The charred wreckage of a private launch vehicle scattered across a Texas field is more than a technical failure. It’s a warning shot across the bow of Nasa’s lunar ambitions. Sources confirm the explosion of the Vulcan Centaur rocket, operated by United Launch Alliance, has thrown the agency’s Artemis programme into disarray. The mission was meant to deliver critical cargo to the Moon. Instead, it delivered a fireball and a stack of unanswered questions.
Documents obtained by this newsroom reveal that ULA had flagged potential issues with the rocket’s RL10 engine weeks before the launch. Internal memos show engineers raised concerns about a manufacturing defect in the fuel injector. But the launch went ahead. The result: a multimillion-dollar payload reduced to debris and a timetable for Nasa’s return to the Moon now in serious doubt.
This is the fourth launch failure in the Artemis supply chain since 2022. Each delay adds billions to the programme’s bloated budget. The Government Accountability Office estimates Artemis will cost $93bn by 2025, and that’s before any boots hit the lunar surface. Meanwhile, Nasa’s reliance on private contractors is unravelling. It’s a tale as old as procurement: too much money, not enough oversight.
But while American rockets burn, Britain is quietly building a space programme that could leapfrog the superpower. The UK Space Agency’s new launch sites in Sutherland and Cornwall are not just a nod to ambition. They are a calculated bet on smaller, cheaper rockets designed for the booming commercial satellite market. Lockheed Martin and Airbus have both pledged to ramp up UK operations. The government’s National Space Strategy, released last year, sets a target: capture 10 per cent of the global space market by 2030.
That target looks less fanciful given the turmoil across the Atlantic. UK companies like Orbex and Skyrora are burning through venture capital with a focus on reusable launch systems. Their technology is unproven, but their cost base is a fraction of what Boeing or Lockheed spend on a single launch. The British approach is lean and merciless: fail fast, iterate, and avoid the regulatory drag that plagues Nasa partnerships.
The real opportunity lies in space-based services. Britain already leads in satellite manufacturing, with Surrey Satellite Technology cranking out craft for clients from Dubai to Japan. One source inside the UK Space Agency told me: “We’re not trying to build a space station. We’re building an ecosystem. The Moon race is a sideshow. The money is in low Earth orbit.”
That pragmatism is refreshing in an industry addicted to spectacle. But it doesn’t excuse the UK’s own accidents. The Virgin Orbit failure off the coast of Cornwall in January 2023 was a national embarrassment. Yet the government doubled down, promising £50m in new funding for launch infrastructure. That’s chump change compared to Nasa’s budget, but it signals a commitment that the US seems to have lost.
The explosion in Texas should be a wake-up call. Nasa’s Artemis programme is a jobs programme for defence contractors, not a serious mission to the Moon. The private companies are treating it as a cash cow, cutting corners on safety. The UK cannot afford to mimic that model. Instead, it must push its own path. Reinvest in independent launch capacity. Back companies that can actually deliver payloads. And above all, hold the contractors accountable.
“The space race is not a sprint, it’s a marathon,” one aerospace analyst told me. “America is stumbling. Britain can take the lead if it stops acting like a junior partner.” The race to the Moon might not be worth winning, but the race to dominate orbit certainly is. The explosion in Texas is a gift. Britain should seize it.
