{"id":362172,"date":"2026-03-28T04:28:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T04:28:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/362172\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T04:28:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T04:28:08","slug":"artemis-ii-crew-arrives-at-launch-site-shares-moon-mascot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/362172\/","title":{"rendered":"Artemis II Crew Arrives at Launch Site, Shares Moon Mascot"},"content":{"rendered":"

The four astronauts set to fly around the Moon on NASA\u2019s Artemis II test flight arrived<\/a> at the agency\u2019s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, Friday, March 27. NASA continues to target as soon as Wednesday, April 1, for launch within a two-hour window that opens at 6:24 p.m. EDT.<\/p>\n

During remarks at Kennedy\u2019s Launch and Landing Facility, Artemis II commander Reid Wiseman announced \u201cRise,\u201d designed by Lucas Ye of Mountain View, California, as the zero gravity indicator that will fly with the crew around the Moon. \u201cRise\u201d was inspired by the iconic Earthrise moment from the Apollo 8 mission. A zero gravity indicator is a small plush item that typically rides with a crew to visually indicate when they are in space.<\/p>\n

The design was selected from more than 2,600 submissions from over 50 countries, including K-12 students, that were part of a Moon Mascot contest. During the selection process, the crew narrowed a list of 25 finalists<\/a> to five top designs, including:<\/p>\n

\u201cBig Steps of Little Octopus,\u201d Anzhelika Iudakova, Finland<\/p>\n

\u201cCorey the Explorer,\u201d Daniela Colina, Peru<\/p>\n

\u201cCreation Mythos,\u201d Johanna Beck, McPherson, Kansas<\/p>\n

\u201cLepus the Moon Rabbit,\u201d Oakville Trafalgar School, Canada<\/p>\n

\u201cRise,\u201d Lucas Ye, Mountain View, California<\/p>\n

While work continues to prepare the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket, Orion spacecraft, and ground systems for launch, the crew \u2013 NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jeremy Hansen \u2014 will review their launch day timeline and mission activities, participate in medical checkouts, and spend time with family.<\/p>\n

View an updated countdown<\/a> for launch and details<\/a> about pre-launch and mission events.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

March 27, 2026 4:10PM<\/p>\n

More from Missions<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The four astronauts set to fly around the Moon on NASA\u2019s Artemis II test flight arrived at the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":362173,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[6353,6552,111197,20920,111198,10094,85,46,9142,141,145,9143,111199],"class_list":["post-362172","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-artemis","tag-artemis-2","tag-christina-h-koch","tag-exploration-ground-systems","tag-g-reid-wiseman","tag-humans-in-space","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-orion-multi-purpose-crew-vehicle","tag-science","tag-space","tag-space-launch-system-sls","tag-victor-j-glover"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362172","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=362172"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362172\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/362173"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362172"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362172"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362172"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}