In photos: Artemis II's historic launch for the moon

NASA shared a flurry of never-before-seen comet 3I/ATLAS images on Wednesday. (Image credit: Chip Somodevilla via Getty Images) Copy link Facebook X Whatsapp Reddit Pinterest Flipboard Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Sign up for the Live Science daily newsletter now Get the world’s most fascinating discoveries delivered straight to your inbox. By submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over. You are now subscribed Your newsletter sign-up was successful Want to add more newsletters? Join the club Get full access to premium articles, exclusive features and a growing list of member rewards. Explore An account already exists for this email address, please log in. Subscribe to our newsletter On April 1, four astronauts blasted off on what will be a 10-day voyage around the moon and back. Their mission, the first to send humans to the moon since 1972, will test key systems for two lunar landings in 2028, which will, in turn, lay the foundation for a permanent base on the moon's surface. The Artemis II crew — which consists of commander Reid Wiseman , pilot Victor Glover , and mission specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen — are slingshotting around Earth before initiating a translunar injection burn to send them on a roughly 245,000-mile (394,000 kilometers) flight to lunar orbit. Here's the launch of the historic mission in pictures. Sunrise over moonshot The sun rises over the Space Launch System rocket and Orion capsule as they stand atop a mobile launcher at Kennedy Space Center's Launch Complex 39B. (Image credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky) At 322 feet (98 meters) in height, the Artemis II rocket stack is taller than the Statue of Liberty and provides over 8.8 million pounds (4 million kilograms) of thrust to a capsule the size of a camper van. Taking a seat Onlookers set up camping chairs to watch the sunrise from a park in Titusville, Florida, several hours before NASA's Artemis II launch. (Image credit: Getty Images) Artemis II's launch has been hotly anticipated, with NASA originally targeting a moon landing by 2024 back in 2019. Still, given the numerous delays and setbacks suffered by Artemis II and its predecessor mission, setting up this early was an act of faith by many onlookers. Onto the tarmac NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen exit quarantine to greet spectators on the tarmac. (Image credit: Chip Somodevilla via Getty Images) To avoid health issues in space, it's standard protocol for astronauts to quarantine before a launch. Sign up for the Live Science daily newsletter now Get the world’s most fascinating discoveries delivered straight to your inbox. The Artemis II astronauts quarantined with their families and, just before exiting, played a card game — one of many prelaunch rituals intended to "use up" bad luck before hea