An April 18 notification from the Coast Guard Reserve warned that a data exposure discovered Jan. 24 distributed the private material to “individuals with no authority to view the information,” a retired Coast Guardsman, who received the notification and spoke on the condition of anonymity, told Military Times.

The incident, which affected 10,700 Coast Guard Reserve members, occurred amid a push from the White House to have the maritime service bolster cybersecurity at American ports.

The Coast Guard said that the home addresses of 7,554 individuals, and the names and employee identification numbers of another 3,146, inadvertently were released. A review by the service of the incident revealed that a document used for internal processes had a separate tab that contained the info, which went to the personal email addresses of 85 Coast Guard Reserve members, it said.

“No incidents of fraud have been reported to the Coast Guard related to this incident,” the service said, which outlined steps it is taking to ensure similar events do not occur.

The office where the incident originated has since removed the separate tab in the document that contained the personally identifiable info, Coast Guard officials said, adding that the unnamed individual who caused the privacy incident received additional training on properly safeguarding such sensitive information.

When asked why it waited nearly three months to inform those impacted of the incident, the Coast Guard said those who improperly received the personal info “immediately” notified the service’s privacy office, which began the process of notifying those affected once the full extent of the privacy incident was determined.

In its notification, the Coast Guard encouraged those affected to vigilantly review their credit reports and to contact one of the major credit reporting agencies to place a fraud alert on credit files in order to ensure protection from potential identity theft.

In an era in which highly classified military documents can be illegally shared on a social media platform, the Department of Defense is no stranger to having sensitive personal information incorrectly disseminated online. Security breaches that compromise the data of current and former troops have also occurred among the Army National Guard, the Marine Corps Reserve and the Navy. And earlier this year, DefenseScoop reported that the Pentagon was in the process of alerting thousands that their data may have been exposed during a breach the year prior.

A 2020 report by Rand Corp. on the data needs of the Coast Guard noted that personnel data can be particularly sensitive, and as a result represent an especially attractive target for malicious actors.

But as the Coast Guard reviews how it manages the security of its own personnel’s private information, it also faces a task from the White House to take on more responsibility responding to malicious cyber activity against U.S. ports, according to a fact sheet released less than a month after the recent breach occurred.

An executive order issued by President Joe Biden in February provides the Coast Guard with more authority to control the movement of vessels that present a known, or suspected, cyber threat to U.S. maritime infrastructure, the fact sheet said.

The Coast Guard has acknowledged a surge in cyber threats that aim to disrupt systems among U.S. vessels, shipyards, waterways and port facilities. A 2023 Coast Guard Cyber Command report outlines that the uptick of reported threats on critical infrastructure has included attacks believed to involve a China-sponsored group.

“The consequences of a cyber attack on the port infrastructure extend far beyond financial losses,” Rear Adm. John Vann, commander of Coast Guard Cyber Command, said in a release earlier this month. “Disruptions to the supply chain can have cascading effects on global economies, impacting industries and livelihoods.”

The Coast Guard has three active duty cyber protection teams and one reserve team, which hunt for bad nation-state actors, the release said. The service will also soon begin training its 1,200 active duty Marine Science Technicians, it added, who will likely become the first line of defense in spotting cyber issues.

U.S. Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East, said the missile that launched from Yemen by the Iranian-backed group appeared to be aimed at the American vessel M/V Yorktown. The Mason and the Navy warship Laboon were escorting it through the region’s precarious waters when the attack occurred.

“There were no injuries or damage reported by U.S., coalition, or commercial ships,” CENTCOM said in the statement.

The incident marks at least the ninth engagement for the Mason since the Houthis began their campaign of assaults in the fall on commercial and military ships, and one of the few times in recent months that officials revealed a U.S. merchant vessel was likely a direct target.

An announcement on the latest skirmish came the same day that CENTCOM shared the U.S. redirected thousands of weapons to Ukraine earlier this month, which it seized from an Iranian group attempting to smuggle the munitions to the Houthis.

Among other episodes for the Mason in the ongoing conflict, back in February, it shot down an anti-ship ballistic missile that CENTCOM said likely targeted the American tanker M/V Torm Thor. The destroyer also participated in January in downing a barrage of drones and missiles fired into the Red Sea.

The Department of Defense also acknowledged that an American MQ-9 Reaper drone went down on Monday in the Red Sea off the coast of Houthi-controlled areas in Yemen.

“Initial indications are that it was shot down by a Houthi surface-to-air missile,” Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said Tuesday during a press briefing, adding that at that time it had not been recovered.

The Navy and coalition partners remain engaged with Houthi militants as the group continues to launch attacks against military and commercial vessels in the region.

The Houthis shot down another MQ-9 in November, according to The Associated Press.

Over the last few days, U.S. forces struck a number of anti-ship cruise missiles, mobile unmanned surface vessels and one-way attack unmanned aerial vehicles launched by the militant group from Yemen, as well as the unmanned underwater vessel, which CENTCOM said was taken out on February 17.

Early Tuesday morning, the Navy destroyer Laboon identified an anti-ship cruise missile headed in its direction, which it subsequently shot down. That marks at least nine confirmed incidents the Laboon has participated in.

Some of the recent attacks by the Iran-backed Houthis have involved U.S.-owned commercial ships, which experienced minor damages. CENTCOM admonished the Houthis for such attacks, noting that they have exacerbated already high levels of humanitarian need in Yemen.

Earlier this month, a Defense Intelligence Agency report confirmed that Houthi forces have employed various missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles from Iran in their regional attacks.

Please review this tracker report for up-to-date information regarding the ongoing series of engagements between the U.S. Navy and the Houthis.

Military Times’ Pentagon bureau chief Meghann Myers contributed to this story.

The youngest branch of the armed forces has lacked its own part-time workforce since its creation in 2019. That changed as part of the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act, signed into law by President Joe Biden in December.

The move is part of the Space Force’s broader vision to adapt military service to the needs of modern Americans. Eliminating the traditional component structure, which separates troops serving on active duty from those in Reserve or Guard units, aims to offer more flexibility for those looking to serve their country and ultimately keep them in uniform longer.

“When fully implemented, this new construct will allow us to manage our military force more effectively, improve quality of life and retention, and capitalize on skill sets developed outside the military to continue delivering unmatched space capabilities,” Maj. Tanya Downsworth, a Space Force spokesperson, told Military Times via email.

Now the service begins the difficult work of figuring out how to make the legislation a reality for the 9,000 or so uniformed guardians under its purview, as well as Air Force Reservists in space-related jobs. A phased implementation is expected to last five years.

“We’re looking at the language to make sure we exactly understand how to move forward,” Chief Master Sergeant of the Space Force John Bentivegna told Military Times in a Jan. 11 interview. “What does it mean to be part-time? What benefits do you have? … How do we promote? How do we select? What does that look like? We’re working through that right now.”

The Space Force works to protect American interests in space and supports military operations around the globe through a vast network of satellites and radars on Earth and in orbit.

As the new service shapes a workforce separate from and much smaller than the other armed forces, it has seized on an opportunity to avoid pitfalls that have accompanied transitions in and out of the Reserve components.

Last year, the federally funded think tank Rand Corp. found retention issues linked to persistent transition challenges for guardians moving to and from part-time roles in the other services — like the Air National Guard or the Air Force Reserve — from reappointment and pay delays to complications with benefits and medical coverage.

Now, as the Space Force prepares to continue expanding its workforce — the only branch Congress has allowed to grow in fiscal year 2024 — guardians will see new options to create their ideal career with potentially fewer headaches.

According to the 2024 NDAA, those on active duty in the Space Force will become classified as serving on “sustained duty,” a regular, full-time status; or as “not on sustained duty,” a part-time position.

Part-timers must still participate in at least 48 scheduled drills or training periods each year, and serve on active duty for at least 14 days (excluding travel time) per year; or serve on active duty for training for up to 30 days each year, according to the law.

The legislation also establishes the designation of “inactive status” for guardians. That would be similar to the Individual Ready Reserve that already exists in other services as an additional pool of people who can be called up in an emergency, Downsworth said.

It’s unclear how many guardians will be expected to serve on full-time, part-time or inactive status at any given time, she added. Air Force Reservists who work in space roles can also opt to transfer into the space service.

Officials hope the new model will attract more recruits in an already highly competitive field. The Space Force and Marine Corps — the nation’s two smallest military services — were the Pentagon’s only branches to meet their recruiting targets in fiscal year 2023. The Space Force plans to grow to 9,400 uniformed guardians by the end of September 2024.

Bentivegna believes more people could opt to join and stay in a service that doesn’t offer such a stark choice between staying and leaving when “life happens.”

“A lot of our part-timers will probably be in their normal job … in the space industry somewhere, or the cyber industry or the intelligence agencies,” he said. “How do we keep leveraging that and bring them back and forth in a way that makes sense?”

The new setup could lead to changes at the operational units, too. For instance, Bentivegna said, the policies could blur the lines between units such as the active duty 2nd Space Operations Squadron and the Reserve 19th Space Operations Squadron, which run GPS satellites from Schriever Space Force Base, Colorado.

“In many ways, I think that Space Force is rightly going to serve as a microcosm, [a] testbed for the larger military in figuring out how to create a more modern personnel system and a true continuum of service,” Todd Harrison, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, told Military Times.

He added that the “bold new direction” will allow Space Force to continue being selective about who it brings in for its often technical, highly specialized jobs. Still, he acknowledged questions remain about how to implement the new model.

Bill Woolf, who heads the nonprofit Space Force Association, argued that a part-time workforce will make it simpler to leverage the expertise of troops who the service may not need continuous access to, but who are still worth keeping on the bench.

“Career flexibility seems to be important for young people these days,” he said in a statement to Military Times. “No other service will be able to offer this kind of flexibility.”

Is a Space National Guard still on the table?

The move to a hybrid workforce of guardians comes amid a long-running fight to create a separate Space National Guard, which proponents have pushed to become the Space Force’s primary combat reserve.

Air Force Brig. Gen. Mike Bruno, the chair of the space task force at the National Guard Association of the United States, told Military Times that the choice to pursue the non-component structure is untested and “ignores the proven history of the National Guard.” He noted his views do not necessarily reflect the Air Force, the Department of Defense or the Colorado National Guard, where he works as the director of the Joint Staff.

Nearly 1,000 National Guard soldiers and airmen perform space-related operations across more than a dozen units in seven states and one U.S. territory, according to the association. They manage missile warning systems, maintain systems that counter electromagnetic attacks and work with military communications satellites, among other missions.

Bruno also suggested that by creating a Space National Guard, the service could further leverage the Guard’s existing state partnership program to advance the space capabilities of foreign militaries.

Lawmakers from Colorado, a longstanding seat of military space operations, heavily favor the creation of a Space National Guard and supported language to do so that was scrapped from the new defense policy law.

Their advocacy comes amid an ongoing battle to retain the headquarters of the now fully operational U.S. Space Command, the joint combatant command in charge of daily space operations, in Colorado rather than move it to Alabama.

Harrison and others who oppose a distinct National Guard component for the Space Force argue it makes “zero sense.” Governors do not need control over the military space capabilities that currently belong to state Guards, he said, because they are “inherently global and … have to be managed at a national level.”

Critics also argue that the bureaucratic and financial costs of standing up an independent Space National Guard are simply not worth it.

“Adding a Space National Guard is like the antithesis of being lean,” Harrison said, arguing it would contradict the streamlined organization for which leaders have advocated.

A 2020 Congressional Budget Office analysis considered a smaller and larger version of a Space National Guard, estimating those options would cost about $100 million to $500 million each year. The White House Office of Management and Budget has also estimated it could cost up to $500 million annually to launch a Space National Guard.

Others, however, have contested the actual cost would be far lower. The National Guard Bureau pegged the price at only $250,000, according to Bruno, which he said would go toward tasks like changing building signage.

The 2024 NDAA instructed the Pentagon to again dig into the feasibility and cost of moving space functions conducted by the Air National Guard to the Space Force. An interim briefing is due to Congress no later than Feb. 1, followed by a final, unclassified report by March 1.

Congress has also requested that the Department of the Air Force, which includes the Space Force, submit a report by Aug. 31 detailing how its forces will evolve through 2050.

The status of the other seven airmen who were aboard the aircraft, as well as what caused the incident, remained unclear. The crew was assigned to the Air Force’s 353rd Special Operations Wing at Yokota Air Base outside Tokyo.

The mishap is the latest fatal incident involving a U.S.-owned Osprey, in which dozens of service members have been injured or killed in accidents around the world over the past three decades.

Four fatal Osprey crashes, including Wednesday’s accident, have claimed the lives of at least 13 American troops in the past two years.

This is the first fatal incident involving an Air Force-owned CV-22 since 2010, and potentially the service’s deadliest accident since 2018, when nine Puerto Rico Air National Guard troops died in a WC-130 weather reconnaissance plane crash.

What is the CV-22 Osprey?

The CV-22 Osprey that went down Wednesday is a variant of the V-22 model produced through a partnership between Boeing and Textron’s Bell.

The tiltrotor aircraft — known for its towering nacelles that allow it to launch and land like a helicopter, and speed forward like a fixed-wing plane — began entering the U.S. inventory in 1999 with the Marine Corps MV-22.

That program started as a behind-schedule, over-budget invention that claimed dozens of lives during development. In the decades since, Ospreys have proven valuable for their speed and versatility, flying faster than conventional helicopters to approach enemies from unexpected angles or rush wounded troops to emergency care.

The Air Force received its first combat-ready CV-22 in 2007, and the Navy’s CMV-22 variant took flight in 2020 and deployed with carrier air wings in 2021. None of the sea service’s Ospreys have been involved in fatal mishaps. Japan’s military operates its own Ospreys as well.

The U.S. military now owns hundreds of Ospreys, largely operated by the Marines. Air Force special operations units use the CV-22 to slip in and out of areas without established runways, where fixed-wing planes may not be able to land with troops and supplies.

Ospreys can carry nearly three dozen service members or 10,000 pounds of cargo at a time, according to an Air Force fact sheet. Each is armed with a .50-caliber machine gun, and cost $90 million apiece as of 2020.

The Yokota-based unit involved in the most recent mishap activated squadrons in 2019 to operate and maintain CV-22 Ospreys as part of the Pentagon’s growing footprint in the Pacific.

But the technological advancements that the V-22 fleets brought to combat and training are still shadowed by concerns about the platform’s longevity and safety.

“CV-22 readiness keeps me up at night,” then-Col. Dale White, who oversaw acquisition and sustainment for the Air Force’s special operations platforms, said in 2019. “It’s not what it needs to be. It’s a tough platform to maintain.”

What problems has the Osprey faced lately?

A combination of pilot error and mechanical failures have contributed to periodic Osprey crashes that, when fatal, have killed multiple troops at once. The military has recently turned its focus to tackling a problem known as a “hard clutch engagement.”

Last year, Air Force Special Operations Command temporarily grounded its Ospreys following back-to-back safety incidents in which the Osprey’s clutch temporarily slipped and then re-engaged, causing an uneven distribution of power to its massive rotors. Such slips can cause the aircraft to lurch dangerously.

A hard clutch engagement on both sides of a Marine Corps MV-22 Osprey in June 2022 led to a crash that killed five Marines in California.

Then in February, the V-22 Joint Program Office — which manages the tri-service fleet — grounded an undisclosed number of Ospreys with more than 800 flight hours to replace aging clutch-related components.

The office claimed in July it had reduced the likelihood of hard clutch engagements, or HCEs, by 99%.

“The V-22 community executed 22,258 flight hours between Feb. 3, 2023 and July 19, 2023, with zero HCE events,” the Joint Program Office said at the time.

The following month, three Marines were killed when their Osprey crashed in northern Australia. The Marine Corps is still investigating what caused the accident.

“I wouldn’t right now apply a sweeping broad stroke across every incident linking them together,” Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said when asked in August whether a clutch malfunction was to blame for those fatalities.

It’s unclear whether Wednesday’s crash involved a hard clutch engagement.

According to the Associated Press, Japanese news outlet NHK quoted a local resident as saying he saw the aircraft turned upside down, with fire coming from one of its engines, and then an explosion before it fell to the sea.

A non-exhaustive history of Osprey accidents

• October 2023: A Marine was injured after a Marine Corps MV-22B Osprey experienced a hard landing during a training event in Nevada. “Initial assessments indicate the incident was likely not mechanical in nature,” a Marine Corps spokesman said in October.
• September 2023: Three Marine Corps Ospreys diverted from scheduled flight paths in a single week due to “caution indications” in the cockpit. The service said the warnings did not appear to be prompted by clutch issues.
• August 2023: Three Marines were killed in an MV-22 Osprey crash in Australia during a multinational training exercise.
• October 2022: The engine of an Marine Corps Osprey caught fire during training at Air Station Miramar, California. No one was injured.
• Summer 2022: Air Force Special Operations Command’s CV-22 Osprey aircraft face two hard clutch engagement problems.
• June 2022: A problem with the clutch of an MV-22 Osprey aircraft caused the June 2022 crash that killed five Marines, according to a Marine Corps investigation released this July.
• March 2022: Marine Corps aviation investigators have determined that a fatal March 18 MV-22B Osprey crash near Bodo, Norway, that killed four Marines was pilot error.
• September 2017: Two service members were injured when a Marine MV-22B made a hard landing in Syria.
• August 2017: Three Marines were killed when their MV-22B Osprey crashed off Queensland, Australia.
• May 2015: Marine Corps officials determined that decisions made by pilots in low-visibility conditions contributed to an MV-22B Osprey crash in Hawaii that left two dead and 20 more injured.
• October 2014: One Marine died when he jumped from an MV-22B Osprey that nearly crashed shortly after taking off from the flight deck of an amphibious assault ship. The Defense Department reclassified his death as one that occurred in support of the military’s effort to combat the Islamic State group, making him the first official casualty of Operation Inherent Resolve.
• June 2012: Five airmen were injured when a CV-22 was destabilized by the wake of another Osprey near Hurlburt Field, Florida.
• April 2012: Two Marines died and two were severely injured when an MV-22 Osprey crashed in a Moroccan military training area while participating in a bilateral exercise.
• April 2010: A CV-22 Osprey accident near Qalat, Afghanistan, killed four people and injured 16 of the 20 onboard.
• April 2000: An MV-22 Osprey crash at Marana Regional Airport in Arizona killed 19 Marines.

Marine Corps Times reporter Irene Loewenson contributed to this story.

For years, a misspelling of “.MIL” in the suffix of military email addresses as “.ML” — the country domain for Mali — unintentionally led to a “typo leak,” according to The Financial Times, which first reported the story. As a result, everything from diplomatic documents, tax returns, passwords and travel details of top officers has been exposed, the outlet noted.

None of the emails are said to be classified.

Department of Defense spokesperson Lt. Cmdr. Tim Gorman told Military Times via email the department “is aware” of the issue and “takes all unauthorized disclosures of Controlled National Security Information or Controlled Unclassified Information seriously.”

A Dutch entrepreneur contracted to manage Mali’s domain, Johannes Zuurbier, identified the leak, Financial Times said.

“This risk is real and could be exploited by adversaries of the US,” he wrote to the outlet.

Authority over the .ML domain, Financial Times reported, is set to soon revert from Zuurbier to Mali’s government, which of late has grown its relationship with Russia. The West African nation may now have additional means to cozy up to the long-time U.S. competitor.

Russia and other world powers prod U.S. networks to gain an unvarnished look at weapons and modernization projects, troop movements and other potentially jeopardizing secrets.

The Defense Department has since 2015 experienced more than 12,000 cyber incidents, with yearly totals declining as of 2017, according to the Government Accountability Office, a federal watchdog.

Among the reported contents of the erroneously addressed emails were: X-rays and medical data, identity document information, crew lists for ships, staff lists at bases, maps of installations, photos of bases, naval inspection reports, contracts, criminal complaints against personnel, internal investigations into bullying, official travel itineraries, bookings as well as tax and financial records.

One misdirected email included travel plans for Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville and his delegation for a then-upcoming visit to Indonesia in May, Financial Times reported.

The Pentagon is already dealing with the fallout of a military documents breach. Massachusetts Air National Guard member Jack Teixeira is accused of accessing, keeping and sharing classified national defense information, including insights concerning the Russia-Ukraine war. He pleaded not guilty to charges in June.

“As you’ve seen from when we had our first unauthorized disclosure from earlier this year we’ve implemented policy and training mechanisms,” Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh said during a July 17 briefing. While the Pentagon bounces emails sent to the Mali “.ML” address, contact made via personal accounts do not offer the same protection, she added.

“None of the leaked emails that were reported came from a DoD email address,” Singh said, adding that the department discourages individuals from using personal emails or credentials for official work.

The American military is not the only one to fall victim to the spelling blunder, Financial Times reported. Emails meant for the Dutch military, which uses “army.nl,” were also unintentionally sent to Mali thanks to a mistaken “army.ml” in the email domain.

Embassies in Washington for Mali and the Netherlands did not immediately respond to a request for comment made by Military Times.

The Pentagon said after an initial 45-day review that the “overwhelming majority” of those at DoD with access to classified information are following the rules, but the department’s analysis still led to several recommendations.

The findings revealed there was not a “single point of failure,” a defense official told reporters Wednesday, who spoke on the condition of anonymity under rules set by the Pentagon.

In April, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin directed the internal department review to take place when Airman 1st Class Jack Teixeira, a member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard, was arrested and accused of unauthorized disclosure of national defense information. Teixeira pleaded not guilty in June to federal felony charges.

Two commanders in the Massachusetts Air National Guard received a temporary suspension in connection with the federal investigation into Teixeira, and the Air Force also revoked their access to classified networks and information, Air Force Times previously reported.

An investigation into the leak that is being conducted by the Air Force Inspector General is still in process at this time.

The recommendations from the DoD review, which were approved by Austin, include deadlines and plans to ensure personnel are included and accounted for in designated security information technology systems and that personnel have a valid non-disclosure agreement on file, according to a June 30 Pentagon memo. Additionally, it proposes plans to establish a new DoD office to monitor insider threats.

A growing number of military facilities that handle classified information in part have prompted the need for consistent and understandable standards, the defense official told reporters.

“We are no longer just talking about a small number of facilities primarily in intelligence community buildings,” the official said. “I think we have a real opportunity to clarify and make consistent the expectations across the services.

Navy Capt. Gregory “Reid” Wiseman will serve as the commander for the Artemis II mission, scheduled for November 2024 at the earliest. The journey will mark the first crewed lunar mission for the space agency since the Apollo program ended in 1972.

Wiseman is set to be joined by Navy Capt. Victor Glover, who will serve as the flight crew’s pilot, as well as NASA astronaut Christina Koch and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen, a colonel in the Canadian Armed Forces.

“Together, we are ushering in a new era of exploration for a new generation of star sailors and dreamers — the Artemis generation,” NASA administrator Bill Nelson said at a news conference at NASA Johnson Space Center’s Ellington Field in Houston, Texas.

On their roughly 10-day mission, the crew will orbit the moon aboard an Orion spacecraft using a Space Launch System rocket. NASA test launched the space capsule back in November 2022.

The Artemis program looks to build toward further moon missions later this decade, which NASA says will include landing the first woman and person of color on the lunar surface. The space agency is targeting a 2025 launch date for that mission, known as Artemis III.

Before being selected as an astronaut in 2009, Wiseman commissioned to the sea service through the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps in 1997, according to his NASA biography. The Baltimore, Maryland, native deployed twice to the Middle East and later served as a Navy test pilot. More recently, he held the most senior position among NASA’s astronaut corps.

This will be Wiseman’s second trip to space after serving aboard the International Space Station in 2014. It will also be his fellow naval aviator Glover’s second space flight, having previously piloted NASA’s SpaceX Crew-1.

Prior to being selected as an astronaut in 2013, Glover deployed in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom, later becoming a test pilot, according to his NASA biography. The California native has accumulated 3,000 flight hours in more than 40 aircraft, over 400 carrier arrested landings and 24 combat missions.

Of the 41 active NASA astronauts, more than half have at least some military experience. Across the services’ components, at least 10 space explorers have or are serving with the Navy, six with the Army, four with the Marine Corps and seven between the Air Force and Space Force.

Liftoff occurred at 12:34 a.m. Eastern time from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, according to a release from the space agency. This was the second attempt to get the mission off the ground after a planned launch on Monday was scrubbed just before liftoff.

Using the SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft, which is powered by a Falcon 9 rocket, the SpaceX Crew-6 team became the the sixth group of astronauts to go into space as a part of NASA’s commercial crew program. The group will spend six months at the space station conducting a variety of experiments before returning to Earth.

“Crew-6 will be busy aboard the International Space Station, conducting over 200 experiments that will help us to prepare for missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond, as well as improve life here on Earth,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said in the statement. “We look forward to seeing all that they accomplish.”

Retired submarine officer Capt. Stephen Bowen, who has made three prior trips into space, is leading the mission. Once aboard the station, Bowen will serve as an Expedition 69 flight engineer.

Bowen is joined by fellow NASA astronaut Warren “Woody” Hoburg, Sultan Al Neyadi from the United Arab Emirates and Russian cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev, all first-time space flyers.

The Crew-6 team is scheduled to dock at the space station during the early morning hours Friday. They will replace the outgoing Crew-5 team, led by Marine Col. Nicole Mann, which docked at the space station in October 2022.

The next team of astronauts that will grace the stars, with the SpaceX Crew-7 mission, will be commanded by Marine Corps Lt. Col. Jasmin Moghbeli.

Early this morning NASA successfully launched its Artemis 1 rocket, blasting the U.S. onto a path to reach the moon’s lunar surface for the first time in 50 years.

Liftoff occurred at 1:47 a.m. local time from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, with engines finally roaring after a few previous attempts that were delayed due to technical difficulties and because of Hurricane Ian.

Using the powerful 322-foot Space Launch System rocket for the first time, and carrying the unmanned Orion spacecraft, the test flight set off on its 25-plus day journey around the moon.

After traveling a total distance of 1.3 million miles, NASA expects the capsule to splash down on Dec. 11 in the Pacific Ocean — off the coast of San Diego — at roughly 24,500 miles per hour (Mach 32).

“What an incredible sight to see NASA’s Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft launch together for the first time,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said in a statement. “This uncrewed flight test will push Orion to the limits in the rigors of deep space, helping us prepare for human exploration on the Moon and, ultimately, Mars.”

Over the course of the mission, the rocket will travel 280,000 miles from Earth and 40,000 miles beyond the far side of the Moon, flying longer than any human spacecraft before it and returning home faster and hotter than ever before, according to NASA. And while there are no individuals onboard, a few mannequins have been slotted in as passengers to gather data that can be applied to a future crew.

“We’re witnessing history as Artemis I brings us one significant step closer to making NASA’s vision for human deep space exploration a reality,” Robert Lightfoot, executive vice president of Lockheed Martin Space, said in a news release. “Through a nationwide industry team that has also leveraged an international industrial base, this launch and mission unite the skills of a dedicated workforce and innovative technologies to make a global impact.”

The mission serves as a test ahead of a future crewed Artemis mission, which NASA says will land the first woman and first person of color on the moon as early as 2024. The last time NASA sent astronauts to the moon was during the Apollo 17 mission in December 1972.

One of the astronauts onboard that eventual lunar flight, which plans to take four total crew members, could be Marine Col. Nicole Mann, who recently led the SpaceX Crew-5 team to the International Space Station.

Last year, NASA’s Office of Inspector General projected the total cost for the Artemis program to be $93 billion by 2025.

“The legacy that this professional crew put together in getting us to this day over the years is a legacy that indeed has been well earned and will continue as we now explore the heavens, as we go back to the moon and then we go to Mars,” Nelson said in a post-launch news conference.

Those interested in tracking the Orion spacecraft on its journey can do so on the NASA website.