The Artemis II crew includes the first Black men, women and Canadians on a moon mission.
Millions of eyes will be trained in the skies above Florida to closely watch the Artemis II crew as they make their historic, powerful journey to the moon.
The crew scheduled to launch at 6:24 p.m. on Wednesday, April 1, is in many ways more reflective of modern international relations and a 250-year-old America than the stoic-minded astronauts who vaulted to the moon in the 1960s and 1970s.
The Artemis II crew includes the first black man, first woman, and first Canadian to fly on a moon mission.
“It was a tremendous amount of work, but what’s great about this crew is how much effort we were willing to put into it,” mission commander Reed Wiseman said on a recent NASA podcast. Houston has a podcastrecorded in October 2025.
Artemis II has a diverse and talented crew on board
The trip will be the first time a black man and woman will go beyond low Earth orbit and into deep space, heading to the moon.
Mission pilot Victor J. Glover is a 49-year-old African American Navy captain with a long history of spaceflight as a pilot on the International Space Station and Crew 1 Dragon spacecraft. He is married and has four children.
Christina Koch, 47, a crew specialist and electrical engineer from North Carolina, became an astronaut in 2013 and spent 328 days aboard the space station on her previous mission. She participated in the first all-female spacewalk in October 2019. He also explored Antarctica on a year-long research mission.
Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen, an Ontario farm boy turned fighter pilot, will become the country’s first man to fly to the moon. The 50-year-old husband and father of three is also the first non-American to fly to the moon.
Commander: “That’s not our problem.”
The four-person crew is led by Captain Reid Wiseman, a 50-year-old former test pilot from Baltimore who served as NASA’s chief astronaut and spent 165 days aboard the space station in 2014. He is a widow who lost his wife to cancer in 2020.
The crew has been working closely together since 2023, chatting at press conferences and wearing black shades and flight suits for promotional photo shoots.
“We understand why so many people pay attention to our name and why our pictures are displayed throughout the center,” Glover said on the show. Houston has a podcast program.
“…It’s not about us. We try very hard to make sure it’s not about us. It’s about landing on the moon and ultimately landing on Mars, and it’s about what’s next.”
JD Gallop is a criminal justice/breaking news reporter for FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Gallop at 321-917-4641, jgallop@floridatoday.com or X (formerly Twitter: @JDGallop).
