Artemis II launches to the Moon

NASA’s Artemis II mission launched into space yesterday from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, kicking off the human race’s first trip to the Moon in over five decades.

A quick refresher: Artemis II is sending four astronauts—including the first woman to visit lunar orbit—on a ~10-day journey around the far side of the Moon and back.

• The mission is designed to test the Orion spacecraft’s life-support systems, communications, and manual controls with humans onboard.
• If all goes according to plan, the crew of three Americans and one Canadian will travel 250,000+ miles from Earth, further than any human has gone before. (And you thought your commute was bad.)

Shoot for the Moon

Assuming Artemis II sticks the landing, NASA’s roadmap shifts from orbiting the Moon to establishing a long-term human presence on the lunar surface.

• The Artemis III mission, scheduled for 2027, will focus on low-Earth orbit tests featuring one or both lunar landers built by SpaceX and Blue Origin.
• Humans will return to the lunar surface in Artemis IV, with NASA aiming to land astronauts near the Moon’s south pole—believed to contain water ice and other key resources—around 2028.

The space race is on. The US is racing to establish a sustained presence on the Moon before China, which is targeting its own crewed lunar landing around 2030. And the stakes are high: first crack at building lunar infrastructure like bases, space stations, and supply chains that’ll likely define the next era of space exploration.