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NASA has confirmed it is on track to launch its first Moon mission for more than 50 years in April.

Artemis II had originally been scheduled to blast off in March before a helium leak scuppered plans.

When the fault was discovered, the rocket was returned to Cape Canaveral in Florida for repairs.

Now, NASA has confirmed that the rocket will be returned to its launchpad on March 19, ahead of blastoff date of April 1 at the earliest.

Speaking at a press briefing, NASA's John Honeycutt, chair of the mission's management team, emphasised the risks of the mission.

He told reporters: "We want to be sure that we're thinking about everything that can possibly go wrong, and have we assessed and adjudicated all the risks to put us in the best posture to be successful."

"If you look at the data over time, over the lifespan of building new rockets, the data would show you that one out of two is successful. You're only successful 50 per cent of the time. I think we're in a much better position than that," he said.

Three Americans – Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch – and one Canadian, Jeremy Hansen, make up the Artemis II crew.

The crew is set to begin their journey on Nasa's mega Moon rocket, the 98m-tall (322ft) Space Launch System, or SLS.

It has only been flown once before for the Artemis I mission in November 2022, but this was with no people onboard.

They will be seated at the top of the rocket in the Orion capsule, which is the size of a minibus and will be their home for the entirety of the 10-day mission.

The first day of their journey will be spent in orbit around the Earth and, if all systems are working well, the astronauts will head towards the Moon.

This part of the voyage will take about four days, where they will travel around the far side of the Moon, the side we never see from Earth.

They will fly by at a distance of 6,500-9,500km (4,000 to 6,000 miles) above the lunar surface, and will have several hours dedicated to studying and taking images of the Moon.

A four-day journey home will then follow, finishing with a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean.

If the mission is successful, it will pave the way for Artemis III, which will see astronauts set foot on the lunar surface.

The last time humans visited the Moon was in 1972 for the Apollo 17 mission.

NASA says the landing will happen by 2028, but this is a very ambitious timescale.