[Global Times Reporter Ma Jun] As the schedule of the US "Artemis" plan to return to the moon becomes increasingly urgent, the patience of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is getting less and less. According to a report by CNN on the 20th, NASA Acting Administrator Duffy publicly declared that due to the serious lag in the progress of SpaceX's "Starship" spacecraft, NASA may let SpaceX "stand aside" and choose another company to send American astronauts to the moon.

NASA and SpaceX signed an agreement worth $2.9 billion in 2021 to provide a moon lander modified by the "Starcraft" spacecraft to assist U.S. astronauts on the moon landing in the "Alchemist 3" mission, according to the report. But so far, the "Starcraft" spacecraft is still in the early stages of development, with three flight failures and several successful suborbital trials so far, but has not yet completed official orbiting and has not conducted critical injection tests in low-temperature orbit.

In an interview with CNBC television, Daffy said that SpaceX¡¯s progress is lagging behind the plan and could hinder NASA¡¯s goal of ¡°taking back to the moon before returning to China¡± and that President Trump and I want to go to the moon within the current presidency, so I want to open the contract for a lunar lander that will let other space companies compete with SpaceX.¡±

According to Reuters, the ¡°other space companies¡± mentioned by Dafe may refer to the Blue Origin company created by U.S. billionaire Bezos, and if SpaceX lags behind, but Blue Origin can do this before them, then Blue Origin is fine,¡± Dafe said in an interview, ¡°but we won¡¯t wait for a company.

According to reports, the Blue Origin company was defeated when the moon lander project competed with SpaceX in 2021 for the "Alphabet 3" mission, but won a similar project for the subsequent "Alphabet 5" mission in 2023. The company is developing the "Blue Moon" series of landers and has been working hard to convince NASA and the U.S. Congress to use it as a backup plan for the "Alphabet 3" mission.

A NASA spokesperson said it had notified SpaceX and Blue Origin to propose a new plan to "accelerate the moon landing" by October 29. He also revealed,"NASA will ask the entire commercial space industry to develop plans to explore how to speed up the pace of our lunar missions."

In response to CNN's comment on Duffy's remarks, Blue Origin simply said "ready to support." Duffy said that in addition to SpaceX and Blue Origin, NASA may also choose to open up competition opportunities to US space companies that have not signed contracts. Bob Benken, vice president of exploration and technology strategy for Lockheed Martin's space division, said in a statement to Reuters that the company has been "conducting significant technical and planning analysis for human lunar landers" this year and working with cross-industry teams to respond to NASA needs. Dynetics, an Alabama-based aerospace company, also bid for a lunar lander in 2021 alongside Blue Origin and SpaceX.

SpaceX founder Musk responded, ¡°SpaceX is progressing as fast as lightning compared to other companies,¡± and previously U.S. media concluded that the blue moon company¡¯s ¡°blue moon¡± MK2 lander is looking to manned moon landing in the early 1930s, and it is difficult to overtake SpaceX in progress.