HOUSTON – NASA on Tuesday revealed the four astronauts who will join the next Artemis mission — a key, two-week flight that will aim to test out various technologies considered vital to putting astronauts back on the surface of the moon for the first time in more than 50 years. The crew, set to launch as soon as late 2027, includes three NASA astronauts — first-time space flier Andre Douglas, record-setting astronaut Frank Rubio, and veteran flier and test pilot Randy Bresnik — as well as Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano with the European Space Agency.  Artemis III is designed to serve as a precursor mission to a moon landing, testing out how the NASA-built Orion spacecraft will dock with a lunar lander. The primary goal of the flight, the space agency says, is to “reduce risk” heading into an actual lunar touchdown, which NASA hopes will take place as soon as 2028. In order to reach the moon’s surface, astronauts will have to complete such a move while in lunar orbit. But for Artemis III, NASA is aiming to test the maneuver much closer to home, sticking to low-Earth orbit, or LEO, the area closest to our home planet and the same region where the International Space Station operates.  The Artemis III crew will launch from Florida aboard their Orion capsule, the same type of spacecraft that completed April’s historic Artemis II lunar flyby mission, and hang out in low-Earth orbit. At least one lunar lander will then launch separately — and it’s not yet clear whether it will be SpaceX’s Starship, Blue Origin’s Blue Moon, or one of each. But upon arrival to low-Earth orbit, the landers would then rendezvous with Orion, allowing the astronauts to dock with the vehicle and potentially climb on board a lander. NASA has suggested it could carry out the test flight with both Blue Moon and Starship, though it’s not clear how soon either vehicle will be ready. The space agency has made a concerted effort in recent months to spur competition between the companies, which have for years held multibillion-dollar contracts to deliver crew-worthy lunar landers to NASA. Both companies have experienced development setbacks and delays. During Tuesday’s news conference, NASA chief Jared Isaacman again suggested Artemis III could involve docking with both landers, saying Orion “will rendezvous and dock with the Blue Origin lander, and then again with the SpaceX lander.”

  But both SpaceX’s Starship and Blue Origin’s Blue Moon are facing uncertain timelines. Blue Origin in particular encountered a major setback last month when one of the company’s New Glenn rockets exploded during a routine ground test.