Following the historic success of the Artemis II mission, NASA is preparing for the next step toward returning astronauts to the Moon. The agency has announced the four astronauts selected for the upcoming Artemis III mission. The crew will include three NASA astronauts – Andre Douglas, Frank Rubio, and Randy Bresnik. The fourth crew member will be ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano of Italy, who will serve as the mission pilot.
“This mission is intended to take informed risks in order to make future missions safer,” said Jeremy Parsons, NASA’s acting deputy associate administrator. In many ways, the Artemis III crew reflects that philosophy, as the agency has assembled a team of highly experienced spaceflight veterans.
Randy Bresnik, the mission commander, represents NASA’s more experienced generation of astronauts. He joined the agency in 2004 and is the only member of the crew to have flown aboard the Space Shuttle before the program concluded in 2011. Frank Rubio, meanwhile, holds the record for the longest single spaceflight by a NASA astronaut, having spent 371 days aboard the International Space Station. Andre Douglas was previously selected as a backup crew member for Artemis II, while Luca Parmitano has accumulated a total of 367 days in space over the course of his missions. The crew will not travel to the Moon or attempt a lunar landing. Instead, they will conduct a series of complex tests in Earth orbit, including practicing the docking of their Orion spacecraft with two lunar landing vehicles.
“As a crew, we are certainly honored to be the team that will carry out the Artemis III mission in space,” mission commander Randy Bresnik said. Andre Douglas added, “My thoughts are moving at the speed of light right now. But my heart is filled with warmth. It is overflowing.”
NASA has a relatively tight schedule for the mission, during which the agency will test several commercial lunar lander systems. NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman stated that the agency aims to begin wet dress rehearsals for the Space Launch System later this year. The assembly of the heavy-lift launch vehicle is planned for the summer. SpaceX, led by Elon Musk, and Blue Origin, founded by Jeff Bezos, are competing to provide lunar landing systems. A two-week demonstration is scheduled for 2027.
The most recent test flight of the New Glenn rocket was not without issues – an explosion significantly damaged Blue Origin’s only launch pad used for New Glenn missions. However, John Couluris, senior vice president for lunar permanence at the company, stated that a prototype lunar lander for Blue Origin will be ready for flight within the Artemis III timeframe in 2027, adding that the company has doubled efforts to restore its infrastructure.
NASA’s Artemis program aims to return astronauts to the lunar surface for the first time since the 1970s. A recent program update announced by Isaacman added a planned Earth-orbit mission to the roadmap, followed by the first crewed mission to the Moon’s south pole, currently scheduled for launch in 2028.
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Source: engadget
