The U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has launched the crewed Artemis II mission, sending four astronauts toward the Moon for the first time since 1972, NASA reported.
The rocket lifted off April 1 from the Kennedy Space Center. The mission is expected to last about 10 days, during which the crew will perform a lunar flyby without landing before returning to Earth.
The crew includes Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen.
The mission marks the first crewed flight to the Moon since the Apollo program. The spacecraft is expected to travel a record distance from Earth for a human mission.
Artemis II is a key stage of the Artemis program, which aims to return humans to the Moon in the coming years.
