On Monday, the first group of astronauts to head back to the moon since 1972 will be announced.
The astronauts will be part of the Artemis II mission, where they will orbit the moon. The mission will include three people from NASA and one from the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).
While NASA has a roster of 41 active astronauts, there are only four active Canadian astronauts: Jeremy Hansen, Jennifer Sidey-Gibbons, Joshua Kutryk and David Saint-Jacques.
The announcement will be made at 11 a.m. ET.
It’s part of NASA’s Artemis program that will return humans to the surface of the moon by 2025, including the first woman and first racialized person. The last time humans were on the moon was in December 1972 for the Apollo 17 mission.
Artemis I, the first test of NASA’s rocket called the Space Launch System (SLS) and the Orion crew capsule, launched in November in a 25-day mission around the moon.
Saint-Jacques and Hansen joined the astronaut corps in 2009, with Saint-Jacques spending 204 days on the International Space Station in 2018–2019. It was the longest Canadian mission to date.
Sidey-Gibbons and Kutryk were recruited in 2017 and since then, the pair have been training vigorously for future missions.
On March 16, the CSA updated their logo, saying it sought “to enter this new chapter with a modern identifying symbol.”
CBC will provide extensive coverage of the astronaut announcement on CBC.ca and News Network.
Source: cbc.ca