Meet the astronauts about to make history on flight around the moon
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NASA's Artemis II astronauts — three space station veterans and a Canadian rookie — stand out even in an astronaut corps full of super achievers.
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Space NASA's Artemis II astronauts bring wealth of experience to moon mission. Meet the crew about to make history. By William Harwood William Harwood CBS News Space Consultant Bill Harwood has been covering the U.S. space program full-time since 1984, first as Cape Canaveral bureau chief for United Press International and now as a consultant for CBS News. Read Full Bio William Harwood March 30, 2026 / 9:29 AM EDT / CBS News Add CBS News on Google The four Artemis II astronauts scheduled to launch on a trip around the moon this week stand out even in a NASA astronaut corps full of super achievers. They include three space station veterans and a Canadian rookie — a commander who is a single parent to two children; an experienced Navy pilot; a veteran spacewalker who will become the first woman to fly to the moon; and the first Canadian who will fly beyond low-Earth orbit. "It's extraordinary as a human being to go to the far side of the moon and look back and see the Earth from the perspective of the moon," Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen said in an interview with CBS News. "Whatever that looks like, and whatever that feels like, that is an extraordinary opportunity that I'm very grateful for." Said astronaut Christina Koch: "How do we feel as the people that can call the moon destination, not just something we're looking at? It is our strong hope that this mission is the start of an era where everyone, every person on Earth, can look at the moon and think of it as also a destination." Koch, Hansen, pilot Victor Glover and commander Reid Wiseman were selected with great fanfare in April 2023. They have spent the past three years training for a relatively short nine-day mission to loop around the moon, a trailblazing flight that sets the stage for planned moon landings in 2028 and the construction of a lunar base near the moon's south pole. The crew brings a wealth of experience to NASA's most challenging mission in decades — scheduled for liftoff Wednesday evening. ...
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