CLEVELAND — The names Glover, Koch, Hansen and Wiseman were added to the history books this month as these four astronauts will make up the Artemis 2 crew.
WKYC’s Betsy Kling got the chance to talk with Commander Reid Wiseman hours after the world found out that he will have the opportunity to orbit the moon.
“The last 24 hours, it’s just been crazy. Very uplifting. The public reaction has just been marvelous so far,” remarked Reid Wiseman.
Growing up in Maryland, Wiseman joined the Navy and became an aviator. In 2009 he was selected to be an astronaut and spent 165 days on the International Space Station. His career is already inspiring the next generation, but as Betsy asked, who inspired him?
“I was a little brother, so I had a big brother. And he was pretty tough guy,” said Wiseman. “And I think I just always grew up in his shadow and I just chased him everywhere. So, he was he was and still is my hero.”
The crew closely followed the Artemis 1 mission, not knowing they would be next.
“Were you just watching, you know, every moment of the mission?” asked Betsy.
“The thing that is burned into my mind is we watch this this insanely huge rocket liftoff,” said Wiseman. “And as I started to accelerate downrange, there was a really bright moon over the horizon. And you're like, oh, my gosh, you're watching this rocket accelerate pointed at the moon because it is going to the moon. This is so much all inside of me. But to be completely honest, a little bit of like, do I really want to go ride that mean it is it is a lot of power coming off the pad.”
18 months of training officially begins in June to make next year’s launch date. Wiseman is most excited about flying with his crewmates and understands what this Artemis mission means to the world.
“We are looking forward to going and doing this for all of humanity to be a unifying force,” said Wiseman. “And I got to be selfish for a minute and say I really want to be 250,000 miles away from Earth and look back at our beautiful planet because we live on the most magnificent machine that nature has ever built called Earth.”
Artemis 2 will not be in lower lunar orbit. They will be about 8,000 miles away from the moon, giving the crew a never before seen view. According to Wiseman they should see a basketball sized moon and a golf ball sized Earth.