Artemis II Crew Share Group Hug After Naming Moon Crater After Crewmate’s Late Wife
“A number of years ago, we started this journey in our close-knit astronaut family and we lost a loved one.”
April 6 marked a landmark day for the Artemis II mission on multiple fronts.
The four-person crew surpassed the record distance from Earth of 248,655 miles—a mark that had stood since the Apollo 13 mission set it in 1970.
That same day, the crew discovered two unnamed, relatively fresh craters on the lunar surface during their historic flyby.
The Artemis II crew—Commander Reid Wiseman, Mission Pilot Victor Glover, Crew Specialist Christina Hammock Koch and Mission Specialist Jeremy Hansen—proposed names for both newly identified craters, though the designations are not yet official.
Proposals must be formally submitted to the International Astronomical Union (IAU), the governing body for naming celestial bodies and their surface features, after the mission concludes.
Carroll Crater: A bright spot on the moon
The first crater sits between the craters Orientale and Ohm on the far side of the moon. The crew proposed naming it Integrity, after their spacecraft.
The second crater carries a more personal significance. Located near the boundary of the far side of the moon, it was proposed to be named Carroll in honor of Carroll Wiseman, the late wife of Reid Wiseman.
The Carroll crater is visible from Earth during certain times of the lunar cycle—a detail that became central to the emotional moment aboard the spacecraft.
“If you want to find this one, you look at Glushko, and it’s just to the northwest of that, at the same latitude as Ohm, and it’s a bright spot on the Moon. And we would like to call it Carroll,” Hansen said in the announcement.
Artemis II crew share group hug aboard the spacecraft
Hansen, who was visibly emotional over the radio, announced the Carroll crater naming on April 6.
In his remarks, Hansen provided specific coordinates relative to well-known lunar features, offering fellow observers a way to locate the crater:
“A number of years ago, we started this journey in our close-knit astronaut family and we lost a loved one. And there is a feature in a really neat place on the Moon, and it is on the nearside/farside boundary,” he said of the crater.
“In fact, it’s just on the nearside of that boundary, and so at certain times of the Moon’s transit around Earth, we will be able to see this from Earth,” he added.
Wiseman wiped tears as Hansen spoke, then placed his hand on Hansen’s shoulder. All four crew members shared a group hug shortly after. The moment was captured in a video posted to NASA’s Instagram account.
Carroll Wiseman was a NICU and pediatric nurse
Carroll Taylor Wiseman was born in Virginia Beach, Virginia, and graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University as a pediatric nurse practitioner.
She dedicated her career to working as a newborn intensive care unit (NICU) registered nurse, serving at Children’s Hospital of the King’s Daughters in Norfolk, Virginia.
She also worked as a school nurse in Patuxent River, Maryland and Friendswood, Texas, near NASA.
Carroll Wiseman died on May 17, 2020, at age 46 after a five-year battle with cancer, according to her obituary.
She was survived by husband Reid, daughters Katey and Ellie, her parents, a brother, a sister and seven nieces and nephews.
Reid Wiseman dedicates lunar flyby to his two daughters
Reid Wiseman was 44 years old when he lost his wife. He has been a single father to his two daughters since Carroll’s passing—something he describes as his “greatest challenge and most rewarding phase of life.”
Just before the mission launched, he shared a selfie on Instagram with his now-teenage daughters and the spacecraft, writing “I’m boarding that rocket a very proud father.”
He also revealed that he spoke to his daughters about death in case things go wrong during the mission.
“I told them, ‘Here’s where the will is, here’s where the trust documents are, and if anything happens to me, here’s what’s going to happen to you,” Wiseman said, per Daily Mail.
“I actually wish more people in everyday life talked to their families in that way because you never know what the next day is going to bring,” he added.
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