BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. — Canadian Astronaut Jeremy Hansen and NASA Astronauts Christina Koch, Victor Glover, and Reid Wiseman will be the first crew to fly around the moon in over five decades.
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Today, the Artemis II crew was at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center to discuss their 10-day mission around the moon. It will now launch no earlier than April of 2026.
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Mission pilot Victor Glover said, “I mean, you know, launch dates are a challenge. And we had delays in the shuttle program, and we’ve had delays in our commercial crew program. And, you know, delays and scrubs are just a thing of reality. So, we’ll know we’re going to space when those solid rocket boosters light.”
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The crew will ride atop the SLS rocket inside the Orion Spacecraft.
NASA teams will use all the extra time they’ve gained from the delayed launch of Artemis II to ensure the crew has as safe a trip as possible by addressing Orion’s environmental control and life support systems and the spacecraft’s heat shield.
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Mission Specialist Jeremy Hansen told us, “We’ve set big challenges. We’re coming together in this country as well as an international collaboration, to do some extraordinary things. And I play a very small part. I’m very proud of that part.”
On Monday, the crew also studied contingency plans and reviewed mission procedures.
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