NASA selects cadre of astronauts for Artemis missions
- by Carmen Reese
- in Science
- — Dec 12, 2020
The Richland native appeared with fellow Artemis team member Kjell Lindgren during a virtual Q&A session broadcast by NASA later Wednesday from the Johnson Space Center in Houston.
Nine men and nine women are the first group of astronauts assigned to the Artemis program, half of whom have already flown into space.
Taking to Twitter after Pence announced the names of 18 astronauts, Chari said he is proud to be part of the team that will take humans to the moon again.
Raja Chari reported for duty in August 2017 and having completed the initial astronaut candidate training is now eligible for a mission assignment. Besides the 18 members, additional people, including astronauts from global partners will join this group as needed.
NASA has named North Carolina native Christina Koch to the Artemis moon-landing program.
Today marked a big step on the way toward NASA's next giant leap, as the space agency gave the public its first-ever look at the members of its Artemis lunar team - a team that aims to rocket humans, including the first female in history - to the lunar surface for the first time in more than 50 years.
NASA may have more than a little bit of time. A team of nine men and nine women astronauts have been chosen for the mission under NASA's Artemis program.
The astronauts will help NASA prepare for the coming Artemis missions, which begin next year working with the agency's commercial partners as they develop human landing systems, assisting in the development of training, defining hardware requirements, and consulting on technical development.
A second piloted flight with four astronauts aboard is planned in the 2023 timeframe to put the Orion capsule through its paces before a landing attempt on the Artemis 3 mission.
That 2024 date is particularly ambitious, however, given the massive budget shortfall NASA is now facing for lander development.
NASA said that we are there in the midst of negotiating to get that lander funded.
A Richland astronaut is getting the chance to make a giant leap for women, and land on the moon. "Either I'm going to walk on the moon or one of my friends is going to walk on the moon, and both of those scenarios are beyond my wildest dreams when I was a kid", she said.
