The European Space Agency (ESA) is poised to send a German astronaut to the moon as part of NASA’s Artemis program, targeting either the Artemis 4 or Artemis 5 mission. Although ESA has not finalized which mission or astronaut will participate, the agency expressed confidence that one of the two German candidates, Matthias Maurer or Alexander Gerst, will be selected to fly from Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

In recent remarks, Maurer conveyed optimism about a German lunar mission, while Gerst underscored that lunar exploration remains in an early stage and highlighted opportunities for long-term research on the moon. “We plan to conduct long-term research on the moon, so there will be numerous other opportunities for international astronauts in the coming years,” he said.

NASA announced on June 9 that Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano would represent Europe on Artemis 3, scheduled for 2027. However, this particular mission will remain in Earth orbit to perform docking maneuvers with lunar landers rather than proceeding to the lunar surface.

At the International Aerospace Exhibition (ILA) in Berlin, ESA Director-General Josef Aschbacher confirmed that he will decide which German astronaut will join the lunar missions. He also noted ongoing productive discussions with NASA regarding these flights. Earlier claims suggesting that Maurer and Gerst would fly on consecutive missions were later clarified by ESA as preliminary and not definitive.

The Artemis program has experienced multiple delays in the past, but Aschbacher indicated that recent plans for Artemis 4 and Artemis 5 remain unchanged. While NASA holds overall responsibility for the missions, ESA will contribute through hardware components and support.

Both Maurer and Gerst bring extensive spaceflight experience. Gerst previously completed missions to the International Space Station (ISS) in 2014 and 2018, while Maurer flew to the ISS in 2021.

In a separate development, the German aerospace startup Isar Aerospace announced plans to launch the second test flight of its Spectrum rocket. The launch window opens Monday at Andøya Spaceport in Norway, following several months of delays. Designed to place satellites into low-Earth orbit, Spectrum aims to enter the commercial launch market with fewer test flights than competitors like SpaceX, which conducted four test launches before entering service.