{"id":375623,"date":"2026-04-05T02:03:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-05T02:03:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/375623\/"},"modified":"2026-04-05T02:03:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-05T02:03:09","slug":"from-bird-leg-syndrome-to-solar-storms-roberta-bondar-breaks-down-artemis-ii-mission-national","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/375623\/","title":{"rendered":"From \u2018bird leg syndrome\u2019 to solar storms: Roberta Bondar breaks down Artemis II mission – National"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the four Artemis II<\/a> astronauts prepare for their historic flyby of the moon on Monday, Roberta Bondar, Canada\u2019s first female astronaut<\/a>, says this mission signals a leap in developments for future space travel.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Speaking with Global News, Bondar said the mission will push humans farther into deep space than they have travelled in decades, exposing the crew to conditions not experienced since the Apollo era.<\/p>\n

The mission, known as Artemis II, will send four astronauts around the moon before returning to Earth on April 10, 2026.<\/p>\n

The crew, made up of three Americans and one Canadian, will travel a total of more than 400,000 kilometres from Earth \u2014 farther than any human has travelled before \u2014 and then loop behind the moon and return home.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople liken this to Apollo 8, but they were much closer,\u201d she said. \u201cThis flyby will be about 4,000 miles out (from the moon), so they\u2019ll be exposed to the background radiation of space and subjected to any solar wind or solar storms.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Bondar said that distance will give the astronauts a rare vantage point, both scientifically and visually.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThey are really out there in deep space, where we haven\u2019t been before,\u201d she said. \u201cThey are going to be looking at the dark moon differently and take pictures of the sun in ways we have not been able to see because human beings have not been there.\u201d<\/p>\n

The crew has recently passed a new milestone of being closer to the moon than to Earth in their deep space journey.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Earth is quite small and the moon is definitely getting bigger,\u201d pilot Victor Glover said from space.<\/p>\n

Beyond the visuals, the mission is also a test of how the human body responds to space flight over longer distances.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey look pretty good actually,\u201d Bondar said of the crew. \u201cThey do have these smartwatches on now that will be looking at aspects of their physiology, their sleep cycle and some of the stresses they will face.\u201d<\/p>\n

That data will help researchers better understand how to prepare astronauts for future missions deeper into space.<\/p>\n

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Bondar also pointed to well-documented physical changes astronauts experience in orbit, including what is often referred to as \u201cbird leg syndrome.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cYour body gets rid of about two litres of blood volume through the kidneys,\u201d she said. \u201cIn space, you don\u2019t need as much, whereas on Earth you need about five litres because gravity pulls blood into your legs.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said Artemis II is part of a broader effort to refine how humans and technology work together in space.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re trying to look at ways of making these kinds of missions not just smarter, but safer.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThese early flights are all about trying to understand the technology,\u201d she added. \u201cThese are really early days and about learning to make things smarter for the next flight, and the next flight.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Artemis II crew is expected to splash down in the Pacific Ocean following its lunar flyby, marking a key milestone in NASA\u2019s plan to return humans to the moon and eventually travel to Mars.<\/p>\n

Live updates can be followed on NASA\u2019s official website, including a stream of the Orion\u2019s journey through space.<\/p>\n

\u2013 With files from The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

\n\t\t&copy 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the four Artemis II astronauts prepare for their historic flyby of the moon on Monday, Roberta Bondar,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":375624,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[111460,245,180177,180178,180179,85,46,141,145,3963,917,2711],"class_list":{"0":"post-375623","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-artemis-ii","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-canada-astronauts","11":"tag-female-astronaut","12":"tag-historic-moon-flyby","13":"tag-il","14":"tag-israel","15":"tag-science","16":"tag-space","17":"tag-trending","18":"tag-u-s-news","19":"tag-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375623","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=375623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375623\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/375624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}