NASA’s New Moon Base Plan

追加: 2026-06-02

[00:00:00]NASA this week unveiled plans for their moon base, a literal permanent outpost on the moon. And the timeline is absolutely wild. We are talking autonomous drones, heavy cargo drops, and robotic scouts landing on the lunar surface starting this year. Hey space cats, I'm Dr. Maggie Lieu and we need to talk about why NASA is suddenly abandoning all of their old plans in favor of building a permanent city in the dirt of the moon.

[00:00:32]>> [screaming] >> Now, right now humanity's current home in space, the International Space Station, is dying. It is leaking. I made a video about this previously, so go check it out if you haven't already. But for years, engineers have been chasing hairline fractures all over the ISS, but in particular on that Russian module. We thought that they fixed it, but just weeks ago the pressure dropped again.

[00:01:00]It's bleeding half a kilo of air into space every day. NASA has elevated this to a catastrophic level five risk. It's so severe that NASA have brought in emergency evacuation protocols, and any plans for extending this space station's lifespan to at least 2032 are now effectively dead.

[00:01:22]We'll be lucky if it even makes it to 2030.

[00:01:26]So, what's next? Well, for years NASA told us that the future was the Lunar Gateway, a space station orbiting around the moon that would act as a deep space pit stop. But last year NASA officially axed it. They canceled the Gateway. They took away that $20 billion budget and they shifted every single engineer towards working on the surface. Whilst we are still high on Artemis 2, the mission that took four astronauts on a loop around the moon, NASA have this week announced their plans for a moon base. A more simple architecture to directly compete with China. Now, NASA didn't just cancel the Lunar Gateway because of the cost. They did it because China is moving way too fast. China's unified human robotic project is being fast-tracked. Their dual launch architecture is targeting a 2029 or even 20 30 crew landing. They will launch the Mengzhou crewed spacecraft and the Lanyue lunar lander on two separate Long March 10 rockets. These will rendezvous in lunar orbit and touch down. And they aren't doing it alone. They've already signed up 17 international partner countries to build a rival South Pole outpost. So, what is NASA's countermove?

[00:02:51]Well, a brand new three-phase 20 billion dollar surface moon base. The end goal is phase three, 2032 and beyond. This is a semi-permanent base at the lunar South Pole with humans living and working on the moon full-time. We are talking advanced uncrewed cargo return systems fetching up to 500 kg of lunar material back to Earth. Pressurized rovers allowing astronauts to travel long distances across the barren terrain. And to get there, we'll need phase two, which will kick off by 2029. This is heavy engineering phase deploying massive solar grids, initial surface nuclear fission reactors, and dropping up to 60 tons of hardware over 24 independent landings.

[00:03:42]But, of course, all of this depends on phase one, which starts right now. This needs to be completed before our astronauts return on Artemis 4 in 2028.

[00:03:53]NASA needs 25 launches and 21 landings just to scout the South Pole, hunt for the ice, de-risk the environment. Phase one relies on three foundational missions, Moon bases one, two, and three. Now, Moon base three selected Intuitive Machines IM-3 mission targeting the gorgeous lunar swirl Raina Gamma to map out magnetic anomalies.

[00:04:19]Moon base two was awarded to Astrobotic's Griffin Mission One, which is carrying the heavy 500 kg commercial flip rover built by Astrolab. And this is going to Nobile Crater. And then there's Moon base one. Now, NASA has selected Blue Origin's massive Blue Moon Mark One lander nicknamed Endurance to execute an uncrewed demonstration landing directly at the Shackleton Connecting Ridge. Geographically, this is the ultimate spot to be on on the moon. If there's any prime real estate on the moon, it's either of Shackleton, Sverdrup Hansen, and De Gerlache craters. Well, the Shackleton Connecting Ridge actually sits on the elevated region between the Shackleton and De Gerlache craters creating a perfect gateway. Peaks of internal light for continuous solar power right next to permanently shadowed craters containing that vital water ice. Now, to secure this contract, Jeff Bezos personally forked out his own money to self-fund the development. It's costing NASA basically nothing while they get to piggyback their science payloads on board. But there is a catch. Endurance is supposed to fly by the end of 2026 on Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket. A rocket that was just cleared by the FAA a week ago after an in-flight second stage failure.

[00:05:47]And just now, disaster struck. During a routine static fire test on the pad in Florida, a New Glenn booster exploded into a massive fireball. The rocket was obliterated.

[00:06:00]The lightning tower collapsed and the launch pad was severely damaged. And besides all of these costs, it will take many months, if not a year, to rebuild.

[00:06:11]And Blue Origin doesn't have a backup pad.

[00:06:15]However, even if the rockets are grounded for the next 6 months, the tech pipeline, the journey to the moon, needs to keep moving. Alongside the landers, NASA is funding project Moonfall, a fleet of four autonomous drones designed to survey that lunar terrain from above.

[00:06:34]And they've just handed out massive checks, $219 million to Intuitive Machines and $220 million to Lunar Outpost to build the first phase of lunar terrain vehicles. When humans aren't driving these, these rovers will use an orbiting communication relay network called Lunarnet to autonomously drive themselves through the dark, hunting for resources alongside Viper, NASA's long-delayed robotic ice driller.

[00:07:04]This is the ultimate evolution of NASA's CLPS program. And structurally, it's a brilliant way for the government to remove the risk from their own balance sheets. If a privately built lander crashes or a private rocket explodes on the pad, just like New Glenn just did, the financial mishap falls squarely on the commercial company and its investors, not the American taxpayer.

[00:07:27]In fact, NASA has built a massive safety net into the program by keeping SpaceX as their ultimate backup. But removing financial risk does not remove the mission risk. The truth is, the companies that NASA has selected for these critical moon bases haven't yet successfully landed a spacecraft completely upright on the moon. Let's talk about the track record. Astrobotics first attempt Peregrine suffered a proportion failure and burned up in Earth's atmosphere. Intuitive Machines made it to the surface twice but both IM-1 and IM-2 broke their landing legs and toppled over onto their sides severely compromising their science operations. And Blue Origin? Well, they have never even flown an orbital mission let alone try to slow down a multi-ton spacecraft in a vacuum environment. By outsourcing the foundation of our future moon bases to a market of unproven private startups, NASA is trading engineering control for speed and cost.

[00:08:31]If these companies can't learn how to stick a flawless landing over the next 12 months, America's 2032 lunar dreams could end up face down in the lunar dust.

[00:08:42]Anyway, only time will tell who will win this space race. Is it America or is it China? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below. Thank you so much to my YouTube perks members for supporting this video. If you enjoyed it, please don't forget to leave me a like, share, and subscribe.

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