On Monday, the US Space Agency (NASA) will reveal the names of the four astronauts who will participate in a mission around the moon at the end of 2024, in an introduction to the return of humans to this astronomical body after an absence of half a century.

The identity of the three Americans and the Canadian who will form the "Artemis 2" mission will be revealed at 10:00 am local time (15:00 GMT), from the NASA Center in Houston, Texas, USA.

The four astronauts will be the first human crew to travel towards the moon, without landing on its surface, since the last mission of the "Apollo" program in 1972.

NASA intends to send during this mission the first woman and the first person of color on the moon, while the Apollo program sent 12 men, all of them white.

Through this program, the US space agency intends to return humans to the moon with a permanent presence by establishing a base on its surface and a space station orbiting it.

Learning to live on the moon would allow testing all the technologies needed for the more complex journey of sending a crew of astronauts to Mars.

The Artemis 2 mission is currently scheduled to launch in November 2024, with a duration of about ten days.

The four astronauts will be transported by NASA's SLS rocket, the most powerful in the world today.

The crew will be on top of this rocket inside the "Orion" capsule, which will separate from the rest of the parts upon reaching space and will transport them to the orbit of the moon. When the mission is over, the astronauts land in the ocean.

The "SLS" missile has only been launched once, during the "Artemis 1" mission, which propelled the "Orion" capsule to the moon during an unmanned test mission that lasted just over 25 days. The capsule successfully returned to Earth in December.

NASA chief Bill Nelson said Wednesday that the test flight "was a success, prompting us to add additional experiments during the flight," and "we will now add a crew to it."

He explained that the agency may send a mission to Mars by 2040.

All of the "active" astronauts (currently 41) were officially authorized to join the Artemis 2 crew. However, the selection path was shrouded in great secrecy.

At the end of August, then-Chairman of the Astronaut Office Reed Wiseman said that the qualities required of the crew members included, in particular, technical expertise and a spirit of esprit de corps. He has since left his position and became one of the astronauts eligible to participate in the crew.

He was replaced as Chief Astronaut Joe Acaba, who is at the forefront of the decision-making process.

And it remains for the unlucky astronauts to be part of the crew of the "Artemis 3" mission, which will be the first mission whose members will land on the moon.

The Artemis 3 mission is scheduled to be officially launched at the end of 2025, although the timetable is not settled at this stage.
"Space is complicated," Bill Nelson said Wednesday, "and we have to wait until we can ensure as much safety as possible."

"I'm not too worried about the time. We will only launch at the right time," he added.