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Before astronauts land on the Moon in 2028, NASA will run a dress rehearsal in space. The Artemis III mission in 2027 will let teams on Earth and in orbit practice rendezvous and docking between commercial lunar landers and the Orion spacecraft, data that will help keep future crews safe when they actually touch down.

NASA is developing human landing systems with two American companies, SpaceX and Blue Origin, to carry astronauts between lunar orbit and the Moon's surface. For Artemis III, both companies will fly test versions of their crewed landers. The landers will launch on commercial rockets, while the Artemis III crew rides to orbit in Orion atop NASA's SLS rocket.

NASA has worked closely with both landing system providers to shape the Artemis III mission. SpaceX will fly Version 3 of its Starship, the basis for the future Starship HLS, while Blue Origin will test its planned HLS crew cabin.

"Each human landing system provider has taken a different approach to the Artemis III mission," said Steve Creech, programme manager for NASA's Human Landing System Program at Marshall Space Flight Center. He noted that both companies have proposed ambitious objectives meant to build confidence in the spacecraft ahead of a crewed landing, and that the lander designs will keep evolving over the next year.

Blue Origin's test lander will be based on its Mark 2 crew lander design, including the avionics, flight software, and control systems needed to translate directly to future crewed flights. Up to two astronauts, wearing orange Orion crew survival suits, will board the Blue Origin lander through its hatch.

The lander will also carry an instrumented spacesuit mass simulator; similar to the "Moonikin" that flew on Artemis I, to gather real-time data on conditions inside the cabin.

SpaceX's Starship test lander, a 171-foot Version 3 vehicle, will carry a docking system on its nose so NASA and SpaceX can evaluate how the full Orion–Starship stack behaves together. Unlike Blue Origin's version, no astronauts will board the Starship lander during this mission.

Three of the world's most powerful rockets will launch within a short span of each other, exercising launch teams, ground facilities, and control centres across the country through two back-to-back docking sequences before Orion returns its crew safely to Earth.

"Artemis III will be a highly choreographed dance with a demanding launch sequence across multiple launch pads," said Jeremy Parsons, Artemis programme manager, calling it one of the most complex and ambitious missions NASA has undertaken, one that will rely on the agency's experience in systems engineering and mission operations to pull together.

Blue Origin's lander is set to launch first and can loiter in orbit for up to 30 days for systems checks before SLS and Orion lift off from Kennedy Space Center. Once Blue Origin completes its docking tests and the Artemis III crew launches, SpaceX will send up its Starship lander for its own round of on-orbit testing with Orion.

Orion will act as the "chaser" spacecraft in both cases, approaching each lander as the target, the same setup planned for future crewed landings. Both companies have already tested their docking hardware on the ground: SpaceX qualified its system in 2023, and Blue Origin ran ground-tests on its pressurized docking system earlier this year.

The two dockings will look different. Orion will dock along the side of the Blue Moon lander, next to the crew cabin, then later dock nose-to-nose with the much larger SpaceX lander. Control of the docked spacecraft will also shift: Orion's software takes charge during the Blue Origin docking, while the SpaceX lander's software takes over for its portion of the mission, letting engineers test how the hardware, software, and combined vehicles behave together in space.

Through Artemis, NASA aims to explore the Moon for scientific and economic gain, laying the groundwork for the first crewed missions to Mars.

Reference:

Beckimger, C. (2026, July 15). NASA. https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/esdmd/artemis-campaign-development-division/human-landing-system-program/how-nasas-artemis-iii-lander-test-will-pave-way-for-moon-landings

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Coram Deo — before the face of God. This blog reflects on Scripture, world events, science, music, psychology, and the human mind — always through the lens of Christian faith. All of life is lived before the face of God.