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NASA says it will be delaying the Artemis II moon mission that includes Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen, initially scheduled for November of this year.
The U.S. space agency provided an update today on the timeline for the upcoming mission around the moon and said it will be pushed back to September 2025 due to a number of technical issues and to allow more preparation time.
A subsequent mission, Artemis III, which will land astronauts on the moon for the first time in more than 50 years, has been delayed until at least September 2026.
Hansen's maiden space voyage alongside veteran NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch was to be the first crewed flight of the Orion capsule and the first mission to the moon since the last Apollo mission in 1972.
The Artemis II mission involves a lunar flyby, performing a figure-eight manoeuvre around the far side of the moon before returning to Earth.
Another Canadian astronaut, Jenni Gibbons, was appointed in November as backup to Hansen.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 9, 2024.