Starship HLS

Starship HLS
Rendering of Starship HLS on the Moon
ManufacturerSpaceX
Country of originUnited States
OperatorSpaceX
ApplicationsLunar lander
Specifications
Spacecraft typeCrewed, reusable
Crew capacity
RegimeCislunar space
Dimensions
Height50 m (160 ft)
Diameter9 m (30 ft)
Capacity
Payload to lunar surface
Mass100,000 kg (220,000 lb)[1]
Production
StatusIn development
Maiden launch2025 (planned)[2]
Related spacecraft
Derived fromSpaceX Starship (spacecraft)
Flown withSpaceX Super Heavy
Starship HLS
Powered by
PropellantCH4 / LOX

Starship HLS (Human Landing System) is a lunar lander variant of the Starship spacecraft that is slated to transfer astronauts from a lunar orbit to the surface of the Moon and back. It is being designed and built by SpaceX under the Human Landing System contract to NASA as a critical element of NASA's Artemis program to land a crew on the Moon.

The mission plan calls for a Starship launch vehicle to launch a Starship HLS into Earth orbit, where it will be refueled by multiple Starship tanker spacecraft before boosting itself into a lunar near-rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO). There, it will rendezvous with a crewed Orion spacecraft that will be launched from Earth by a NASA Space Launch System (SLS) launcher. A crew of two astronauts will transfer from Orion to HLS, which will then descend to the lunar surface for a stay of approximately 7 days, including at least five EVAs. It will then return the crew to Orion in NRHO.

In the third phase of its HLS procurement process, NASA awarded SpaceX a contract in April 2021 to develop, produce, and demonstrate Starship HLS. An uncrewed test flight is planned for 2025 to demonstrate a successful landing on the Moon. Following that test, a crewed flight is expected to occur as part of the Artemis III mission, no earlier than September 2026.[2] NASA later contracted for an upgraded version of Starship HLS to be used on the Artemis IV mission.[3]

Starship itself has been in privately funded development by SpaceX since the mid-2010s, but development of the HLS variant is being funded under NASA's Human Landing System contracts.[4]

  1. ^ Berger, Eric (2 May 2022). "SpaceX engineer says NASA should plan for Starship's "significant" capability". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on 11 December 2023. Retrieved 11 December 2023.
  2. ^ a b Smith, Marcia (9 January 2024). "NASA Delays Next Artemis Missions to 2025 and 2026". SpacePolicyOnline. Archived from the original on 10 January 2024. Retrieved 10 January 2024.
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference OptionB was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference sn20210416 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).