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NASA on Monday named the first woman and first African American assigned as astronauts to a lunar mission, introducing them as part of the four-member team chosen to fly next year in what would be the first manned trip around the moon in more than 50 years. years. Christina Koch, an engineer who already holds the record for the longest continuous spaceflight by a woman, has been named the mission specialist, along with US Navy aviator Victor Glover, who has been selected as Artemis.II pilot. (READ ALSO: What is NASA's Artemis 1 mission?) Glover, who was part of the second crewed flight of a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, would become the first black astronaut sent on a lunar mission.
Rounding out the four-member crew are Jeremy Hansen, the first Canadian chosen to fly to the moon, as mission specialist, and Reid Wiseman, an International Space Station veteran, named commander of the Artemis II mission.
The Artemis II quartet was unveiled during a televised press conference in Houston at the Johnson Space Center, NASA's mission control base.
Artemis II will mark the first crewed flight, but not the first moon landing, of a successor program to Apollo aimed at returning astronauts to the moon's surface later this decade and establishing a sustainable outpost there, creating a springboard. for future human exploration. from Mars .
