Ars: Presumably that would not happen until after Artemis III?

Glaze: Yeah, agreed.

Ars: And with Blue Moon Mk. 1, that’s launching sometime this year. You know, presumably within a few months?

Glaze: I think it will launch this year.

Ars: I hope so. What should we be looking for on that flight as it pertains to HLS?

Glaze: I think some of their propulsion systems are going to feed forward into the guidance, navigation, and control. Their ability to land will be key. We all know that is not as easy as one might think. So that’ll be key, just seeing how all the systems perform in the lunar environment.

Ars: Have the companies shown a greater vigor toward executing on HLS in the last couple of months?

Glaze: Yeah, in fact, I’m glad you asked that. Because I think we really have seen them—they’re taking it very seriously. Our request to try and pull things in, to try and meet the mandate to land on the surface in 2028, I think we have seen real commitment to try to do that on both sides, from both Blue and from SpaceX, yeah, a real commitment to seeing what they can do to try and pull that in.

Ars: You mentioned the ICPS [Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage, currently used by the SLS rocket, of which NASA has one left] and that you’re sort of still trading on whether to fly that on Artemis III. If you could save it, why would you fly it on Artemis III?

Glaze: If we don’t need it on Artemis III, we won’t fly it because I think there’s value. I think we all recognize that there would be value in having it available for Artemis IV, giving a little bit more development time for the Centaur V replacement. However, we haven’t closed yet on what the Artemis III mission profile looks like and whether or not we’re going to need an upper stage to get us to the right orbit.

Ars: How far can the SLS core stage push it?

Glaze: You know, that’s a really good question. I’ll have to get back with you. I don’t know that I have a specific answer for you on that. I know we’re looking at and considering a low-Earth orbit. But I don’t know exactly what it would be. Is that an ISS orbit? Is it a little higher than ISS? We’re still looking at that, and some trades in particular orbits, and then where can we get to without the upper stage.

Ars: OK, you’ve got a busy time ahead of you. Good luck.

Glaze: Oh, you’re not kidding.