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Four astronauts are set to blast off next week on NASA’s first human moon mission in 53 years called Artemis II.
NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch, along with Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen, will take a 10-day trip around the moon, without landing.
“For the first time since 1972, humans will be far away from the Earth,” Noah Petro, project scientist on the first Artemis Lunar Surface Science Team told WTOP. He’s also a research scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.
Artemis II will be the first crewed test of NASA’s huge Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft. It was tested without a crew during the Artemis I mission in 2022.
Artemis II will give astronauts a rare view of the moon, including the far side that can’t be seen from Earth.
“They’re going to be looking for subtle textural differences on the lunar surface, color differences and if the geometry allows us, they’re going to be looking for small flashes of light that are meteorite strikes on the lunar surface,” Petro said.
He hopes what the astronauts see can help scientists better understand what’s been happening on the moon since it was formed.
The mission also aims to study how the human body responds to travel in the harsh environment of deep space.
“We’re actually sending an experiment called Avatar that will be taking blood from each astronaut …(and) flying it with them as basically additional mini crew members,” Petro said.
If all goes according to plan, Artemis II will be launched from Kennedy Space Center in Florida on April 1.
The launch window opens at 6:24 p.m., and you’ll be able to watch the liftoff live online.
The next mission, Artemis III, is planned for next year and will test one or both of the lunar landers that are being developed by Space X and Blue Origin.
Artemis IV, expected to launch in early 2028, plans to bring humans back to the surface of the moon for the first time in decades.
