The Artemis II space mission is set to launch Wednesday afternoon, with four astronauts expected to go deeper into space than humans have ever ventured before.
Leading the journey will be mission commander Reid Wiseman, a Cockeysville native and a graduate of Dulaney High School and Johns Hopkins University.
When and where will the Artemis II launch
The Orion spacecraft, which will carry the crew and their cargo, sits atop NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket.
The rocket will launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida at 6:24 p.m. Eastern Time on Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (And no, this is not an April Fool’s Day prank.)
How to watch the launch
Launch coverage began at 12:50 p.m., though the actual launch time is targeted for 6:24 p.m.
Folks can watch the historic launch as it will be broadcast live on NASA.gov, NASA+, NASA’s YouTube channel, Amazon Prime Video, and major news networks.
In the meantime, NASA officials are providing launch updates and background about the mission.
Who are Reid Wiseman and the other Artemis II astronauts?
Reid Wiseman grew up in Cockeysville, where he discovered his love for flight and space.
Wiseman graduated from Dulaney High School and went on to earn his bachelor’s degree in computer and systems engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. He would later earn his master’s degree in systems engineering from Johns Hopkins University.
One of Wiseman’s former Hopkins professors, Christian Utara, told Baltimore Fishbowl that Wiseman stood out for his academic commitment and curiosity.
“He was very dedicated to his studies, and he was motivated to learn as much as he possibly could from the program, which is one of the things that motivates me as an instructor: to see a student that is interested in learning the material, not just getting a grade and getting a degree,” Utara said.
Dulaney High School science teacher Steve Shaw did not have the opportunity to teach Wiseman, but he has been communicating with the astronaut ever since Wiseman was preparing to spend six months aboard the International Space Station in 2014.
Shaw said Wiseman is “the right guy for this mission.”
“He’s got a wonderment about space,” Shaw said. “He can be very serious about the ramifications of what’s going on, yet he’s got the enjoyment and the inquisitiveness of a young kid.”
The Artemis II mission will make history in many ways.
In addition to Wiseman, the Artemis II crew also includes pilot Victor Glover and mission specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen. NASA astronauts Glover and Koch and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Hansen will be the first Black person, the first woman, and the first non-American, respectively, to travel beyond low Earth orbit.
The Apollo `3 mission in 1970 traveled 158 miles beyond the Moon. The Artemis II crew is expected to travel nearly 30 times that distance past the lunar suface — about 4,700 miles beyond the far side of the Moon.
This mission will also be the first time that a crewed mission has gone to the moon in 54 years since the Apollo 17 mission in 1972 — though the Artemis II astronauts won’t land on the lunar surface.
However, information gathered during Artemis II will inform future flights to the Moon and, eventually, Mars.
NASA’s next mission, Artemis III, is scheduled to launch in 2027. It will carry four astronauts to the Moon, two of which will spend about a week on the lunar surface near the Moon’s South Pole. There, they will look for ice craters in the hopes of using that water to fuel journeys to Mars in the future.
