Four astronauts launched aboard a Nasa rocket on Wednesday for a journey around the Moon, marking the first crewed lunar flyby in more than 50 years.
The rocket lifted off from Florida’s Kennedy Space Centre at approximately 18:35 local time (22:35 GMT), carrying three Americans and one Canadian on the Artemis II mission.
The crew includes Americans Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch, along with Canadian Jeremy Hansen. They wore bright orange suits with blue trim for the launch.
“We have a beautiful moonrise. We’re headed right at it,” said Wiseman, the mission commander.
US President Donald Trump praised “our brave astronauts” at the start of his televised address on the war against Iran, calling the launch “quite something”.
Approximately 400 000 people gathered along Florida’s Space Coast to witness the launch, according to local authorities.
The astronauts are currently orbiting Earth, conducting checks on the spacecraft which has never carried humans before. They successfully completed proximity operations demonstrations, testing how their Orion capsule can move relative to another spacecraft.
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“Great flying with you, Houston. Nice vehicle,” said pilot Glover.
Teams identified several technical issues, including “a controller issue with the toilet when they spun it up”, said Amit Kshatriya, Nasa’s associate administrator, during a post-launch briefing.
Nasa head Jared Isaacman noted a temporary communication problem with the spacecraft that has since been resolved. The astronauts were “safe, they’re secure, and they’re in great spirits”, he said.
If all proceeds as planned, the Artemis 2 team is expected to begin its three-day journey towards the Moon on Thursday, looping around it to capture images and make observations. The voyage should last approximately 10 days in total.
The mission aims to prepare for a Moon landing in 2028 and marks several historic achievements. It will send the first person of colour, the first woman and the first non-American on a lunar mission. The astronauts are expected to venture farther from Earth than any human before.
This is also the first crewed flight of Nasa’s new lunar rocket, the Space Launch System. The SLS is designed to allow the United States to repeatedly return to the Moon, with the goal of establishing a permanent base for further exploration.
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The launch was originally scheduled for February but faced repeated setbacks that required the rocket to be returned to its hangar for investigation and repairs.
“Nasa really needs this win right now,” Casey Dreier, chief of space policy at The Planetary Society, told AFP, noting the US space agency’s recent budget turmoil and workforce departures.
The American lunar programme has been portrayed as competing with China, which aims to land humans on the Moon by 2030.
During the post-launch briefing, Isaacman said competition was “a great way to mobilise the resources of a nation”.
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The Artemis programme has faced pressure from Trump, who has pushed for boots to hit the lunar surface before his second term ends in early 2029. However, the projected 2028 landing date has raised questions among experts, partly because Washington is relying on private sector technology.
Earlier on Wednesday, Trump posted on Truth Social that the US is “winning” economically, militarily “and now, beyond the stars”.
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