NASA tested a Space Launch System rocket RS-25 engine at the Stennis Space Center. Credit: NASA Stennis Space Center

The race to Mars has intensified, with two major players leading the charge—NASA and SpaceX. NASA, a government-backed agency with decades of space exploration experience, is taking a calculated and methodical approach.

Firefly Aerospace successfully reached the lunar surface, to be followed in short order by space companies Intuitive Machines and ispace.

"It's time to consider alternatives for going to the Earth, to the moon and back." Pace said. "Ideally, NASA should be able to buy heavy lift services to send humans to the moon. A revised Artemis campaign plan should be a high priority for the new administrator."

As Trump returns to the White House, however, most of those accomplishments are at risk. The budget overruns that hobble NASA’s ambitions have only gotten worse. The promised Artemis Moon landing keeps getting delayed.

"It's like a game of billiards around the solar system, flying by a couple of planets at just the right angle and timing to build up the energy we need to get to Jupiter and Europa."

If federal employees want to space out from their jobs,' Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) told The Post, 'they need to refund the American people for every last penny.'

A new mission designed to better understand the heliosphere will be the first to map in three dimensions how the solar corona becomes the solar wind.

Intuitive Machines second NASA-backed lunar lander mission will deliver scientific instruments to hunt for water under the moon's surface.