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| Attribute | Starship HLS Artemis III LEO Demo → Artemis IV Crewed Landing Trust: Agency-primary Last verified Remove × | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Operator | ispace | ISRO | SpaceX |
| Prime contractor | ispace | ISRO | SpaceX |
| Status | Lost | Landed | In development |
| Customer | private | ISRO | NASA-HLS |
| Launch date | 2022-12-11 | 2023-07-14 | Late 2027 (NET — Artemis III crewed LEO docking demo); first crewed landing Artemis IV (~2028) |
| Landing date | 2023-04-25 | 2023-08-23 | — |
| Landing site | Atlas crater, Mare Frigoris (planned; impacted at altitude ~5 km) | Statio Shiv Shakti, 69.37°S — first soft landing near lunar south pole | Lunar south pole (NASA-curated candidate region near 84-90°S) — first surface use Artemis IV |
| Payload | Rashid rover (10 kg, UAE/MBRSC) + Sora-Q (0.25 kg, JAXA) + commercial (2023-04-25) | Pragyan rover 27 kg + lander Vikram 1,749 kg (2023-08-23) | ~100 tonnes to lunar surface (sustained variant target) (2024-04-16) |
| Contract value | — | ₹6.15B (~$75M USD) (2023-07-14) | $2.89B + $1.15B Option B = $4.04B total (2022-11-15) |
| Outcome | Travelled ~1.4M km — at the time, furthest a privately funded spacecraft had flown. Software flagged the radar altimeter as faulty after the lander crossed a crater rim cliff and ignored its readings. Lander ran out of fuel hovering ~5 km above surface and free-fell. | First soft landing near the lunar south pole and first lunar landing by ISRO. Pragyan rover traversed ~100 m over 10 lunar days, confirmed sulfur, aluminium, calcium, iron, chromium, titanium, manganese, silicon, oxygen at the landing site. Lander 'hopped' to a secondary location demonstrating reusable propulsion. | Selected April 2021 as sole HLS provider for Artemis III. Architecture requires Super Heavy launch + multiple Starship tanker refueling flights in LEO + transit to NRHO + rendezvous with Orion (SLS). NASA OIG IG-26-004 (March 2026) flagged crew-rescue capability as open risk. October 2025: NASA acting administrator Sean Duffy reopened the Artemis III lander contract to competition due to Starship development pace. In 2026 NASA redefined Artemis III as a crewed HLS docking demonstration in Earth orbit (late 2027 NET), naming the crew — Randy Bresnik, Luca Parmitano, Frank Rubio, and Andre Douglas — on June 9, 2026; the first crewed lunar landing moved to Artemis IV (~2028). |
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Underlying dataset: GET /api/moon/landers. Methodology: /moon/methodology.