Artemis II mission poised for a historic moment with Victor Glover

The countdown to launch the highly-awaited Artemis II mission has started. It is scheduled to take off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Wednesday at 6:24 EDT.

The historical lunar mission, taking place after more than 5o years, has included four astronauts, Victor Glover, Reid Wiseman, Christina Koch, and Jeremy Hanse.

Victor Glover is set to make lunar history as the first black man to ever fly around the moon as the pilot of this mission.

Talking about Glover’s monumental achievement, the first black astronaut candidate Ed Dwight expressed how proud he is of Victor Glover.

As reported by Al Jazeera, Dwight said, “ I am really proud. He is going to go down in history no matter what happens there.”

In 1960, Ed Dwight was denied the chance to go to space, but according to him, he is living his long-held dream through Glover.

“I have personal attachment and affiliation with Victor because I met him when he was 15 years old and we had a program where we were trying to encourage young black candidates to go to pilot training. I did not know that Victor would take its encouragement seriously while taking it to the moon,” Dwight added.

Glover’s achievement runs in the family as his father also became the first Black astronaut to complete a long-term stay aboard the International Space Station at 167 days.

Moreover, Christina Koch will become the first woman to ever fly around the moon.

NASA Artemis II will be the first crewed lunar mission since 1972. The mission will be the 10-days long. Astronauts are expected to make a lunar flyby, reaching a distance of over 248,000 miles from Earth, the ever greatest distance from Earth during this stage.

Unlike Apollo, Artemis II will not include the landing of humans on the surface of the Moon.