The countdown is on for the first manned mission to the Moon in over 50 years, which is due to launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida April 1.
The countdown for NASA’s Artemis II test flight is underway, the clock beginning yesterday at 4:44 PM local time (9:44 PM Irish time) to a targeted launch time of 6:24 PM local time (11:24 PM Irish time) on Wednesday, April 1.
Artemis II is the first crewed launch of the American space administration’s SLS (Space Launch System) rocket and Orion spacecraft.
It will lift off carrying four astronauts, three Americans and one Canadian, who will be embarking on a 10-day looping flight around the Moon and back.
The crew – NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch and CSA astronaut Jeremy Hansen – will be the first people to fly on a mission to the Moon since 1972, which saw the Apollo 17 mission land astronauts Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt on the lunar surface.
However, this time around, they will not be landing on the Moon. That will be reserved for Artemis IV, described by NASA as “Humanity’s return to the lunar surface”:
“Artemis IV astronauts will travel to lunar orbit, where two crew members will descend to the surface and spend approximately a week near the South Pole of the Moon conducting new science before returning to lunar orbit to join their crew for the journey back to Earth.”
Artemis IV is scheduled for launch “early 2028”. It is intended as a stepping stone towards the United States establishing a long-term human presence on the Moon.
Earlier this month, NASA announced its intention of building a “Moon base” and establishing an “enduring presence” there so as to “ensure American leadership in space”.
“If we concentrate NASA’s extraordinary resources on the objectives of the National Space Policy, clear away needless obstacles that impede progress, and unleash the workforce and industrial might of our nation and partners, then returning to the Moon and building a base will seem pale in comparison to what we will be capable of accomplishing in the years ahead,” NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said.
In February, SpaceX founder Elon Musk also stated his company’s shift from primary focus on Mars to the Moon, saying that they intend to build a “self-growing city” on the Moon, because it is his belief that SpaceX can “potentially achieve that in less than 10 years, whereas Mars would take 20+ years”.