Watch the first crewed Artemis mission take flight

Artemis II, the first crewed mission under the Artemis program, is scheduled to launch today, April 1. NASA is opening a two-hour window for its lift off, starting at 6:24 PM Eastern time, at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The agency said the forecast for launch day “shows an 80 percent chance of favorable weather conditions” and that, on March 31, its engineers had finished critical health checks on the Space Launch System rocket that the mission will use.

On the evening of March 31, the engineers shifted the launch system into its final configuration. In the early hours of April 1, they will activate the ground launch sequencer. You can start watching Artemis II’s ...