NASA’s Artemis II Is Moon-Bound: Day 3 Live Updates

April 4, 2026 10:49 a.m. PT

“We can see the moon out of the docking hatch right now. It’s a beautiful sight,” said Mission Specialist Christina Koch to Mission Control.

On Wednesday, a team of American and Canadian astronauts departed Earth in a 332-foot-tall rocket to do something that humanity hasn’t done in more than 50 years: travel to the moon. 

Mission control continued its tradition of using a song as a wake-up call for the Artemis II crew. This morning’s selection was Pink Pony Club by Chappell Roan.

This is the first image NASA has shared of the Orion and its Integrity capsule in space. A camera on the ship’s solar array wing took the photo.

As we all reveal the day-to-day moments that the Artemis II crew experiences, from liftoff and performing a translunar injection burn to fixing broken toilets and taking gorgeous images of Earth, we want to look back to what got the astronauts there: the rocket. It’s called the Space Launch System and is the world’s most powerful rocket.

Three years ago, CNET’s now former Principal Video Producer, Claire Reilly, got to go inside the factory where the super-heavy-lift giant rocket, the SLS, was built. Take a look at her video below:

Artemis II Commander Reid Wiseman took this absolutely gorgeous photo of the Earth. If you look closely you can see the lights from cities dot the globe. Look to the bottom right and you can see a sliver of sunlight peeking around our planet.

Orion is expected to loop around the moon on Monday, giving the crew a view of about 20% of the moon’s far side, which is not visible from Earth. The far side of the moon will be lit up by the sun when Orion passes, with the spacecraft aligned with the sun and moon for six hours.

During its daily press conference on Friday, NASA said it should be closing in on the moon at around 2:30 p.m. ET / 11:30 a.m. PT Monday.

Some of the lunar features they’ll see — for the first time with human eyes — are the Pierazzo crater, the Ohm crater and the full Orientale basin.

To prepare for the moment, the crew will continue practicing stowing equipment and setting up their cameras as quickly as possible in the cramped conditions of microgravity onboard the spacecraft. The astronauts will use 80-400mm and 14-24mm telephoto lenses to take images of the far side of the moon.

On the heels of NASA’s dramatic Artemis II launch and weeks after NASA announced its ambitious timeline for building a base on the moon in accordance with President Donald Trump’s executive order “Ensuring American Space Superiority” on Friday, the president turned around and proposed a $5.6 billion cut in the agency’s FY 2027 budget, Reuters reports.

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman delivered the news in a memo to employees (as reproduced by independent site NASA Watch), stating, “Achieving this will require disciplined focus on the highest-impact activities and rigorous stewardship of taxpayer resources.” 

Budget proposals are far from done deals — they’re just the jumping-off point for the politicking. But with $5.6 billion as the starting point, the eventual cuts could potentially still be pretty big.

Artemis V: No date specified yet, but NASA said in March that it will be planning at least one surface landing per year following Artemis IV. Beyond Artemis V, the space agency hopes to boost the cadence to every six months and eventually faster. (For comparison, there were two Apollo landings in 1969, three in 1971 and two in 1972.)

After that, plans get more vague, with a loose three-phase outline. First comes a shift “from bespoke, infrequent missions to a repeatable, modular approach.” Second, establishing a “semi-habitable infrastructure” and regular logistics. Third, delivering “heavier infrastructure needed for a continuous human foothold” and “a permanent lunar base.”

The astronauts on the Artemis II mission were slated to complete the mission’s first outbound trajectory correction (OTC) burn at 6:49 p.m. ET / 3:49 p.m. PT today, but NASA mission control has canceled it. Burns last around 8 seconds, and would adjust Orion’s velocity by approximately 0.7 feet per second. They’re used to refine the spacecraft’s trajectory and use Orion’s thrusters to stay on path.

However, NASA said on its Artemis II blog that the spacecraft is already on the right trajectory for the mission and did not require further adjustment.

“Flight controllers in mission control at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston elected to cancel the spacecraft’s first outbound trajectory correction burn, as the spacecraft’s trajectory is on the right flight path,” NASA wrote.

It was the first of three planned OTC burns for the mission.

Even though they are traveling to the moon in a tiny space capsule, the Artemis II astronauts are expected to get 30 minutes of exercise daily to help offset and minimize any muscle and bone loss that occurs while they’re without gravity. The challenge for the Artemis II crew is that Orion’s capsule, named Integrity, doesn’t have that much room.

“Operating much like a yo‑yo, the device provides resistance proportional to the force applied, allowing loads up to 400 pounds,” says a NASA blog post for the Artemis II mission.

As each astronaut exercises, NASA’s ground team monitors the spacecraft’s air systems.

You’re in the above photo, somewhere. While Friday was a quieter day than Wednesday’s launch day for the moon mission, we were rewarded with some glamour shots taken by the four astronauts.

Mission commander Reid Wiseman and others have been snapping some beautiful photos that remind me of the famed Big Blue Marble shot taken by NASA astronaut Harrison Schmitt back in 1972 on Apollo 17. You’ve likely seen that image in history and science textbooks ever since. Who knows? Maybe the next generations will be seeing these new NASA shots in their (probably electronic, because it’s 2026) future textbooks.

What did David Bowie say in his 1969 song, Space Oddity? “I’m stepping through the door, and I’m floating in a most peculiar way. And the stars look very different today.”

Y’know who else was watching the incredible take-off of the Artemis II launch vehicle from NASA’s control room? A plushie of a certain character named… Artemis.

Eagle-eyed Redditor 1108amh posted on the r/Sailor Moon subreddit that they’d spotted a white cat stuffed animal that looked just like Artemis, the guardian and advisor to Minako (Sailor Venus). 

“Looks like the astronauts have all the protection they need on their journey to the moon!” 1108amh wrote in their post. 

Someone commenting on the post noted that it likely belonged to the man in the light blue shirt sitting in front of the plush, as he’s wearing a dark blue lanyard with Sailor Moon characters on it (visible if you zoom in).

The plushie cameo is a neat little reference for all fans of the wholesome Sailor Moon anime. And for fans of the less-wholesome show It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, they had their own Artemis jokes too. 

Mission Control Center gave the crew a 1 p.m. EDT wake-up call in the form of the song In a Daydream by the Freddy Jones Band. When woken up, Orion was approximately 99,900 miles from Earth and 161,750 miles from the moon. Today’s activities for the astronauts include:

• An outbound trajectory correction burn — the first on this mission
• Orion spacecraft operations
• Lunar science prep work
• Crew health demonstrations

NASA just released two brilliant photographs captured by the Artemis II crew during their journey to orbit the moon.

In another beautiful picture, you can see Earth in all its glory.

At 7:49 p.m. EDT and just 150 miles above the Earth, the Artemis II crew performed a translunar injection burn with the European Service Module’s Orbital Maneuvering System engine. The burn lasted 5 minutes and 49 seconds and put the Artemis II mission on a trajectory that will take Orion around the moon and back to Earth. The solar array wings were positioned forward (away from the ESM) during the burn to avoid any damage.

NASA shared in a post that the four Artemis II astronauts started their day at 2:35 p.m. EDT. The Orion crew got a wake-up call in the form of Green Light, the 2008 John Legend song featuring Andre 3000.

So many people were lucky enough to see the Orion launch happen live, with videos making the rounds on social media. On Instagram, several people have posted clips of seeing the rocket launch from a plane in the sky, while others watched from viewing points all across Florida, including Disney’s Grand Floridian resort at Walt Disney World.

One particularly impressive video we saw was not so much about the location as about how it was filmed: Someone used a Nintendo 3DS camera and shared the video on Reddit, with the outdated handheld console managing to capture both video and sound rather well.

The Artemis II crew fixed the restroom on the Orion spacecraft on Thursday after reporting that the toilet fan was jammed less than 24 hours after liftoff. 

In a blog post, NASA shared that the Orion’s bathroom became operational again after the astronauts worked with directions from mission control in Houston on how to get into the fan and clear the area. They had reported a blinking fault light earlier, and “mission control teams successfully assessed the data and worked with the crew to troubleshoot and resolve the issue.”

Wondering how a toilet in space works? Nat Geo and NASA partnered to release behind-the-scenes videos of the Orion yesterday, including a look at the toilet. Astronauts have to use foot straps, handholds and hearing protection to use the toilet, which has a funnel to collect the waste and store it in containers.

Liftoff is done, so what’s next? The rocket’s four-person crew is scheduled to perform what’s called a translunar injection burn this evening. Basically, it’s a maneuver that gives the rocket an extra boost of power to help it successfully leave Earth’s orbit. Orion will burn its engines for approximately six minutes during the exercise, NASA said. After, the astronauts will officially begin the first four-day leg of their journey to the moon.

Astronauts: They’re just like us. Sometimes their email client gets glitchy. 

More than 36,000 miles from the planet’s surface, Commander Reid Wiseman’s Microsoft Outlook stopped working. He reported it as they were troubleshooting other software.

“I also see that I have two Microsoft Outlooks and neither one of those are working if you want to remote in,” Wiseman said.

About an hour later, after remotely taking a look like any good corporate tech support, Houston reported getting things working again: “For Outlook, we were able to get it open. It will show ‘offline,’ which is expected.”

On NASA’s live video stream of the Artemis II mission, the Orion capsule is seen against the background of Earth, with Australia visible.

If you want to talk about team efforts, look at spaceflight. Thousands of people make it possible for rockets to get to space, and with Artemis II, lift astronauts to the moon. That also extends to supporting the people gathered for launches.

Shortly before launch, AT&T reached out with details of how its FirstNet resources are being deployed to support the launch. FirstNet, the First Responder Network Authority, is the company’s emergency response and public safety program that is a private/public partnership between AT&T and the US government.

(Warning, acronyms ahead, but that’s no surprise when working with the space industry.)

For the Artemis II mission, AT&T coordinated with NASA Protective Services and its Emergency Management Operations to maintain reliable communications across Kennedy Space Center. It deployed a SatCOLT (Satellite Cell on Light Truck) and a CRD (Compact Rapid Deployable) to keep NASA’s public safety teams connected.

It also brought in an LCT (LEO Cell Trailer) for high-speed temporary cellular service and activated a Cell Booster Pro at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex for indoor phone and data service.

Lastly, NASA Kennedy’s Press Site had an NDR (Network Disaster Recovery) Connect and Care Trailer parked for attendees to charge their devices. Since the rocket lifted off spot on time, it may not have gotten much use, but space launches often get delayed for technical and weather reasons, so it was prepared for an extended launch window.

We’ve passed another key moment on the Artemis II mission: the deployment of the solar array wings.

The Orion spacecraft has launched, taking astronauts Victor Glover, Christina Koch, Jeremy Hansen and Reid Wiseman into space on the historic 10-day Artemis II mission for the moon.

Liftoff occurred at 6:35 p.m. ET / 3:35 p.m. ET.

NASA has retracted the crew access arm from the Artemis II rocket.

The Orion has been cleared to launch today, with the new launch time set for 6:35 p.m. ET / 3:33 p.m. PT (and 12 seconds).

The Artemis II liftoff countdown has now resumed after a planned hold and check at the 10-minute mark. The mission is officially in terminal count, and the automated ground launch sequencer hardware has begun running.

The Artemis II liftoff countdown is holding at 10 minutes. Once the countdown resumes, the mission will be in terminal countdown.

NASA’s Artemis II launch countdown clock officially passed 30 minutes to takeoff.

A livestream from the Orion spacecraft will begin at around 6:30 p.m. ET/3:30 p.m. PT, or once launch takes place. The stream will go live as Artemis II begins ascending into space, featuring “live views from Artemis II’s Orion spacecraft, without commentary, as it makes its journey around the moon.” The stream will end just before the Orion’s splashdown into the Pacific Ocean at the conclusion of the mission. 

If there’s a loss of signal or a lack of enough bandwidth during the mission, you’ll see a blue screen. If it’s nighttime, you’ll see what looks like a black screen.

To catch up on what’s been happening overnight or while you’re at work, you can read NASA’s live blog for all Artemis II mission updates. We’ll also keep updating with major mission milestones on CNET.

Astronaut eats: they’re not just Tang and Space Food Sticks these days. NASA shared a look at the menu for the Artemis II astronauts, and it doesn’t sound half bad.

The Artemis II crew will enjoy more than 10 types of beverages, including coffee, mango-peach smoothies, green tea, apple cider, lemonade, a pineapple drink, cocoa and breakfast drinks flavored in their choice of chocolate, vanilla or strawberry. 

The most common food items they’ll eat include tortillas, wheat flat bread, vegetable quiche, barbecued beef brisket, mango salad, granola with blueberries, macaroni and cheese, tropical fruit salad, couscous with nuts, broccoli au gratin, spicy green beans, almonds, cashews, and butternut squash cauliflower.

NASA also reports that the astronauts can choose to spice up their meals — there are five different hot sauces available to the crew. And culinary flavorings available include maple syrup, chocolate spread, peanut butter, spicy mustard, strawberry jam, honey, cinnamon and almond butter. Sweet treats include cookies, chocolate, pudding, cake, candy-coated almonds and cobbler.

And, no, they’re not popping a flavor pill or sucking a sandwich out of a tube, like old sci-fi shows told us.

“Food aboard Orion is ready-to-eat, rehydratable, thermostabilized or irradiated,” NASA says. “The crew uses Orion’s potable water dispenser to rehydrate foods and beverages and a compact, briefcase-style food warmer to heat meals as needed.”

An issue has been discovered with less than an hour to go until the launch window opens: one of the two battery temperature sensors on the Launch Abort System is “out of spec,” with the NASA engineering team now troubleshooting to understand whether it’s a sensor issue or a battery issue. It’s unknown whether this could delay or prevent launch.

Launch weather chances have improved, however, with NASA now predicting a 90% chance of launch, up from the 80% previously reported.

With just over an hour until the launch window opens, the last hatch on the Orion spacecraft has been sealed.

The range is cleared for launch, and the sun is poking through the clouds after some rain, according to NASA’s livestream. Again, the two-hour window begins at 6:24 p.m. ET / 3:24 p.m. PT.

The Artemis II mission is the first time humans have gone to the moon since the 1970s. In addition, Victor Glover will be the first Black person to travel to the moon; Christina Koch will be the first woman; and Jeremy Hansen will be the first Canadian.

The astronauts will not be disembarking the spacecraft and setting foot on the moon. Rather, this mission will travel around the moon, including to the far side, where no crewed mission has been before.

NASA intends to put humans on the moon by 2028:

• Artemis II: Scheduled to launch today, April 1, it will send astronauts around the moon to conduct tests.
• Artemis III: Scheduled to launch in mid-2027, it will perform additional tests, connect with lunar landers in low Earth orbit and test gear.
• Artemis IV: Scheduled to launch in early 2028, it will put humans back on the moon for the first time since Apollo 17 in 1972.
• Artemis V: Could launch in late 2028 or 2029, and intends to put humans on the moon, again.

As we close in on 2.5 hours before the launch window opens, you can check out some of National Geographic’s videos taken aboard Orion last year as part of a partnership with NASA. Some of the videos showcase the spacecraft’s toilet and sleeping quarters.

NASA and Nat Geo collaborated under a Space Act Agreement to develop compact, lightweight audiovisual hardware for use inside Orion during the Artemis II mission.

Over on the Orion right now, voice checks with all four crew members have been completed, and while rain showers are heading through the Kennedy Space Center area, they shouldn’t be a problem for launch. According to AccuWeather, it’s currently 75 degrees Fahrenheit and partly sunny on Merritt Island, Florida. AccuWeather is predicting conditions are “likely dry for the Artemis II launch.”

People all over the world are watching the launch preparations with interest, including royalty. The Instagram account of Britain’s royal family posted a message from King Charles III of the United Kingdom on Wednesday, in which the king sent a congratulatory message to one of the astronauts.

The king’s message was sent to mission specialist and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Colonel Jeremy Hansen, the first Canadian to travel on a moon mission. Canada is part of Britain’s Commonwealth of Nations.

“As you embark on this momentous endeavour, I send you and your fellow crew members my heartfelt good wishes,” the message reads. “May the stars align in your favour, and may your safe return inspire countless others to uphold the values of sustainability, cooperation and wonder that the Astra Carta inspires.”

Mention of the Astra Carta refers to an initiative by Charles to inspire sustainability across the space industry.

The full message sent to Hansen is available on the royal family website.

The close-out crew is now strapping NASA astronaut Commander Reid Wiseman and Canadian mission specialist II Jeremy Hansen into the Orion, while NASA pilot Victor Glover and NASA mission specialist Christina Koch wait in the white room to board. They have to strap in the astronauts two at a time because of the extremely tight quarters on board; one suit technician had to kneel on the seat where Koch will be seated in order to strap Wiseman and Hansen in.

Five-point harnesses with a quick release are being strapped to the astronauts, as well as the close-out crew connecting communications, air and water cooling cables.

The Orion test conductor just completed a successful test with Hansen, making contact with the astronauts on-board the spacecraft. A successful comms check with Wiseman was then completed.

With just 4 hours until the launch window opens, the crew is in the final stages prior to boarding the Orion spacecraft, crossing a 274-foot-high bridge to the entry point.

The crew member signed a wall with their patch on it at Pad 39B at the Kennedy Space Center, and they were fitted by NASA’s suit technicians with their caps, helmets and gloves in the white room. The suits are flame-retardant and have built-in knee pads, as the astronauts will have to crawl inside the spacecraft.

The astronauts boarded the Astrovan (a customized Airstream van built for NASA) to take them to the launch pad. It’s about a 20-minute journey, but to kill the time, the van has a video player and monitor. NASA’s official launch broadcast said that the Artemis II crew plans to watch Top Gun and Point Break while in the Astrovan. It’s not clear how much of either film they’ll get to view, but the NASA broadcast noted that Point Break was chosen because astronaut Christina Koch surfs.

Before the astronauts head to the launch pad, they said goodbye to their families ahead of their 10-day mission. The Artemis II crew boarded the Astrovan, a modified Airstream van, which will carry them to the launch pad.

NASA has a handful of live streams from different cameras for the launch in addition to the official broadcast. There are live streams from the Kennedy Space Center, where the launch pad is, and from the International Space Station, monitoring the situation from Earth’s orbit. The Artemis II mission is slated to travel 1,000 times farther than the ISS, to the far side of the moon. It’ll be the farthest a crewed mission has ever traveled — around 4,000 miles farther than the Apollo 11 crew traveled.

With just under five hours to go until launch, the crew is in the suit-up room right now. Over on NASA’s livestream on YouTube, you can watch Reid Wiseman (the commander), Victor Glover (the pilot), Christina Koch (mission specialist) and Jeremy Hansen (mission specialist) getting fitted out with their equipment. The four astronauts are wearing bright orange space suits as other NASA workers attach equipment and technology to their suits.

The weather is favorable, though one display unit onboard the spacecraft is running cooler than usual. NASA cites an 80% chance of launch today. The space agency is predicting launch towards the start of its two-hour window, which opens at 6:24 p.m. ET / 3:24 p.m. PT.

While the Artemis II mission isn’t planning on having astronauts land on the moon’s surface, it’s important for many reasons.

Like Apollo 8, which laid the foundation for Neil Armstrong and the other Apollo 11 astronauts to become the first men to walk on the moon, Artemis II is integral to future NASA missions. Artemis II is the first crewed mission of the series, which will put the Space Launch System rocket and its life support systems to the test. There are two more Artemis missions planned and funded through 2028, with Artemis IV slated to put humans on the moon.

Artemis II’s crew is also planning to go farther into deep space than any previous mission. At the peak of its orbit, the rocket will be over 4,700 miles from the far side of the moon. With NASA and other space organizations dedicated to exploring deeper space and Mars, it’s important to build and test technology and equipment that can support longer missions.

I’m going to say upfront that I am not an expert in aerospace engineering. If you are, you might enjoy reading NASA’s official reference guide for the Artemis II rocket. Here are some quick highlights.

• Artemis II’s rocket consists of a Space Launch System (SLS, the actual rocket) and Orion spacecraft (the payload on top of the rocket, which is what the astronauts will return in).
• The SLS is the most powerful rocket NASA has ever built, producing 8.8 million pounds of thrust. It has two rocket boosters and is 98 meters (about 322 feet) tall. That’s just a bit taller than the Statue of Liberty.
• The Orion spacecraft is wider and roomier than the spacecraft used in the Apollo missions. Luckily for the astronauts, it also has a new and improved toilet.
• Compared with the Saturn V rocket, the SLS is shorter but has more efficient engines that pack a bigger punch. But the SLS maxes out at 27 metric tons, while the Saturn V could support heavier payloads. You can check out our full comparison of Artemis versus Saturn V for more info.

I grew up watching the Apollo moon missions. It was absolutely thrilling — every liftoff, every step on the lunar surface, every splashdown on the safe return to Earth. Then, suddenly, it was over, and more than 50 years have passed since humans made that epic journey so far from home. Now, the Artemis program has arrived to bring back that sense of awe. Space travel has never been exactly humdrum, but after so many successful space shuttle, Soyuz and SpaceX flights into orbit and long-term residencies at the International Space Station, it has gotten routine. 

Artemis II is here to shake things up.

Which got me thinking about where this is taking us. The Apollo program was the culmination of the first wave of space exploration, an epoch of heroic achievement by scientists, engineers and astronauts alike. The Artemis missions mark the start of a whole new era of space exploitation. It won’t be long now before we are tapping into the moon’s natural resources, before space mining becomes a career option. Elon Musk, rather than Neil Armstrong, could soon be the face of our lunar endeavors. I hope the sense of wonder and adventure stays with us.

The Artemis II crew (from left): Backup crew members Andre Douglas and Jenni Gibbons, then prime crew members pilot Victor Glover, commander Reid Wiseman and mission specialists Jeremy Hansen and Christina Koch. Hansen is the sole Canadian among the American crew and will be the first of his countrymen to travel to the moon.