Cal Poly Graduate Piloting NASA’s First Lunar Mission in Half a Century
SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. (KEYT) - A graduate of Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo is slated to circle the moon with three other crew members over the next ten days.
The mission is intended as a precursor of more to come.
NASA will launch the Artemis II no earlier than Wednesday, April 1st at about 6:30 in the morning from Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
“It was actually originally planned in March,” says Jeffrey Armstrong, Cal Poly University President. “They had pushed back. And so it's been, wait, they’re in quarantine, not in quarantine.”
The crew: Commander Reid Wiseman from Baltimore Maryland, mission specialists Christina Koch from Grand Rapids Michigan and Jeremy Hansen From Ontario Canada, and the pilot, Victor Glover, graduate of Cal Poly Class of 1999, and a navy captain.
“He carries many ranks,” says Armstrong. “Besides his engineering degree at Cal Poly. And being an amazing student athlete, he's received a couple of other master's degree, if not more. So he's quite decorated.”
The mission’s purpose: to make sure current spacecraft can sustain astronauts for new missions to the moon planned for the near future.
“They're going to go farther into space than any human beings ever, even farther than some of the Apollo missions,” says Armstrong. “So it’s, it's incredible. And there's some parallels, to the Apollo missions.”
Cal Poly University President Jeffrey Armstrong reflected on his friend’s career, and says it’s not lost on students that captain glover has actually reached the stars.
“The 45 minutes that we're closest to the lunar surface are also going to be out of contact,” says Capt. Victor Glover, Artemis Ii Pilot. “We are going to have an L.O.S. in NASA terms, a loss of signal. And while we cannot talk to the planet and our friends that are even in space on the International Space Station, I would love it if the entire world, those 8 million people could come together and just, you know, be hoping and praying for us to get that acquisition of signal.”
NASA is observing additional launch opportunities through Monday, but are anticipating all systems go.
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