Artemis II Leads a Busy Global Launch Week

Nine rocket launches are scheduled this week across the US, Russia, Kazakhstan, and China, led by NASA’s Artemis II crewed Orion mission to the Moon on SLS. SpaceX has four Starlink missions (two from Florida, two from California); ULA’s Atlas V will deploy Amazon Leo satellites; Russia plans a Meridian-M on Soyuz 2.1a from Plesetsk; Baikonur hosts the first flight of Soyuz 5; and China’s CAS Space (Kinetica 2) and Space Pioneer (Tianlong-3) will mark debuts. Artemis II carries Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Jeremy Hansen for about 10 days of tests before heading toward the Moon, while other launches test new vehicles and capabilities from multiple nations.