrupted communication.

The station is expected to be operable for at least 15 years.

The Artemis program has missions planned into the 2030s, with the expectation that by then, a regular return to the moon with an eye toward habitation and further exploration will feel more like an inevitable next step for the human race.