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A Message From Administrator Jared Isaacman, 22 May 2026

Page: a NASA workforce-updates blog post, 22 May 2026, 10:42 AM. https://www.nasa.gov/blogs/workforce-updates/2026/05/22/a-message-from-administrator-jared-isaacman/. An editor's note says it "was updated on May 22, 2026, to confirm the target launch of SR-1 as targeting 2028". Fetched 2026-10-02T04:02:38Z. File: sources/moon-base/nasa-gov-blogs-workforce-updates-2026-05-22-a-message-from-administrator-jared-isaacman.md.

Summary. The Administrator's note behind the realignment release of the same day, with ten directives. It is the fullest source on how the agency was reorganized: two mission directorates merged into the Human Spaceflight Mission Directorate (HSMD), with a Moon Base Program and an Artemis Program "renamed from Moon to Mars"; two more merged into the Research and Technology Mission Directorate (RTMD), with the Space Reactor Office and SCaN. Directive 6 creates the Moon Base Program as "NASA's central authority for all lunar activities". Where it bears on the architecture is on Architecture definition process.

Key points

  • Objectives ("the objectives remain unchanged"):
    • Artemis: "Standardize the SLS architecture to the greatest extent possible", and "at some point in the future, transition to commercial pathways with crewed missions as often as every six months"
    • Moon Base: "build an enduring presence through a phased iterative approach to learn until we have an outpost that delivers novel science, stimulates a lunar economy and becomes the proving ground for the technology necessary to undertake future crewed missions to Mars"
    • Space Reactor Office: SR-1 Freedom, "lay the foundation for a lunar surface power station, and scale-up to a generation of spacecraft capable of supporting a crewed mission to Mars"
    • the orbital economy (ISS, private astronauts, "one or more commercial space stations"); X-planes and science
  • Mission directorates:
    • "Combine SOMD and ESDMD into a single Human Spaceflight Mission Directorate (HSMD)": "At the time these orgs were separated, sending astronauts to the Moon was conceptual, while LEO was operational. Today, both are operational." Dr. Lori Glaze, Associate Administrator. Primary divisions: "Low Earth Orbit" (Dana Weigel; CCP, ISS, CLD), "Moon Base, Carlos Garcia-Galan as Program Manager", and "Artemis, Jeremy Parsons as Program Manager (renamed from Moon to Mars)"
    • ARMD and STMD combine into RTMD (Dr. James Kenyon), "unifying NASA's aeronautics, space technology, and nuclear power and propulsion capabilities". Primary divisions: Aeronautics; Advanced Research and Technology; "Space Reactor Office, Steve Sinacore as Acting Director"; "Space Communications and Navigation (SCaN), Kevin Coggins as Director"
    • SMD unchanged
  • Mission directorates now report to the Administrator; center directors to the Associate Administrator, who also becomes NASA Chief Engineer. Adam Steltzner (JPL) becomes "HQ Chief Engineer for Special Projects, to encompass Moon Base, SR-1 Freedom, and other priority initiatives".
  • Centers of Excellence: each center gets a specialty (for example Johnson "Human Spaceflight", Marshall "Space Structures, Propulsion, and Infrastructure", Armstrong "Flight Test and Aircraft Operations", JPL "Deep Space and Robotics").
  • Directive 6, Moon Base. "Consolidate all lunar programs outside of the Artemis program, into a unified Moon Base Program within HSMD, aligning capabilities and personnel to enable a sustained U.S. presence on the Moon by 2030." The program is "responsible for integrating exploration architecture, surface mobility, science payloads, cargo landers, habitability systems, logistics, observation, communication, navigation and other technical demonstrations into a coherent end-to-end campaign". Actions:
    • consolidate "CLPS, large cargo landers, Argonaut/HLS cargo, human surface mobility, advanced exploration systems, lunar infrastructure development, habitation, and the current Gateway surface relevant scope" under one program office
    • "unified program authority for planning, integration, contracting, and execution across all lunar missions, including SCaN and other science and technology elements"
    • "Increase mission cadence to the lunar surface"; "remove or redirect efforts that do not directly support sustained surface operations"
    • "Develop an integrated lunar architecture and operations plan that identifies the critical path, long lead items, supply chain vulnerabilities, international, interagency, and commercial partnerships"
    • a transition plan within 30 days, a Program Management Plan within 60; the program office at Johnson
  • Directive 7, nuclear power and propulsion. All space nuclear funding "across HSMD, RTMD, and SMD" under the Space Reactor Office; "SR-1 targeting launch to Mars in 2028, and LR-1 ready for launch by 2030"; Gateway's Power and Propulsion Element realigned to SR-1; SMD leads "the Sky Fall science payload"; radioisotope power sources consolidated in the Space Reactor Office, to "encourage affordable, commercial procurement of RTG and RHU's"; a 60-day study of "NTP, NEP, and chemical propulsion to enable unrefueled roundtrip crewed and cargo missions to Mars by 2036".
  • Directive 8, LEO: one LEO Program combining ISS, Commercial Crew, Commercial LEO Destinations and the ISS EVA office, at Johnson.
  • Directive 10: each program writes a plan "that close[s] on national space policy timelines", with named engineers on the critical path; "a targeted SBIR funding line focused specifically on high risk and high impact supply chain vulnerabilities" ("valves, hypergol propulsion components, specialized materials").
  • Other directives, no architecture bearing: 1 (workforce and organization), 2 (communications), 3 (science: consolidating extended missions, commercial Earth-observation data, a possible new flagship such as "Uranus Orbiter and Probe"), 4 (finance and infrastructure; printed twice), 5 (legislative affairs), 9 (aviation portfolio, led by RTMD with the Armstrong Center Director, including "future use of NASA 737 reduced gravity-platform").

What it doesn't say

  • Anything about the Strategy and Architecture Office, the Architecture Definition Document or the Architecture Concept Review. Directive 6 gives the Moon Base Program "exploration architecture" to integrate and an "integrated lunar architecture and operations plan" to write, without naming the ADD.
  • What "Argonaut" is.

Oddities

  • Directive 4's text is printed twice. "WTFC" and "WFTCA" both appear, unexpanded; the body has "Working Families Tax Cut Act".

Architecture definition process · Moon Base hub · Phases · Lunar Nuclear Fission System · Gateway · CLPS · SCaN Networks · Mars-forward · realignment release · HSMD page