LAUNCH OF ARTEMIS II MISSION AROUND THE MOON, Apr 1, 2026, KSC, 6:24 pm ET

NASA is planning to launch the four-person Artemis II crew around the Moon on April 1, 2026 at 6:24 pm ET (the opening of a two-hour launch window that day).

The launch can take place any day through April 6 if weather or technical problems intervene. In the event of a last minute scrub on any of those days, it will take either 24 of 48 hours to recyle, depending on the cause. If the problem is weather, for example, they can try again in 24 hours, but if it’s technical, it may take longer.

A list of public briefings (times subject to change) and a detailed countdown timeline are available on NASA’s website. Several are on Sunday,  Monday and Tuesday. On Wednesday, launch day, coverage of tanking operations begins at 7:45 am ET and of launch at 12:50 pm ET. About 2.5 hours after launch, a post-launch briefing is planned.

NASA’s Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch and Canadian Space Agency’s Jeremy Hansen will be the first astronauts to fly to lunar distance since the last Apollo crew, Apollo 17, in December 1972.  They will not orbit the Moon, much less land, on this test flight, but fly around the Moon on a “free-return” trajectory that will bring them back to Earth even if their propulsion system doesn’t perform as expected.