Overview
- NASA's Artemis II lifted off Wednesday evening at 6:35 p.m. ET from Kennedy Space Center, placing Orion and four astronauts into orbit after the spacecraft deployed its solar arrays.
- The crew is spending about 24 hours in a high Earth orbit to test life support, communications, maneuvering and a docking demonstration using the rocket’s upper stage before a go or no‑go for the trans‑lunar injection burn.
- Launch teams resolved late‑countdown issues, including verifying flight‑termination system hardware, clearing a false high temperature reading on the launch abort system and addressing a brief ground communications glitch that did not affect the vehicle.
- If cleared for the burn, Orion will follow a free‑return path that swings 4,000 to 8,000 kilometers from the Moon, likely breaks the Apollo‑era distance record and then returns for a planned April 10 splashdown in the Pacific off San Diego.
- As a test flight, Artemis II aims to prove the Space Launch System and Orion for future landings while collecting data on radiation, microgravity and crew health, and it uses a revised reentry profile informed by heat‑shield wear seen on the uncrewed Artemis I mission.