NASA announces Artemis II crew: What we know about the astronauts, the mission and the launch date
NASA is once heading to the moon, and now we know the crew that will make the historic journey. Let’s take a look at those who will make the trip...
Soon the number of individuals who have entered the moon’s orbit will be expanded, thanks to the Artemis II space program, a collaboration between NASA and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).
The lunar team includes Commander Reid Wiseman, Pilot Victor Glover, and two Mission Specialists, Christina Hammock Koch, and Jeremy Hansen.
When making the announcement, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, said that “each has their own story, but, together, they represent our creed: E pluribus unum – out of many, one. Together, we are ushering in a new era of exploration for a new generation of star sailors and dreamers – the Artemis Generation.”
The team is expected to take off in November 2024 for their lunar mission which is expected to last ten days.
Who is Commander Reid Wiseman?
Commander Wiseman has been a NASA astronaut since 2009 and has participated in several missions to conduct research and increase collaboration between space agencies around the world. One of the most memorable missions taken by Reid took place in 2014, where jointly “with two of his best friends, Soyuz Commander Maxim Suraev of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) and Flight Engineer Alexander Gerst of the European Space Agency,” he made a trip 165-day mission to the International Space Station. According to NASA, the team “set a milestone for station science by completing a record 82 hours of research in a single week.”
A historic mission
Supporting Commander Wiseman is Pilot Victor Glover, who joined NASA as an astronaut in 2013. Glover will become the first Black person to make the lunar trip, and NASA hopes that his inclusion will inspire a new, more diverse generation to join the ranks of the world’s premier space organization. In more recent years, Glover participated in “the first post-certification mission of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft,” which took place from November 2020 to May 2021.
Glover’s membership of the Artemis team is not the only history-making factor. Mission Specialist Christina Hammock Koch will be the first woman to make a trip out of earth’s orbit. Throughout her career as an astronaut, she has spent 328 days in space and has “conducted six spacewalks, including the first three all women spacewalks, totaling 42 hours and 15 minutes.” Hammock Koch’s background in science has contributed to research into “the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, which studies dark matter, growing protein crystals for pharmaceutical research and testing 3D biological printers in microgravity.”
Lastly, Jeremy Hansen will become the first Canadian to make a trip to the moon. Hansen is also the first non-US citizen to participate in a lunar mission, a fact that he has been applauded for by Canadian Prime Minster Justin Trudeau.