by JumpCrisscross
8 subcomments
- April 6: flyby
April 10: splashdown
After that, the exciting work will be in Starship making LEO and testing propellant transfer (a humanity first) [1] and Blue Origin testing its rocket and lunar lander [2], both scheduled for 2026, to enable Artemis II (EDIT: III), currently scheduled—optimistically, in my opinion—for next year.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Starship_launches#Futu...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Moon_Pathfinder_Mission_1
by mathieu4v
2 subcomments
- I will be watching the launch from Europe, so it will be not earlier than half past midnight for us. My kids (9 and 10) are sleeping on the couch in front of the projection screen, so that they do not even have to get up when I wake them up at midnight, which I promised.
Just wanted to add my grain of positivity here. Godspeed Artemis 2!
- Even though you could question the whole Artemis concept, it's still extremely exciting watching the countdown with my son. I just missed the original Apollo flights and had assumed I would never see a moon landing in my lifetime. We may well not have a landing for quite some time yet, but it's still cool to see a Moon bound rocket standing on the launchpad...
- Minutes after launch they reached "ten thousand miles per hour". That's 2.78 miles per second. Nuts. No doubt the speeds go even higher later too.
I'm sure people here are already familiar with the speeds these things go, but that's the first time I've confronted a fact like that and it blew me away.
- It is a bit chilling to watch these astronaut profiles having just read yesterday about the heat shield issues observed on the prior mission, and that this will be the first time we can test the heat shield in the actual pressures and temperatures that it will have to endure.
Godspeed crew of Artemis II.
- Fingers crossed that this https://idlewords.com/2026/03/artemis_ii_is_not_safe_to_fly.... doesn't have any effect.
- After spending years as a kid seeing footage of these things on TV outside living outside of America, I finally got to see it live!
Brought my camera and got a few good pics too! Very invested in this entire mission!
Someone behind me kept whisper crying "That's it! Go baby, go baby go" like it was his child and was encouraging them on. Very emotional, loved it.
Also when that engine sparked it really hit me just how many hours of deep thought and technical innovation goes not only into getting us as humanity to that point, but also the crews at NASA planning, building and executing these missions
- watched this with teary eyes. it truly shows what we can do when we come together and challenge ourselves for the greater good of humanity.
by kiernanmcgowan
1 subcomments
- "We have a beautiful moon rise, we're heading right at it" got me a little choked up. Here's to the ever unfolding adventure of mankind.
by rpozarickij
4 subcomments
- Direct livestream link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tf_UjBMIzNo
by 1970-01-01
0 subcomment
- You're supposed to have peanuts, not popcorn, tonight:
https://science.nasa.gov/missions/what-are-jpls-lucky-peanut...
- Regardless of whether this particular mission is perfectly planned, this is precisely the kind of thing that will help humanity outgrow the dark age of war, inequality and climate mismanagement.
It is a noble endeavor - science, engineering and peaceful exploration hold the keys to our survival and prosperity.
It is also important psychologically to our survival - a reminder there is a bigger pie, that we can solve hard problems, that progress can be made, that competence and education counts, as does courage, and that we can work together for a common cause.
This is the best of America, and for a while we can be proud of the human race.
by zimpenfish
1 subcomments
- Found a stream on YouTube earlier (which presumably wasn't an official one because it disappeared 15 minutes later after a claim by "FUBO TV") and it had a poll attached: "Will the Artemis astronauts land on the moon?"
40% of people had voted yes. Which is somewhat worrying given the mission plan and hardware.
- Does anyone know of a good status tracker for the mission? I'm watching the official feed on Youtube and it's great for commentary but I'd love a live Kerbal-style UI I could poke around.
- I don't think I'll ever not get chills when watching a crewed launch. Godspeed!
- Liftoff! The planning that went behind this is mind boggling. Well done
by iamkonstantin
0 subcomment
- There is also a stream on ESA Web TV https://watch.esa.int/
by Singletail
0 subcomment
- As someone who watched the Apollo 11 launch live on TV, this is no less awe-inspiring. This transcends nations, languages, and politics. This is of and by all humanity.
(If anyone managed to get the perfect shot of the spark-filled separation feed, please share. That was... incredible.)
- That was awesome!
it's better to invest in human progress than in war
- It's been 54 years since humans last visited the Moon. Hopefully, in a few years we will get boots back on the surface.
by markus_zhang
0 subcomment
- Gonna watch with my son if it doesn’t get postponed.
- I do hope the doomers who think that the entire US government has been completely gutted will take note of this. The government workforce is in a bad spot for sure, SLS is far from a perfect program, but this still demonstrates that we are doing some real work still.
by vjvjvjvjghv
3 subcomments
- The camera work was just terrible. They really need to learn from SpaceX how to do this right. Minus the obnoxious cheering.
SpaceX does these beautiful drone shots and live telemetry so well. Considering that each SLS launch costs in the billions it would be nice to do a little better on production
I felt the commentary during the launch also wasn't good. And I am not too interested in hearing from some Hollywood people before the launch
- I'm having trouble finding a simple tracker of whereabouts the craft is at in terms of the path to the moon? Might just be me but the fancy 3-d rendering thing on the NASA page just shows me a close-up of the craft and not much else?
- Longest trip since 1972.
54 years.
I hope we as humanity never stop again.
Good luck!
by siruwastaken
1 subcomments
- I really hope the report from a few days ago about the heatshield not sustaining earth reentry does not turn out to be true.
by Blackstrat
2 subcomments
- It's good to see NASA finally do something beyond navel gazing. Nonetheless, calling this flight historic is a stretch. Other than flying a few miles further than Apollo 13, it will actually accomplish less than Apollo 8 did 57 years ago.
- Praying for these astronauts to have a safe return. The heat shield stuff has me really rattled. These folks are really brave to go through with this.
by partiallypro
2 subcomments
- The politicization of everything and constant doomerish on here sure has echoes of early 2000s Slashdot. That's not a compliment. Reading the comments here is actually depressing. Human progress is never all at once, we can't even celebrate this triumph? Life is almost never "one or the other," the program could be scrapped to a junk yard and that wouldn't solve global hunger or global conflicts. Setting human eyes forward is good.
by ginkgotree
0 subcomment
- From here on the space coast of Florida: GODSPEED THE CREW OF ARTEMIS II
- Wish them all the best and safe travels. I’ll be tuning in as you never know when the next crewed mission will be, probably not another 50 years if advancements in space travel happen.
- I'd like to see views of the moon and the earth from the spaceship on every hour. Is there any link for that?
- There are tons of comments here that say, "this could have been a robot." And no, it really couldn't have.
The best of humanity is remarkably capable as compared to the best physical machines / robots. There's a great paper called the "dispelling the myth of robotic efficiency." https://academic.oup.com/astrogeo/article-abstract/53/2/2.22... // https://lasp.colorado.edu/mop/files/2019/08/RobotMyth.pdf
> “the expert evidence we have heard strongly suggests that the use of autonomous robots alone will very significantly limit what can be learned about our nearest potentially habitable planet” (Close et al. (2005; paragraph 70).
>
> Putting it more bluntly, Steve Squyres, the Principal Investigator for the Mars Exploration Rovers Spirit and Opportunity, has written:
>
> “[t]he unfortunate truth is that most things our rovers can do in a perfect sol [i.e. a martian day] a human explorer could do in less than a minute” (Squyres, 2005, pp. 234-5).
Yes, a robot car that drives on its own will be a better driver than most humans who text and drive, or have 400ms reaction times.But making a machine that can beat a 110ms reaction time human with 2SD+ IQ – and the ability to override the ground controllers with human curiosity – for exploration is much harder. Healthy, smart humans have high dexterity, are extremely capable of switching roles fast, are surprisingly efficient, and force us to return back home.
So in terms of total science return, one Apollo mission did more for lunar science and discovery than 53 years of robots on the surface and in orbit.
by nodesocket
1 subcomments
- The SpaceX cameras of live launches are way better. This NASA stream is mostly all computer generated art after the initial pad launch. Hardly any live space feeds from the ship.
- Is there any website that gives me updates mirroring the livestream but in plain text? I won't be able to tune in for the launch but this is exciting and I'd like to follow the developments! I'm sure the answer is "Twitter" but I don't understand how that platform works.
- Is anybody aware of audio-only coverage of this mission? I'd have loved to just tuned into most of the launch like radio, rather than having my unwatched youtube running.
by MattCruikshank
0 subcomment
- An okay unity app for tracking:
https://www.nasa.gov/missions/artemis-ii/arow/
- 24/7 coverage here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3kR2KK8TEs
by stephenhuey
4 subcomments
- Just listened on the radio driving the kids to swim class! I'm curious, does anyone think the show For All Mankind provided any peer pressure or influence to help propel NASA to this moment?
by briandoll
1 subcomments
- This is the first live launch I've seen on TV (well, YouTube in this case) since the Challenger disaster. Was a nice relief to see this one go so smoothly.
- Mild Space Weather: https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/
Moderate geomagnetic storm watch until April 2.
- I’m so glad they lifted off safely. I hope they re-enter safely too.
by coldcity_again
2 subcomments
- I'm watching it rapt, but also wondering which KIND of leaky will result in a scrub..
by chinathrow
0 subcomment
- Range is go after they worked to verify the FTS. Great news.
- And NASA proves that it's still got game!
- I'm just SO HAPPY we can talk about something that doesn't involve the Iran war, ICE etc. This is a really historic moment, I hope that the current and future administrations continue investing in space exploration. I've waited my whole life for this as the entire "action" happened before I was born. Hubble/James Webb/ISS are cool but Artemis is something else!
by ReptileMan
0 subcomment
- Safe trip to the crew. I do hope that they have ironed out all the issues.
by joeblubaugh
0 subcomment
- Good luck to the astronauts
https://idlewords.com/2026/03/artemis_ii_is_not_safe_to_fly....
- Godspeed AI-I
- too windy outside for this to happen imo
by darepublic
0 subcomment
- God speed
- If the crew were to be lost into deep space or something, is there a protocol for self euthanization?
by DanDeBugger
0 subcomment
- Neil Armstrong 2: A New Moon?
by sandworm101
0 subcomment
- KSP irl. I still dont know how they keep the framerate so high with so many parts.
by GMoromisato
0 subcomment
- I get that not everyone, even on HN, thinks crewed-spaceflight is worth doing. And I certainly get that launching people to the moon doesn't makes up for the latest crap thing Trump is doing to the world.
But I really think that space exploration could be the thing that unites everyone, and the more unified we are--the more we feel like we have a common purpose--the easier it will be to solve our other problems.
I for one pledge to support space exploration (crewed or uncrewed) regardless of who is running the government. I will cheer Artemis II even though I voted against Trump. I will cheer if/when China sends people to the moon. I will even cheer if Russia does something cool in space.
- 4.5hrs to go
- Oh hell... Thanks for this reminder, I have almost forgot about it with all the problems I'm trying to solve now.
- Somebody needs to say that:
What was the AI usage in this endeavour?
Zero, huh?
by mikelitoris
0 subcomment
- Gods peed
by _DeadFred_
0 subcomment
- Why do this? Why look to space and understand Earth's smallness? So we can understand reality as Carl Sagan explains in his pale blue dot speech.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wupToqz1e2g
by GaryBluto
6 subcomments
- It is very disconcerting to see so many completely disregarding incredible technological innovation because other problems exist, especially on HN.
If we were not allowed to progress technology until everybody is 100% free of suffering, we'd never be able to create technological that may potentially lead to the alleviation of suffering. It all feels very crabs in a bucket - "I don't feel happy so nobody else should, and nothing should happen unless it is things that directly, immediately do things I want and solve problems I care about."
by GreenSalem
2 subcomments
- Waiting to see what happens to the heat shield on reentry...
https://idlewords.com/2026/03/artemis_ii_is_not_safe_to_fly....
https://theconversation.com/heat-shield-safety-concerns-rais...
by maximgeorge
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by Nick_Finney
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by ValidateKorea
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by randomNumber7
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- There was an interesting thread on HN yesterday about the safety of the heat shield.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47582043
by SwuduSusuwu
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by happy-go-lucky
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by Ethanalker
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by ValveFan6969
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by curiousgal
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by KnuthIsGod
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by sollewitt
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by jeffrallen
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- Really hoping those of us who think NASA has jumped the shark won't have to keep ourselves from saying "I told you so" next week out of respect for the dead.
This is four people putting their lives at risk for poor engineering and bad project management.
The "right stuff" applies to the engineers too, but they've all unfortunately left Boeing and NASA.
- This opinion may be unpopular here but it's hard to get excited about a colossal waste of taxpayer money after all the damage DOGE did. I don't understand how these NASA missions with questionable scientific value and obscene budgets get off the ground.
I mean I do understand, NASA funding is important to oligarchs. But still.
by longislandguido
1 subcomments
- I find it interesting the MSM is too busy sperging out about Trump to not treat this as page-three news and place it below the cut.
It's also the first woman and black guy to go to the moon, for those keeping score at home.
- Did anyone else even know this was happening?
by _trampeltier
2 subcomments
- Even I'm a big space fan, at moment I just can enjoy anything that comes from USA. I just can't applause to a super bully.
- Kelon Mus is surprised that the rocket didn't explode at all. “You can't learn anything from a rocket that doesn't explode,” Mus said.
by techteach00
0 subcomment
- Finally something interesting. I'm familiar with dead Internet theory, the whole Lindy thing where culture died in the early 2010's etc. Economy stinks, global violence everywhere.
Going back to the moon is really acceptable distraction. I mean that seriously. I know it's technically not new but it will be amazing to see modern video and photographic pictures of the moon close up.