The Space Race Is Back: NASA Prepares for Liftoff of Deep Space Exploration Crew
By Virginia Grace Mckinnon
Published on March 31, 2026.
NASA is set to launch four astronauts on a 10-day mission to deep space, Artemis II, which will test NASA's crew capabilities in deep space and gather information that could ultimately help astronauts to Mars. The mission will not land on the moon but use the gravitational pull of planets as a slingshot. This will mark the first trip around the Moon in over 50 years and the farthest humans have ever been from Earth's surface. This is the first crewed flight of the Artemis program and will also be the first flight aboard the Orion spacecraft launched atop NASA's Space Launch System rocket. The Artemis program was originally announced under President Donald Trump in 2017 and will eventually return humans to the moon for the first time since the Apollo era.
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