NASA Invites the Public to Add their Names to a Database that will Orbit the Moon

NASA is inviting members of the public to submit their names to a database that will be loaded on to a flash drive and sent on a trip around the moon with Artemis 1. The US space agency will send the Orion capsule atop a Space Launch System (SLS) mega rocket at some point this summer, possibly as early as late May.

Copying something offered during the Mars missions, NASA will allow people to get a virtual ‘boarding pass’ to send their name to the moon. Artemis I will be the first uncrewed flight test of SLS and Orion, the system that will take the first woman and first person of color to the moon by 2025.

The spacecraft, and the flash drive of names, will spend about three weeks in space, including six days in a distant retrograde orbit around the moon. Artemis 1 is the first of three initial lunar flights planned by NASA as part of the plan to return to the moon, and will use the SLS and Orion capsules. The combination of spaceship and rocket will be put to the test in a wet dress rehearsal on March 17, where it will be rolled out to the launch pad at NASA Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

It was originally due to lift off at the end of last year, but was delayed and is now scheduled to launch anytime from late May to mid-July.  All eyes will be on the historic Launch Complex 39B when Orion and the Space Launch System (SLS) lift off for the first time from NASA modernized Kennedy Space Center in Florida.