During an event at NASA Johnson Space Center’s Ellington Field in Houston, NASA and CSA (Canadian Space Agency) will announce the four astronauts who will venture around the Moon. Traveling aboard NASA’s Orion spacecraft during Artemis II, the mission is the first crewed flight test on the agency’s path to establishing a long-term scientific and human presence on the lunar surface. The event will take place at 11 a.m. EDT (10 a.m. CDT) on Monday, April 3.
The event will air on NASA Television, the NASA app, and the agency’s website.
Artemis II is the first crewed mission aboard NASA’s foundational human deep space capabilities: the Space Launch System rocket, Orion spacecraft, and the ground systems needed to launch them. The approximately 10-day mission will test and stress the Orion spacecraft’s life-support systems to prove the capabilities and techniques required to live and work in deep space in ways only humans can do.
The crew will include three NASA astronauts and one CSA astronaut, demonstrating the agency’s commitment to international partnerships through the Artemis program. Artemis II builds on the successful Artemis I flight test, which launched an uncrewed Orion, atop the SLS rocket, on a 1.4 million-mile journey beyond the Moon to test systems before astronauts fly aboard the systems on a mission to the Moon.
NASA’s Artemis II mission aims to test the Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft with crew by flying four astronauts around the Moon for about 10 days. The mission will help establish NASA’s human deep space exploration capabilities and prepare for lunar surface missions, such as the first woman and person of color landing on the Moon.
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