The US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has announced the names of four astronauts who will fly around the moon at the end of 2024. For the first time, a woman, electrical engineer Christina Koch, and an African-American, pilot Victor Glover, will participate in a lunar mission. The pair will be joined by astronauts Reid Wiseman and Canadian Jeremy Hansen, the space agency said.
Last December, the Artemis I mission was successfully completed, when the Orion module orbited the Moon and went further from Earth than any other spacecraft designed for crew. The Artemis II mission, during which the module will orbit a natural Earth satellite with a crew, is planned for the end of 2024. The trip should take about ten days. The landing on the moon, for which the quartet presented today should pave the way, is scheduled for 2025.
The crew will be commanded by Wiseman. The 47-year-old pilot looked into space in 2015, participating in a mission to the International Space Station (ISS). He is joined by pilot Hansen of the same age, who leaves Earth for the first time.
A little more experienced is the 44-year-old Koch, who holds the record for the duration of a woman’s continuous stay in space, which is 328 days. Together with astronaut Jessica Meir, she took part in the first all-female spacewalk in October 2019. The crew will be joined by Glover, who became the first African-American to stay on the ISS for six months.
“It’s a big day. We have a lot to celebrate and it’s a lot more than just the four names that have been announced,” Glover said. By selecting a woman and a non-white astronaut, NASA is making good on its promise to bring more diversity to its research efforts. All previous missions to the moon have been white.
The quartet will now begin a period of intensive training. At the end of next year, it will essentially repeat the Apollo 8 mission, which saw a human crew leave Earth orbit and enter lunar orbit for the first time. The biggest difference will be the use of 21st century technology developed by NASA specifically for the Artemis mission.
NASA does not yet have a system capable of transporting astronauts to the surface of the Moon. It is developed by billionaire Elon Musk’s company SpaceX. The Starship spacecraft is scheduled to begin flight tests in the coming weeks.
If the roughly ten-day mission is successful, NASA wants to land two astronauts on the moon by the end of 2025.
NASA presented new spacesuits (March 14, 2023):
NASA has introduced new spacesuits with which astronauts will also land on the moon. | Video: Associated Press
