STORY: :: The Artemis II crew gets set for the first crewed moon mission in half a century

:: Cape Canaveral, Florida / April 1, 2026

NASA mission managers on Monday polled "go" to launch the Artemis II mission's towering, 322-foot (98 m) Space Launch System rocket topped with the astronauts' Orion crew capsule as early as 6:24 p.m. EDT (2224 GMT) on Wednesday.

It will launch from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida just one pad away from where the last moon-bound astronauts of the U.S. Apollo program lifted off more than half a century ago.

The Artemis II crew awoke about nine hours before launch for breakfast, a weather briefing and pre-mission preparations ahead of their 2 p.m. drive to the launchpad.