NASA Announces Artemis II Astronaut Crew for Moon Mission

NASA has announced the four astronauts who will fly on its Artemis II mission, the first crewed flight to orbit the Moon since the Apollo program. The mission, potentially scheduled for 2024, is intended to test NASA's deep space exploration capabilities and pave the way for future lunar landings.

The Artemis II crew consists of commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover and mission specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen. Wiseman is a former Navy pilot and test pilot who flew on the International Space Station (ISS) in 2014. Glover is a former Navy fighter pilot who recently completed his first spaceflight on the ISS as part of the SpaceX Crew-1 mission. Koch is a former electrical engineer and Antarctic researcher who holds the record for the longest single spaceflight by a woman, spending 328 days on the ISS in 2019-2020. Hansen is a former Canadian Air Force fighter pilot.

The four astronauts will launch on NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The mission will last about 10 days, during which the crew will check out Orion's systems before heading toward the Moon. The spacecraft will fly around the far side of the Moon, reaching a distance of about 6,400 miles beyond it, and then return to Earth using a fuel-efficient trajectory that harnesses the Earth-Moon gravity field. The crew will splash down in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Diego, where they will be recovered by NASA and Department of Defense personnel.

Artemis II is stepping stone on NASA's plan to land the first woman and first person of color on the Moon, and establish long-term lunar science and exploration capabilities.