STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Some other news now. Four astronauts are orbiting the Earth, and today, they find out if they're going to the moon. NASA's Artemis II mission started Wednesday with a picture-perfect launch from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Three, two, one. Booster ignition. And lift-off - the crew of Artemis II now bound for the moon. Humanity's next great voyage begins.
INSKEEP: We heard that live on NPR's All Things Considered last evening. NPR's Nell Greenfieldboyce reports on how NASA will decide whether this crew will actually make the nearly 10-day trip around the moon and back.
NELL GREENFIELDBOYCE, BYLINE: Just minutes after the rocket launch, Commander Reid Wiseman spoke with capsule communicator Stan Love in mission control, saying things were looking good and the crew was enjoying a great view of their ultimate destination.
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REID WISEMAN: Outstanding, Stan. We see the same, and we have a beautiful moonrise. We're heading right at it.
GREENFIELDBOYCE: This successful launch was a huge deal for NASA. It's the first time the agency has sent astronauts to space with one of its own rockets in 15 years. And it's been even longer since NASA has flown anyone on a moon mission, as agency administrator Jared Isaacman joked after the launch.
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JARED ISAACMAN: After a brief 54-year intermission, NASA is back in the business of sending astronauts to the moon.
GREENFIELDBOYCE: The three NASA astronauts, plus one from the Canadian Space Agency, have had a busy time working through small glitches as they orbit Earth. Their communications with mission control had some interruptions, for example, and they also had a bit of trouble dealing with their toilet. NASA's Lori Glaze said all of this is to be expected, given that this is a test flight and no humans have ever flown in this spacecraft before.
LORI GLAZE: A lot of what we're doing here is exactly this, trying to test out all of the things that require the crew interaction. We anticipate to have a lot of these. That's what we're here for - to work through them.
GREENFIELDBOYCE: This afternoon, mission managers will meet to see if all of the space vehicle's essential systems are working well enough to try for a flyby of the moon, which is over 200,000 miles away. If the crew gets the go-ahead, they'll fire the engine to go off on a looping figure-eight path that will send them zipping around to the far side of the moon. The trip out there will take about four days.
Nell Greenfieldboyce, NPR News, at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
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ELTON JOHN: (Singing) I'm a rocket man. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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