NASA takes a trip to Seattle area to thank suppliers for work on the next moonshot

Geek Wire

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NASA astronaut Woody Hoburg faces the TV cameras at L3Harris' Aerojet Rocketdyne facility in Redmond, Wash. An R-4D-11 thruster and a decontamination oven are off to his left. (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle)
REDMOND, Wash. — The first crewed flight around the moon in more than 50 years is still months away, but NASA is already saying thank you to L3Harris Technologies' Aerojet Rocketdyne segment and other suppliers who are making the trip possible.
Today, NASA's road trip brought agency officials — plus astronaut Woody Hoburg — to the L3Harris facility in Redmond, which has contributed propulsion systems to NASA missions ranging from space shuttle flights to the Voyager probes' journeys to the edge of the solar system.
Now NASA is getting ready to launch four astronauts on a round-the-moon mission known as Artemis 2, powered in part by hardware built in Redmond. Hoburg, who spent six months on the International Space Station in 2023 and is awaiting his next crew assignment, told an audience of about 200 L3Harris employees and VIPs that the Artemis 2 crew is well aware of the company's contribution.
'They're depending on you, and they know they can count on you,' he said. 'Thank you for all the hard work you're doing to make this amazing adventure possible.'
The Artemis 2 mission is currently targeted for launch in April, or perhaps even earlier, said Howard Hu, NASA's program manager for the Orion crew vehicle. The mission after that, Artemis 3, is due to lift off no earlier than mid-2027 with the goal of landing astronauts on the lunar surface for the first time since Apollo 17 in 1972.
L3Harris' Aerojet Redmond team delivered the hardware for those two Artemis missions — including auxiliary engines for Orion's European-built service module — years ago. Now the team is working on thrusters for missions as far out as Artemis 8, which is scheduled to go the moon no earlier than 2033.
NASA astronaut Woody Hoburg uses a basketball and a tennis ball to provide a sense of the relative sizes of Earth and the moon during a thank-you ceremony for L3Harris employees in Redmond, Wash. (L3Harris Photo)
With the advent of the Trump administration and new management at NASA, the long-term plan for crewed moon missions has been in flux.
The White House initially sought to cancel the Space Launch System and Orion programs after Artemis 3, and instead focus on a commercial alternative for Mars missions, such as SpaceX's Starship launch system. But Congress voted to stay the course — and Don Mahr, director of program management at L3Harris' Redmond facility, told GeekWire that NASA has told its suppliers to continue executing the current plan, at least for now.
Amit Kshatriya, NASA's deputy associate administrator for the Moon to Mars Program, said propulsion systems from L3Harris will continue to be essential components in NASA's toolbox even if the long-term plan for Artemis changes.
'It's the wrong argument to think about picking one thing or another,' he said. 'The right argument is, how do we stimulate and create missions and capability across the country in all sorts of different capability classes.'
Kshatriya said that NASA's needs are almost certain to change 'five years from now, 10 years from now, 15 years from now,' and that L3Harris has demonstrated it'll be able to keep up.
'A shop like this is the DNA that we need to keep going, which is why we're so excited to be here,' he said.
Hoburg is excited as well. 'We're using the moon as a proving ground to figure out how to get to Mars, so it's a really exciting time,' he said. 'And the Artemis 2 crew that's embarking on this mission, they're the pathfinders that are starting a sequence of missions. … It's going to be the next step in space.'
Does Hoburg want to go to the moon? His answer was diplomatic. 'I want the United States of America to go to the moon,' he told GeekWire. 'It is time to do it. I would love to get to fly one of those missions myself, but I'm proud of our country that we're leading and executing these missions.'
During today's thank-you gathering in Redmond, four L3Harris Aerojet employees received awards from NASA for their contributions to the Artemis program. Brett Mendenhall and Richard Mirabella were given NASA's Silver Snoopy Award, which must be pinned onto the winner's lapel by an astronaut. 'That was the part where I try not to draw any blood,' Hoburg quipped.
Camille Samonte received the NASA Space Flight Awareness Trailblazer Award, and Cory Houck won the SFA Management Award.