The aspiration of returning American astronauts to the moon has been in limbo for decades, as plans have been embraced and rejected from one presidential administration to the next. In 2026, however, that goal will come into sharper focus.
NASA’s Artemis program — an effort announced in 2017 to not only return astronauts to the moon but eventually establish a permanent lunar base — is finally on the verge of launching its first crewed flight.
The landmark mission, dubbed Artemis II, is on track to lift off as soon as February. The highly anticipated endeavor will mark the first time astronauts have ventured beyond the bounds of near-Earth orbit since the final Apollo mission in 1972.
Artemis II will send a group of four astronauts — NASA’s Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch as well as the Canadian Space Agency’s Jeremy Hansen — on a trip around the moon.
But returning to deep space after a more than five-decade hiatus is not without its challenges. Although NASA is leaning heavily on the learnings from Apollo, the Artemis missions will pursue far more complex objectives using some novel technologies.
As is the case with any mission to space, uncertainties are inevitable. And nothing is guaranteed.
“The most important thing we are working on — refining and honing — is: How do we handle the unknown?” Hansen said during a September news conference.
The crew will not be carrying out an exact repeat of any of the Apollo flights. Instead, Artemis II aims to test and verify the various systems and components of the crew’s spacecraft, called Orion. It will circumnavigate the moon on a slingshot trajectory designed to bring the astronauts back toward Earth — even if something goes wrong and the capsule’s propulsion system fails.
Unlike the Apollo missions that entered low-lunar orbit, Artemis II will use a flight path better suited to Orion’s design and mass. The spacecraft will make a large, sweeping loop around the moon, rather than flying tight circles closer to the surface.
And while the crew members will not land on the moon, their trajectory will offer a unique view of our closest celestial neighbor.
“We could see parts of the moon that never have had human eyes laid upon them before,” Koch said during a September news conference. “And we have been learning how to turn those observations into tangible science.”
The mission will also take flight against a backdrop of geopolitical drama, as hawkish lawmakers have made clear that they view lunar exploration as a political imperative in light of China’s rapidly advancing space program. Artemis II is set to serve as a pathfinder mission, paving the way for astronauts to land at the moon’s south pole region for the first time in history later this decade.
As with any mission that ventures beyond near-Earth orbit, portions of the journey will be agonizingly isolating.
“For the 45 minutes we are closest to the lunar surface, we are also going to be out of contact — we’re going to have an LOS, in NASA terms, a loss of signal,” Glover said in September. “I would love it if the entire world — those 8 billion people … could come together and just be hoping and praying for us to get that acquisition of signal.”
But, Glover emphasized, the point of returning astronauts to the moon is to better understand the vehicles and systems it takes to support human life and navigate such a harsh environment.
The better the limits and capabilities are understood, the closer NASA will be to realizing its goal of establishing a permanent lunar settlement where astronauts can work and train as they prepare to tackle even more complex missions — perhaps to Mars.
Even missteps, Glover said, “would be a reminder, a data point we all share that we can do challenging and very big and very important things when we work together.”
When the Artemis II mission takes flight, the crew will be strapped aboard the Orion capsule as it journeys to space atop NASA’s gargantuan Space Launch System rocket. The mission could take off from the federal agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida as soon as February 6, according to the agency.
After maneuvering to the correct trajectory, Orion will detach from the SLS rocket’s upper engine and begin free flying. Over the course of several days, Orion will traverse the 238,900-mile (385,400-kilometer) void between Earth and the moon.
At such distances, the astronauts will face a far harsher radiation environment than do the vast majority of space travelers.
Astronauts who spend time on the International Space Station, which orbits just a couple hundred miles above Earth, are still “within the protective envelope that helps shield us from some of that space weather” that showers much of our solar system with radiation, noted Jacob Bleacher, the chief exploration scientist within NASA’s Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate, in September.
The impact such an environment has on the human body remains a bit of a mystery, Bleacher added.
“We have learned much from the astronauts who traveled to the moon previously. But although we studied the moon, we studied our systems — we didn’t necessarily study ourselves the way that we can today,” he said.
“The science of Artemis is the science of us. We will be collecting some of the baseline data here on how humans operate when they get away from the Earth.”
The Artemis II astronauts will also be flying aboard a rocket and spacecraft system that are markedly different from their Apollo predecessors.
While Orion and the SLS rocket were put through their paces during the Artemis I mission, which lapped the moon during an uncrewed test flight in 2022, NASA has never tested the spacecraft’s systems, including life support infrastructure, in space.
Orion’s heat shield — which is a special coating applied to the bottom of the spacecraft that protects the astronauts from extreme heat as the spacecraft hurtles back toward Earth — will also be put to the ultimate test.
The heat shield showed abnormal wear and tear during the Artemis I test. Chunks of the ablative material became dislodged as the capsule plunged back into Earth’s thick inner atmosphere, a process that can heat the capsule’s exterior to more than 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit (2,760 degrees Celsius).
The damage was not catastrophic and the heat shield still adequately protected the capsule, but NASA spent more than a year working to address the issue. And the heat shield’s performance has steeped Orion in controversy and criticism.
“We feel very confident that we are going to be able to bring our crew back safely for Artemis II,” said Lakiesha Hawkins, NASA’s acting deputy associate administrator for the Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate.
The Artemis II astronauts will be far from passive passengers during their 10-day trek.
On board with the four crew members will be a slew of tools that can be used to evaluate the their cognition, sleep, stress, immune responses and cardiovascular health.
Small chips with human organ tissue will also be tucked on board and collect data on how the astronauts’ bodies may respond to the deep-space environment.
Finally, a suite of lunar science initiatives that can be utilized even without landing on the moon’s surface will aim to enhance NASA’s understanding of the rocky, treacherous terrain.
“As Orion passes on the far side of the Moon — the side that always faces away from Earth — the crew will analyze and photograph geologic features on the surface, such as impact craters and ancient lava flows, relying on their extensive geology training in the classroom and in Moon-like places on Earth,” the space agency said in a statement. “This type of information reveals the geologic history of an area and will be critical to collect when Artemis III astronauts explore the surface.”
Sign up for CNN’s Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more.