Nasa unveils next steps to build permanent Moon base

[Eugene]

Source: BBC

Nasa unveils next steps to build permanent Moon base

26 May 2026

Georgina Rannard
Science reporter

Nasa has released details of robotic landers, hopping drones and vehicles it aims to send to the Moon as part of US plans to build a lunar base.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos's space company Blue Origin is one of several companies picked to build the machines.

The US wants to land Americans back on the Moon before President Donald Trump leaves office in 2028.

But Nasa is competing with China to return humans to the lunar surface, meaning the space agency is under pressure to appear to be winning the new space race.

China is forging ahead with its own plans to land humans on the Moon by 2030.

-snip-

Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c39228nxyr4o

[Irish_Dem]

1. We cannot afford food, gas, education, healthcare.

Where does the money for a moon base come from?

How much are the billionaires and Trump going to make on this boondoggle.

[erronis]

3. Since trump doesn't believe in science, the only reason he's in on this is for the money.

Musk, of course, also.

I wouldn't trust either of these to send people to the moon ---- and bring them back.

[Irish_Dem]

4. There will end up being no moon base.

Just a bunch of rich people who get richer on the latest scam.

[slightlv]

6. Where does the money come from?

From the same place as it comes for his Great Arch, a reform of the Reflecting Pool, a grand ballroom and data center bunker underneath it. Plus all those banners which adorn the government building, just like in China and N Korea. We pay the cost, but reaping any rewards will be in what the conglomerates can make from it for us to buy.

I long for the days of Research for the pure unadulterated joy and discovery of research.

[Eugene]

2. Nasa selects Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin for first of three uncrewed lunar missions

Source: The Guardian

Nasa selects Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin for first of three uncrewed lunar missions

Three lunar landings are planned for this year in preparation for the construction of a $20bn moon base

Richard Luscombe
Tue 26 May 2026 21.14 BST
Last modified on Tue 26 May 2026 22.19 BST

Nasa announced on Tuesday ambitious plans for three uncrewed lunar missions this year to kickstart construction of a $20bn moon base, and said it had chosen the Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin, ahead of Elon Musk’s SpaceX, to conduct the first.

The revelation by Nasa’s administrator, Jared Isaacman, at a press conference in Washington DC marked the first detailed public explanation of how and when the moon base will be built.

He said the three missions planned for 2026 would be followed by “more than a dozen” more in the coming years to test systems and equipment. He said the highly successful Artemis II mission last month that sent four astronauts around the moon for the first time since 1972 had been both a catalyst and incentive to advance the moon base plan.

-snip-

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2026/may/26/nasa-jeff-bezos-blue-origin

[Irish_Dem]

5. Billionaires getting the US taxpayer to fund their new hideaway?

They will trash this planet and go to a new moon base.

[slightlv]

7. Send them up now with all the building supplies they'll need

and tell them to build it. Get them off our planet once and for all, IMO.

[Irish_Dem]

8. Yep the billionaires can take themselves and their filthy money and go to the moon.