NASA will fly your name around the moon on historic mission. Here’s how to sign up

UPDATE: The registration period to submit names for the Artemis 1 flight ended at 4 p.m. EDT Tuesday, June 14, with 3,390,027 “boarding passes” claimed, NASA reports. “We’ve finished collecting names for Artemis I and are working on loading them onto the Orion spacecraft,” NASA reports. The original story is below.

Space travel is clearly for astronauts and the super rich, but NASA has found a way the rest of us can claim our spot among the cosmos.

“You can send your name to the Moon,” agency officials wrote in a June 12 Facebook post.

“How? Sign up to get your boarding pass and join the nearly 3 million ‘passengers’ flying around the Moon aboard #Artemis I this year.”

Names can be added to the list by visiting Nasa.gov/wearegoing.

NASA says the names of all 3 million “passengers” will circle the Moon on a flash drive aboard the Orion spacecraft and the trip will cover 1,300,000 miles.

While that definitely qualifies as cheap seats, the occasion will be historic at multiple levels.

NASA says the uncrewed Artemis I qualifies as our first step toward building “a long-term human presence at the Moon for decades to come.”

“The flight paves the way toward landing the first woman and the first person of color on the Moon!” NASA reports.

“We will collaborate with commercial and international partners and establish the first long-term presence on the Moon. Then, we will use what we learn on and around the Moon to take the next giant leap: sending the first astronauts to Mars.”

A specific launch date has not been set, but NASA is hoping for an August liftoff. A “wet dress rehearsal test” is June 18 at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Updates on the mission are posted at: Blogs.nasa.gov/artemis/.

This story was originally published June 13, 2022 at 11:13 AM.