NASA is restructuring how it plans to send astronauts to the Moon, giving SpaceX’s Starship a broader role in lunar transportation while the Space Launch System rocket built by Boeing faces growing questions about cost and schedule.

NASA’s Artemis 2 mission, planned to launch on April 1, 2026, will test the powerful SLS rocket, Orion spacecraft, high-speed laser communications, manual rendezvous capabilities, and advanced radiation research with human “organ-on-a-chip” avatars.

NASA's towering Space Launch System rocket is about to depart the launch pad in Florida where it has been vertical for more than a month in anticipation of the first U.S. human lunar mission in decades. There it sat at Launch Pad 39B for weeks as the ...