By Charlotte Causit with Chris Lefkow in Washington, AFP
NASA gave the four Artemis astronauts circling Earth the green light on Thursday (US time) to head for the Moon and carry out the first crewed lunar flyby in more than 50 years.
NASA flight director Jeff Radigan told the astronauts the mission management team had approved firing up the engine of their Orion capsule to send the spacecraft on a trajectory towards the Moon.
The 5min and 49sec burn is scheduled to take place at 7:49 pm Eastern Time (2349 GMT) and send the astronauts out of Earth orbit to begin the three-day voyage toward the Moon, the first since 1972.
“Flight controllers will closely monitor engine performance, guidance, and navigation data throughout the maneuver to ensure Orion remains precisely aligned for the outbound journey,” NASA said.
The enormous orange-and-white Space Launch System (SLS) rocket blasted off flawlessly from Kennedy Space Centre in Florida on Wednesday for the long-anticipated journey around the Moon.
The astronauts, Americans Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch and Canadian Jeremy Hansen, spent their first hours in space performing checks and troubleshooting minor problems on their Orion capsule, including a communications issue and a malfunctioning toilet.
Before getting a few hours of sleep, they ignited the spacecraft’s main engine to place it in a high Earth orbit, the US space agency said.
“Artemis II astronauts are doing great,” NASA chief Jared Isaacman said in a post on X. “The Orion spacecraft is performing well in an impressive elliptical orbit.”
NASA’s mission management team will meet later today to perform an assessment of the spacecraft’s performance and decide whether to give the go-ahead for the astronauts to begin their three-day voyage toward the Moon.
The “go/no go” decision for the translunar injection burn (TLI) is scheduled for 7:07 pm Eastern Time (12.07pm NZ time).
Assuming everything checks out, the TLI that will send the astronauts on their way is scheduled for 25 minutes later.
Orion is to loop around the Moon as part of the 10-day Artemis 2 mission aimed at paving the way for a Moon landing in 2028.
NASA’s Artemis II Space Launch System rocket carrying the Orion spacecraft lifts off from Launch Complex 39B at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on April 1, 2026.
Photo: NurPhoto via AFP / Mauricio Paiz
‘Brave astronauts’
US President Donald Trump praised “our brave astronauts” at the top of his televised address on Wednesday evening on the war against Iran, calling the launch “quite something”.
Before their rest period, the astronauts performed various checks to ensure the reliability and safety of a spacecraft that has never carried humans before.
NASA said they carried out “proximity operations,” which tested how the Orion capsule can move relative to another spacecraft, and manoeuvres that mimic what would be needed to dock with a lunar lander.
Among the issues they identified was a “controller issue with the toilet when they spun it up”, said Amit Kshatriya, NASA’s associate administrator.
NASA head Jared Isaacman said a communications problem had been resolved and the astronauts were “in great spirits”.
“NASA is back in the business of sending people to the Moon,” he said.
The mission marks a series of historic accomplishments: sending the first person of colour, the first woman and the first non-American on a lunar mission.
(L/R) Canadian Space Agency (CSA) astronaut Jeremy Hansen, Artemis II mission specialist, NASA astronauts Victor Glover, Artemis II pilot, Reid Wiseman, Artemis II commander, and Christina Koch, Artemis II mission specialist.
Photo: JIM WATSON / AFP
If all proceeds smoothly, the astronauts will set a record by venturing farther from Earth than any human before.
It is also the inaugural crewed flight of SLS, NASA’s new lunar rocket.
SLS is designed to allow the United States to repeatedly return to the Moon with the goal of establishing a permanent base that will offer a platform for further exploration.
It was meant to take off as early as February after years of delays and massive cost overruns.
But repeated setbacks stalled it and even necessitated rolling the rocket back to its hangar for repairs.
Compete with China
The current era of American lunar investment has frequently been portrayed as an effort to compete with China, which aims to land humans on the Moon by 2030.
During a post-launch briefing, Isaacman said competition was “a great way to mobilize the resources of a nation.”
“Competition can be a good thing,” he said. “And we certainly have competition now.”
The Artemis programme has come under pressure from Trump, who has pushed its pace with the hope that boots will hit the lunar surface before his second term ends in early 2029.
But the projected date of 2028 for a landing has raised eyebrows among some experts, in part because Washington is relying heavily on the private sector’s technological headway.
-AFP