SpaceX's New Crew Dragon Method to the Moon instead of Starship Shocked NASA!

SpaceX's New Crew Dragon Method to the Moon instead of Starship Shocked NASA!
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SpaceX's New Crew Dragon Method to the Moon instead of Starship Shocked NASA!
Orion, NASA’s incredibly expensive spacecraft, is slowly fading away, much like the legendary Space Shuttle once did. It’s powerful, impressive, and reliable, but at the end of the day, it represents an aging technology that’s being left behind by newer, more advanced, and more cost-effective systems.
But here’s the real question: if Orion is truly canceled, what could possibly take its place in future lunar missions?
Surprisingly, the answer is SpaceX’s Dragon. Originally built to ferry astronauts to the ISS, now emerging as NASA’s most promising backup for lunar missions.
So, how realistic is that idea? Let’s find out in today’s episode of Alpha Tech.
SpaceX's New Crew Dragon Method to the Moon instead of Starship Shocked NASA!
Orion is perhaps the most troubled spacecraft ever built. It was born under the Constellation Program, launched in 2005 during President George W. Bush’s administration, with a bold goal: to restore America’s leadership in space exploration. The plan was to pair Orion with the Ares I and Ares V rockets, creating a powerful and safe launch system for long-duration missions, to the ISS, the Moon, or even Mars. In other words, it was designed to be a multipurpose spacecraft, much like what Starship aims to be today.
But that bold dream quickly ran into major trouble. By 2010, the program was canceled by the Former President Barack Obama due to its enormous cost, projected to exceed $100 billion, along with slow progress and concerns raised by the Congressional Budget Office that it simply wasn’t cost-effective compared to commercial alternatives.
SpaceX's New Crew Dragon Method to the Moon instead of Starship Shocked NASA!
Despite billions already spent, Orion was on the brink of being scrapped entirely. It was only saved thanks to Congress and lawmakers who insisted on keeping NASA’s domestic crewed spaceflight capability alive.
One hundred billion dollars was a staggering number, but at the time, it still seemed “reasonable” compared to the Space Shuttle program, which had cost around $200 billion in total, and that’s probably why Orion managed to survive.
After being “frozen,” Orion underwent a major restructuring starting in 2010. It was redirected into NASA’s new Space Launch System and the Artemis program, focusing on crewed missions to the Moon.
By 2014, Orion finally made its first uncrewed test flight, Exploration Flight Test-1— launched atop a Delta IV Heavy rocket. It reached an altitude of 5,800 kilometers, testing its heat shield and parachute system, successfully proving it could survive the intense re-entry conditions of a lunar mission. That’s why, eight years later, Artemis I in 2022 became such a huge success.
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