Artemis II: Crew announced
On April 3rd, 2023, NASA and the Canadian Space Agency announced the crew of Artemis II! CSA astronaut Jeremy Hansen will join NASA astronauts Christina Koch, Victor Glover, and Reid Wiseman on the journey to send humans back to the Moon. The astronauts will be tasked with confirming that all of the Orion spacecraft’s system work as designed to support human endeavours in deep space. The approximately 10 day long mission will involve the crew orbiting Earth for two days, where they will check out Orion’s systems before heading towards the Moon. After a journey of about four days, the crew will enter orbit around the Moon, and then take another four days to return home. All the while, they will continue to evaluate the different systems onboard the Orion spacecraft.
You can learn more about the Artemis II mission here.
Jeremy Hansen is the Canadian astronaut that will be part of the Artemis II crew as a mission specialist, and will be the first Canadian to circle to Moon.
Hansen holds a bachelor’s degree in honours space science, and a Masters of Science in physics. Prior to being selected in the third Canadian Astronaut Recruitment Campaign in 2009, Hansen served as a fighter pilot. When he graduated from Astronaut Candidate Training, he began working at Mission Control Centre as the voice between the ground and the International Space Station.
Hansen has been involved in two different extreme environment training sessions. In 2013, he participated in the CAVES program. This expedition was designed by the European Space Agency, and involved living underground for six days. The other was the NEEMO underwater expedition. For six days in 2014, Hansen and other crew members lived in the underwater Aquarius laboratory – 19 metres underwater.
In 2017, Hansen was put in charge of training astronaut candidates from the United States and Canada. This made him the first Canadian to do so. You can learn more about Jeremy Hansen here.