After years of delays, NASA’s mission to send a crew of astronauts around the Moon and back again is almost ready to lift off.

The agency is targeting February 6 for the launch of Artemis 2, the first crewed spaceflight of its lunar program. The mission will launch aboard NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket from Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The crew—consisting of mission commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, and mission specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen—will ride inside the Orion spacecraft.

Artemis 2 will serve as a critical test of SLS and Orion and a stepping stone to the Artemis 3 Moon landing. Decades in the making, these missions will mark humanity’s historic return to deep space. It’s been a very long time since astronauts last flew to the Moon, but Artemis 2 will make history in many other ways as well.

Here’s a look at the records Artemis 2 is set to break and the firsts it will achieve when it finally lifts off this year.

First human spaceflight beyond LEO since Apollo

The last time humans traveled beyond low-Earth orbit (LEO) was nearly 55 years ago, during the Apollo 17 mission. Since then, we’ve remained comfortably within about 400 miles (640 kilometers) of Earth’s surface. With Artemis 2, that’s about to change.

Once SLS and Orion are in space, Orion will separate from the rocket and perform multiple maneuvers to raise its orbit around Earth, ultimately setting itself on a lunar free return trajectory. This will send the spacecraft and its crew on a slingshot-like journey around the Moon, using Earth’s gravity to naturally pull Orion back home.

Artemis 2 will be the first crewed mission to leave LEO since Apollo 17. This achievement will usher in a new era of human deep-space exploration, carrying astronauts farther from Earth than anyone has traveled in over half a century.

Farthest distance humans have traveled from Earth

The current record for the farthest human spaceflight is currently held by the Apollo 13 mission, which sent three astronauts on a flight around the far side of the Moon in 1970. At their farthest, the Apollo 13 astronauts were 248,655 miles (400,171 km) away from Earth, according to NASA.

This record, a consequence of the mission’s emergency trajectory after an oxygen tank exploded, has stood uncontested for more than five decades, but Artemis 2 is designed to break it. The Orion spacecraft will reach a maximum distance of approximately 250,000 miles (400,000 km) from Earth.

First crewed flight of the Orion spacecraft and SLS

NASA has been developing the SLS rocket and the Orion spacecraft for deep space human transport for more than a decade, but Artemis 2 will be the first time this launch system actually flies with astronauts on board.

In 2022, the Artemis 1 mission served as the first fully integrated flight test of SLS and Orion, sending the capsule on two lunar flybys. While SLS performed nominally, Orion’s heat shield suffered an unexpected amount of charring as it reentered Earth’s atmosphere.

An ensuing investigation into the heat shield issue and additional technical problems delayed Artemis 2 to April 2026, but now, NASA says Orion is good to go. The two years the agency spent testing and analyzing the heat shield damage have led engineers to believe they can minimize charring by increasing the angle of Orion’s descent.

This should shorten the amount of time Orion spends exposed to extreme heat during reentry. Now that human lives will be at stake, here’s hoping NASA’s calculations are correct.

Highest reentry velocity for a crew return

Speaking of reentry, Orion is expected to set a new record for the highest velocity ever achieved by a crewed spacecraft returning to Earth. That record is currently held by the Apollo 10 mission, which was traveling at 24,791 miles per hour (39,897 kilometers per hour) upon reentry.

Orion should beat that record by approximately 200 mph (320 km/hr), with speeds reaching 25,000 miles per hour (40,234 km/hr), according to NASA. As it descends, the spacecraft will slow to about 325 mph (523 km/hr) before its parachutes unfurl for a safe splashdown in the Pacific Ocean.

First person of color, woman, and Canadian to fly to the Moon

The Artemis 2 crew will make history in its own right. Pilot Victor Glover will be the first person of color to visit the lunar environment, mission specialist Christina Koch the first woman, and mission specialist Jeremy Hansen the first Canadian—and first non-American—to make the journey.

These firsts signal that NASA has truly entered a new era of human spaceflight—one that is far more diverse than the Apollo era.

With NASA racing to land astronauts on the Moon before China, it’s easy to mistake Artemis 2 for a simple dress rehearsal. Together, these milestones show that it’s so much more than that. This mission will attempt to prove that humanity is ready to return to deep space after half a century of absence.