NASA Launches Historic Artemis II Crewed Lunar Mission

April 2, 2026

Florida, April 2: NASA’s Artemis II lunar mission was launched from Florida, marking the first crewed flight around the Moon in over 50 years. This mission carries four astronauts aboard the Orion spacecraft, which was propelled by the Space Launch System rocket, lifting off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center at 6:35 PM Eastern Time on Wednesday.

Artemis II is NASA’s inaugural crewed mission under the Artemis program. The four-member crew includes NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, along with Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen.

The launch countdown was briefly halted at T-10 minutes but resumed shortly after. The Artemis II mission aims to demonstrate several capabilities necessary for deep space missions. According to NASA, it will verify Orion’s life-support systems and provide astronauts with critical operational practice for Artemis III and future lunar missions.

The crew will travel approximately 7,400 kilometers beyond the far side of the Moon before returning to Earth. This mission will take astronauts farther from Earth and closer to the Moon than ever before in the past half-century.

Re-entry will be one of the most challenging phases of the mission. Orion is expected to enter Earth’s atmosphere at about 25,000 miles per hour, facing temperatures around 5,000 degrees before landing in the Pacific Ocean.

During the mission, astronauts will evaluate the spacecraft’s performance, practice emergency procedures, and capture images of the Moon’s far side.

This crew represents several historic milestones, including the first woman, the first African American astronaut, and the first Canadian to travel to the Moon.

Artemis II is seen as an initial step in NASA’s broader plan to establish a long-term human presence on the Moon and eventually send astronauts to Mars. The Artemis program follows the Apollo missions, which sent 24 astronauts to the Moon between 1968 and 1972, with 12 walking on its surface.

NASA aims to build on this legacy by establishing a lunar base and plans missions to the Moon’s south pole by the end of this decade, before advancing to Mars.