1 / 10Moon Mission: NASA is preparing Artemis II, its first crewed lunar mission in more than 50 years, which will send astronauts further from Earth than any humans have traveled before. The mission marks humanity’s first crewed flight toward the moon since 1972 and is part of NASA’s Artemis program aimed at returning humans to the moon and preparing for long-term lunar exploration.
(Photo Credit: nasa.gov)
2 / 10Flyby Plan: Artemis II will send four astronauts on a lunar flyby rather than a landing mission. The spacecraft will travel several thousand miles beyond the moon, perform a turn in space, and return directly to Earth. The mission will last less than 10 days. There will be no lunar orbit and no moonwalk, only a short out-and-back test flight.
3 / 10Test Mission: NASA plans future missions that will land astronauts on the moon, but Artemis II is designed as a practice mission to test systems and procedures with a crew aboard. Astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen will evaluate the Orion spacecraft and mission operations as part of NASA’s plan to build a long-term human presence on the moon.
4 / 10Diverse Crew: The Artemis II crew includes the first woman, the first person of color and the first non-American assigned to a lunar mission. The astronauts come from the United States and Canada and range in age from 47 to 50. The mission reflects NASA’s effort to include a more diverse and international astronaut team in lunar exploration.
5 / 10Crew Experience: Christina Koch holds the record for the longest single spaceflight by a woman after spending 328 days aboard the International Space Station from 2019 to 2020, where she also participated in the first all-female spacewalk. Victor Glover, a Navy test pilot, became the first Black astronaut to live and work aboard the space station and launched on a SpaceX mission.
(Photo Credit: AP)
6 / 10Mission Leaders: Jeremy Hansen of the Canadian Space Agency, a former fighter pilot, will be the only astronaut on the mission who has not flown in space before. The mission commander, Reid Wiseman, is a retired Navy captain who lived aboard the space station in 2014 and later served as chief of NASA’s astronaut corps.
7 / 10Powerful Rocket: Artemis II will launch on NASA’s Space Launch System rocket, which stands 322 feet tall and produces more power at liftoff than the Saturn V rocket used during the Apollo program. The Orion capsule carrying the astronauts will sit on top of the rocket. The SLS uses liquid hydrogen fuel and engines and parts adapted from the space shuttle program.
8 / 10Launch Delays: Hydrogen leaks that affected space shuttle launches also delayed earlier SLS tests, including an uncrewed test flight in 2022. Artemis II experienced similar hydrogen leaks during a fueling practice run in February, causing NASA to miss the first launch window. Additional helium flow issues delayed the mission further and moved the expected launch period into April.
(Photo Credit: nasa.gov)
9 / 10Flight Path: After liftoff, the astronauts will spend about 25 hours orbiting Earth in a high orbit while practicing spacecraft manoeuvring using the rocket’s upper stage as a target. They will rely on visual judgment rather than instruments to guide Orion close to the stage. The spacecraft will then fire its main engine to begin a free-return trajectory around the moon.
10 / 10Return Splashdown: During the mission, Orion will travel about 244,000 miles to the moon and reach a point about 5,000 miles beyond it, farther than the Apollo 13 record. The crew may photograph parts of the lunar far side. The mission will end with a Pacific Ocean splashdown near San Diego, where Navy ships will recover the capsule after reentry.
