Space and Physics
PUBLISHED
Artemis II, the mission that will see humans return to deep space and beyond the Moon, looks ready to fly this week. After postponing the launch in February and March due to some technical issues, everything now seems ready to happen. The launch window opens on April 1, and it is no joke! Humans might finally go back into deep space after five decades.
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The launch window opens on April 1 at 6:24 pm EDT (10:24 pm UTC) and will stay open for two hours. It is a narrow time period, but Artemis II is not a rocket that can launch whenever; it has specific objectives when reaching the Moon, so the time needs to be right for the celestial mechanics to work.
How to watch Aremis II launch
Tickets to see the launch in person at the Kennedy Space Center are unfortunately sold out, but the launch will be livestreamed by NASA on a multitude of platforms, with the live stream starting as early as 12:50 pm EDT (4:50 pm UTC). NASA will stream the launch live from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. You can also watch it via the space agency's official social media accounts on YouTube, X, Facebook, and Twitch and NASA's free streaming service, NASA+, as well as a variety of third-party streaming services, including Netflix and Amazon Prime.
If you want to see Artemis with your own eyes, you could use good binoculars or, even better, a telescope to track it in space. Ideally, you’d want a modern telescope that can automatically track the ephemeris of the object – it will be moving pretty fast.
The spacecraft will fly south of Europe after launch and continue in this orbit before widening it after one loop. All things going well, on its second loop, it will start the translunar injection and go to the Moon.
If the weather where you are won’t cooperate, or you do not have a powerful or reactive enough telescope to follow the Orion spacecraft after launch, worry not. The team at the Virtual Telescope Project will also provide a live stream with observations as Orion moves into orbit around Earth, and then beyond.
What happens if the Artemis II launch is scrubbed today?
If April 1 stops being a good day for launch, there are other possible windows for the month of April. The next suitable one is on April 2 at 7:22 pm EDT, followed by April 3 at 8 pm EDT on the dot. On April 4, the window opens at 8:53 pm EDT, and on April 5, at 9:50 pm EDT. April 6 will be the last of that bunch, with a launch window opening at 10:36 pm EDT. If none of those are suitable, the launch will be postponed to April 30.
