Technologies

NASA Pushes Back Next Moon Landing to Artemis IV Mission

NASA wants its Space Launch System rocket to stop requiring yearslong launch delays.

NASA is shaking up its Artemis program in a big way. The space agency held a press conference on Friday to discuss the continued delays of the Artemis II mission and address various changes to the program, which should help reduce the long waits between launches.

In light of multiple Artemis II delays, NASA believes putting humans back on the moon with Artemis III is too ambitious. It’s now delaying a moon landing until Artemis IV.

The Artemis II mission had been scheduled for launch in February but was pushed back after NASA’s SLS rocket failed its first wet dress rehearsal due to a hydrogen and helium fuel leak. The second test run was more successful, but NASA again delayed the launch due to «helium flow» issues discovered after the test, which required the rocket to return to the hangar for additional repairs.

The new launch date for Artemis II is no earlier than April 1.

Speeding up the Artemis missions

According to NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman, the Artemis II delay stems from the SLS rocket’s extended launch cadence. Isaacman told reporters on Friday that after three years, skills can «atrophy,» and that asking personnel to stick around for years for the next launch is not tenable.

The key to more successful launches is to simply launch more frequently, he said.

«Launching a rocket as complex as the SLS every three years is not a path to success,» Isaacman said during the press conference. «When you are experiencing some of the same issues between launches, you take a close look at your process for remediation, whether you’re getting the true technical root cause, or are you getting close to it.»

For now, NASA is making changes to the agency and the Artemis missions, including shaking up personnel, standardizing the SLS rocket so it can launch more often and getting «back to the basics» to launch missions faster.

The ultimate goal is to have missions ready to launch every 10 months rather than every three years.

When will each Artemis mission launch now?

NASA still intends to put astronauts on the moon by 2028. Here is the new launch schedule for the Artemis missions:

Artemis II: Will launch no earlier than April 1, 2026, and will send astronauts around the moon to conduct tests.
Artemis III: Scheduled launch is mid-2027 to perform tests, connecting with lunar landers in low Earth orbit and testing gear that will go on Artemis IV.
Artemis IV: Scheduled launch is early 2028, and it will send humans back to the moon.
Artemis V: Could launch in late 2028 and send humans to the moon again. If Artemis III and IV are delayed, however, Artemis V will launch in 2029.

What will Artemis III do now?

Now that it’s no longer set to be the moon-landing mission, the new goal of Artemis III is to launch into low-Earth orbit, rendezvous with NASA’s lunar landers, perform tests and learn more about the effects of microgravity on lunar suits.

Per Isaacman, this is in response to concerns raised by NASA’s Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel that the gap in mission objectives between Artemis II and Artemis III was too great, posing a risk to astronauts. The extra test flight will give NASA more data to better protect astronauts when they do go to the moon.

«We did not just jump to Apollo 11, we did it through Mercury, Gemini and lots of Apollo missions with a launch cadence (of) every three months,» Isaacman told reporters.

These discussions have been going on behind closed doors for quite some time, and NASA says that Congress and its commercial partners, like Boeing, are all-in on the new plan.

«As NASA lays out an accelerated launch schedule, our workforce and supply chain are prepared to meet the increased production needs,» said Steve Parker, Boeing’s defense, space and security president and CEO.

Technologies

The FCC Just Approved Charter’s $34.5B Cox Purchase. Here’s What It Means for 37M Customers

Technologies

Spotify Expands Into Audiobook Rankings With Weekly Charts

The feature is available to both free users and Premium subscribers. Wuthering Heights is reaching the heights on both the US and UK charts.

If you’re a Spotify user, you may be familiar with features like the year-end summary Wrapped, as well as your daily usage stats. Now, the service has a new popularity chart tracking audiobooks.

Spotify’s audiobook charts are now available to free and Premium users within the service’s Audiobooks hub. While only Premium users receive 15 hours of audiobook listening per month, the company offers a larger selection of titles you can buy.

US charts and UK charts are both available now.

Read more: Best Music Streaming Services for 2026

Spotify says that the audiobook charts will help customers discover new and popular titles in real time.

«As we’ve proven with Music and Podcasts Charts, when content is easier to access, discover, and enjoy, the demand grows,» said Duncan Bruce, Spotify’s director of audiobook partnerships and licensing, in a statement on Friday.

Spotify launched audiobooks in 2022, and has since added features such as the AI catchup tool Recaps and PageMatch, which lets you swap more easily between a printed book and the audio version.

Spotify Premium currently costs $13 a month and includes more than 100 million songs, as well as audiobooks. Spotify Premium is currently CNET’s Editors’ Choice for best music streaming service.

The current US audiobooks chart lists Emily Brontë’s romantic classic Wuthering Heights as the top listen, followed by James Clear’s self-help book Atomic Habits and Freida McFadden’s psychological thriller The Housemaid. Audiobook popularity is also broken down by genre, with charts for romance, mystery and thriller books, self-help, science fiction and fantasy, biography and memoir, business and careers, teen and young adult, religion and spirituality, history, and parenting and relationships.

Powered by its blockbuster movie adaptation starring Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi, Wuthering Heights also leads the overall chart for the UK.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections: Sports Edition Hints and Answers for Feb. 28, #523

Here are hints and the answers for the NYT Connections: Sports Edition puzzle No. 523, for Saturday, Feb. 28.

Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Connections: Sports Edition is a tough one. Chicagoans and southerners, you might have an advantage, at least with the blue and purple categories. If you’re struggling with today’s puzzle but still want to solve it, read on for hints and the answers.

Connections: Sports Edition is published by The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by The Times. It doesn’t appear in the NYT Games app, but it does in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can play it for free online.

Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta

Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Fore!

Green group hint: Take me out to the ballgame.

Blue group hint: Alma mater.

Purple group hint: Bear down.