04/01/2026
The last crewed mission to the Moon was the Apollo 17 mission, December 7th, 1972.
Today, that’s expected the change.
NASA’s Artemis II’s launch window is expected to open this evening at 6:24 p.m. EDT. If all goes to plan, commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, and mission specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen will take the Orion space craft on a nine-and-a-half day trip around the far side of the Moon and travel 252,000 miles away from Earth, further any other crew in history.
The crew won’t be landing on the Moon this time. They will use this flight to help NASA prepare for the Artemis IV Moon landing scheduled for 2028.
All of this takes an incredible amount of engineering, and needless to say, we’re impressed! Over 2,700 suppliers were needed to make this mission a reality. The Orion space craft alone has 355,056 parts, and the primary contractor for the crew module, Lockheed Martin, 3D printed over 150 parts.
You can watch the launch live on NASA’s YouTube channel. This is a truly historic event. Don’t miss it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NaJklsJonD4
https://www.nasa.gov/mission/artemis-ii/