Artemis II Rocket Launch
The Artemis II is a rocket that was launched from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on April 1st, 2026. The crew consists of 4 astronauts: commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, and mission specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen. The crew is going to be gone for 10 days with the goal of being extremely close to the moon and using this vantage point, they will be able to have scientific investigations in order to inform future human space operations according to NASA.
As of April 6th, 2026, the NASA crew on the Artemis II spaceship traveled further from Earth than any human has before. The crew traveled 252,756 miles away from Earth surpassing the original record 248,655 miles, set by the Apollo 13 crew on April 14th, 1970. The Mission was originally supposed to be in March; however, there was an interruption to the helium in the upper parts of the rocket. According to Astronomy.com the Helium is used to pressurize the stage’s liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen tanks. Unless they had this helium, they would not have been able to go to the moon, so this is why they had to wait.
The NASA crew arrived on April 20th, 2026. This was the most dangerous part of the missions according to the New York Times. NASA stated that the heat shield on the Artemis II is flawed, as if the shield fails, the underlying metallic structure could melt and rupture. Luckily this did not happen and the astronauts were able to land safely off the coast of San Diego. They touched down at 5:07 p.m. PDT, approximately 50 nautical miles away from the coast of San Diego. They were greeted back on Earth by NASA and U.S. military teams, and were then extracted from the ship and taken by helicopter to the USS John P. Murtha, a dock ship, in order to be evaluated by medical personnel.
After getting evaluated and making it back on land in San Francisco, the crew took a rather short flight for them to Houston,Texas to be reunited with friends and family at the Kennedy Space Center. The New York Times touched on how each astronaut spoke at the Kennedy Space Center, each one touching on themes of humanity and how everyone shares the same planet.