The four astronauts chosen to fly NASA's Artemis II mission touched down in Florida on Friday and immediately moved into the final phase of prelaunch preparations for the first crewed trip toward the Moon in over five decades.
Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch of NASA, along with Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen, flew from Houston, Texas to the agency's Kennedy Space Center in Northrop T-38 jets they piloted themselves. At Kennedy they will be positioned to board NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, which could lift off as soon as April 1, with an Orion crew capsule carrying the four on a roughly 10-day mission that will loop around the Moon at high speed and return to Earth.
Speaking to reporters after arriving at Kennedy, Wiseman, the mission commander, said: "The nation and the world has been waiting a long time to do this again," and added that he and his crewmates "are really pumped to go do this." He also commented on the lead-up to the flight, saying "It has been a lot of work. It’s been a great journey, it’s great to be down here in the Florida warm air."
Artemis II represents the first crewed sortie under NASA's multibillion-dollar Artemis program. Although the mission will not include a lunar landing, its objectives focus on sending humans farther from Earth than any prior human spaceflight, and on validating critical systems aboard Orion. Tests will examine life-support functionality, navigation, communications and the performance of the spacecraft's heat shield during reentry.
Contractors supporting the mission are listed as Boeing, the prime contractor for the SLS core stage; Northrop Grumman, which supplies the rocket's solid-fuel boosters; and Lockheed Martin, the builder of the Orion spacecraft.
Crew preparation and status
The four astronauts have trained for more than two years since their selection in 2023. They were placed in standard preflight quarantine at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston on March 18 and are scheduled to transfer into NASA’s Astronaut Crew Quarters in Florida in the days leading up to launch.
Victor Glover, assigned as pilot for Artemis II, will make history as the first Black astronaut to travel to the Moon’s vicinity. Christina Koch will be the first woman to reach that region, and Jeremy Hansen will be the first non-American astronaut to travel beyond low Earth orbit. All crew members except Hansen have prior spaceflight experience.
Wiseman has previously said the mission is being treated as a test and that the crew are prepared for multiple possible outcomes. "When we get off the planet, we might come right back home, we might spend three or four days around Earth, we might go to the Moon - that’s where we want to go," he told reporters last year, adding that the team is ready for every scenario.
Background on the crew
Reid Wiseman, 50, logged 165 days aboard the International Space Station on a 2014 mission launched on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft. A former U.S. Navy test pilot, he later served as NASA's chief astronaut before being tapped to command Artemis II.
Victor Glover, 49, spent 168 days in space beginning in 2020 as pilot of NASA’s Crew-1 mission, the first operational flight to the ISS using SpaceX’s Crew Dragon. Prior to joining NASA, Glover flew more than 40 types of aircraft during his U.S. Navy career, which included combat deployments and test-pilot assignments.
Christina Koch, 47, holds the record for the longest continuous spaceflight by a woman, having spent 328 days aboard the ISS in 2019. Trained as an electrical engineer and physicist, Koch has previously worked as a NASA engineer and conducted extended research missions in Antarctica.
Jeremy Hansen, 50, will undertake his first spaceflight on Artemis II. Selected as a Canadian astronaut in 2009, his assignment to this mission reflects the ongoing partnership between the United States and Canada in human spaceflight and in contributions such as robotics used aboard the International Space Station.
Program outlook
NASA has indicated plans for additional Artemis missions in the coming years as the agency pursues a sustained human presence on the Moon and eventually crewed missions to Mars. Artemis II is positioned as a key test to demonstrate capabilities needed for those future objectives.
Summary of the upcoming flight
- The mission is a roughly 10-day high-speed loop around the Moon and back.
- It will not attempt a lunar landing but will validate Orion systems for deep-space human missions.
- The crew moved from Houston quarantine into final prelaunch preparations in Florida and could launch as soon as April 1.