The Artemis 2 mission, which will send a crew of four astronauts around the moon, could launch as early as February 6, NASA said. If successful, it would be the first time since Apollo 17 in 1972 that humans have returned to orbit the moon. Artemis 2 has been delayed several times from 2023, to 2024 and then to 2025 due to various issues with the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and the Orion space capsule.
The crew consists of NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch, as well as Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen. If all goes well, the mission will take 10 days, making it the farthest journey from Earth ever made by humans.
In the Artemis I mission, launched in 2022, the Orion capsule, which did not contain a human crew, traveled 432,200 km from Earth while also orbiting the moon. If the Artemis 2 mission goes well, Artemis 3 will return humans to the lunar surface and will also be the first time a woman has set foot on its surface.
SpaceX's delays in developing the Spaceship mean that Artemis 3 will only be launched after 2027. Frustrated by SpaceX's failure, NASA has opened a tender for a secondary lunar landing system from a consortium consisting of Blue Origin, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and Draper.
