After 50 years, humans are going back to the Moon — NASA’s Artemis II launch is days away

The upcoming flight will be Artemis II, the second mission under NASA’s Artemis campaign and the first to carry astronauts beyond low-Earth orbit since the Apollo era.

“Artemis II will be a momentous step forward for human spaceflight. This historic mission will send humans farther from Earth than ever before and deliver the insights needed for us to return to the Moon — all with America at the helm,” NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said.

Isaacman added that Artemis II represents progress toward establishing a sustained human presence on the Moon and advancing NASA’s long-term goal of sending astronauts to Mars.

“I could not be more impressed by our NASA team and the Artemis II crew, and wish them well. Boldly forward,” he said.

Why does the Artemis campaign matter?

NASA says the Artemis programme is central to its plans to explore the Moon for scientific discovery, technology development, and understanding how humans can live and work on another world. The lessons learned from Artemis missions are expected to play a critical role in future crewed missions to Mars.

Launch preparations underway

NASA said it is targeting no earlier than 7 a.m. EST on Saturday, January 17, to begin the multi-hour rollout of the Artemis II launch vehicle from the Vehicle Assembly Building to Launch Pad 39B at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The agency’s crawler-transporter 2 will move the nearly 11-million-pound Space Launch System stack at a speed of about one mile per hour along the four-mile route. The journey to the launch pad is expected to take up to 12 hours.