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Over 3 million people to fly to the moon on NASA’s Artemis I
Artemis I is an uncrewed long-duration 2.1-million-kilometre trip to the moon, past the moon and then back again.
Photo: NASA
Over 3 million people across the planet Earth have added their names to fly around the moon aboard Artemis I.
Launch dates
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) continues to target a launch date no earlier than 14 November, a 69-minute launch window that opens at 12:07am Eastern Standard Time (EST).
NASA said inspections and analysis over the previous week have confirmed minimal work is required to prepare the rocket and spacecraft to roll out to Launch Pad 39B at Kennedy Space Center in Florida following the roll-back due to Hurricane Ian.
“Teams will perform standard maintenance to repair minor damage to the foam and cork on the thermal protection system and recharge or replace batteries on the rocket, several secondary payloads, and the flight termination system. The agency plans to roll the rocket back to the launch pad as early as Friday, 4 November.”
ALSO READ: WATCH: Artemis I Moon Rocket to roll out to launch pad
Technical issues in late August and September, as well as fears of a hurricane, prompted NASA officials to scrub a couple of launches and cancel other planned launch dates.
NASA has requested back-up launch opportunities for Wednesday, 16 November at 1:04am and Saturday, 19 November at 1:45am, which are both two-hour launch windows.
A launch on 14 November would result in a mission duration of about 25-and-a-half days with a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean on Friday, 9 December.
Journey to the moon
Artemis I is an uncrewed long-duration 2.1-million-kilometre trip to the moon, past the moon and then back again.
It will test NASA’s new heavy-lift rocket, the Space Launch System (SLS), the biggest rocket ever built as well as proving-out the Orion spacecraft for crewed flights to the moon for an eventual voyage to Mars.
Astronauts
NASA has been collecting names of people to fly around the moon aboard Artemis I.
“We’ve finished collecting names for Artemis I and are working on loading them onto the Orion spacecraft! If you’ve submitted your name, it is included on a flash drive that will fly aboard Orion on Artemis I.”
A small piece of moon rock from the Apollo 11 mission will also join the ride, along with a patch and a bolt from Neil Armstrong’s iconic mission, to help connect the Apollo legacy to the Artemis programme.
Moon walks
Twelve men walked on the moon between 1969 and 1972 and one of the goals of Artemis is to put the first woman and person of colour on the lunar surface.
The name Artemis was chosen to echo that of the Apollo programme.
Artemis, in Greek mythology, was the twin sister of Apollo and a goddess associated with the moon.
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