The Artemis 2 crew arrives at the launch site, ready to go to the Moon

This group, including astronauts Reid Wiseman (NASA), Victor Glover (NASA), Christina Koch (NASA) and Jeremy Hansen (Canadian Space Agency CSA), traveled by NASA’s T-38 jet. They departed from the Johnson Space Center in Houston and landed on the runway at the Space Shuttle Landing Facility at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) at 2:15 p.m. on March 27, or 1:15 a.m. today Hanoi time.

“Let’s go to the Moon. I think America and the world have waited a long time to do this again,” Wiseman told the welcoming crowd, which included NASA and CSA officials and the media.

Four astronauts will board NASA’s Orion spacecraft, launching into space on the agency’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket on April 1. They will then control Orion to fly around the Moon and return to Earth for 10 days.

Artemis 2 is the first manned mission in NASA’s Artemis program, which aims to establish a permanent human presence on the Moon. In addition, this is also the first human mission to the Moon since the Apollo 17 mission in 1972.

The Artemis 2 crew has been quarantined since March 20, when the SLS rocket was transported from KSC’s Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) to the launch pad of Launch Complex 39B. At KSC, they will continue to quarantine throughout the remainder of the launch timeframe.

This is the second time SLS has been launched. In the first time, which took place earlier this year, NASA had to return the rocket to VAB due to a problem detected while conducting important tests.

Artemis 2 was designed as a stepping stone to the Artemis program, allowing the Orion’s life support system to be tested with astronauts in space for the first time. The crew will not land but circle the far side of the Moon in a free return orbit. This orbit helps them easily return to Earth without having to fire the ship’s engine many times.

If no major problems arise during Artemis 2, NASA will test the Orion and lunar landers on the Artemis 3 mission in Earth orbit next year. The agency aims to carry out the program’s first lunar landing in 2028 with the Artemis 4 mission. By the 2030s, NASA expects to begin developing settlements, autonomous robots and cargo landing stations, aiming to establish a sustainable presence on the lunar surface.