Amid the successful mission, Artemis II, Reid Wiseman, the commander, has been grabbing the attention. He lost his mother before his wife's death, and his dad was diagnosed with cancer.
With three other astronauts, Reid Wiseman, the commander of Artemis II, is back on Earth with a Pacific Ocean splashdown. The mission, which was launched back on April 1, 2026, was completed on April 10, 2026, and the preparation for the Artemis III has begun, which is slated to take place in mid-2027.
Amid this, Reid Wiseman has been making headlines not just with his professional achievements but also with his personal life. Apart from being an astronaut, Reid Wiseman is also a single dad who lost his wife back in 2020 due to cancer. Not only that, Reid Wiseman had a back-to-back tough phase in his personal life.
Reid Wiseman married Anne Carroll Taylor Wiseman in 2003. The couple welcomed two daughters, Ellie and Kathrine. Things were going well until 2014, when, during his first spaceflight, his wife, Carroll, was diagnosed with cancer. Carroll, who was a registered nurse at the NICU, battled cancer for five years and passed away on May 17, 2020. Reid was already going through a tough phase back then.
As per the reports, his mother, Judy, passed away only a month before Carroll's demise. His mother was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease and passed away in April 2020. It was a hard time for Reid, who had to take care of his kids single-handedly. 2020 has seemingly been the hardest year for Reid, which marked two of the biggest losses of his life.
And it was in the same year, when his dad, Bill Wiseman was diagnosed with metastatic prostate cancer. Doctors have revealed to Bill Wiseman that his cancer has spread to his back and hip. Well, Bill Wiseman had the wish to watch the Artemis II launch in person, and even though his body had weakened over the years due to medications, he reached Florida before his son, Reid, along with four astronauts, headed to space for the historical lunar flyby. Bill Wiseman and his older son, who is also named Bill, reached Florida on April 1, 2026 to watch Reid flying. Speaking about the same, Reid's sibling, who shared the same name as their father, told The Banner:
"This is what he is living for. The whole concept of going to Cape Canaveral, watching the rocket take off and seeing Reid be the national hero, is just going to be amazing for him."
For Reid Wiseman to be an astronaut was something that was very visible since the time he was a 10-year-old kid, when he would bring models home from a local shop, and fill them with engines to launch them. Well, he completed his graduation from Timonium’s Dulaney High School in 1993, and then, he became a Navy pilot. He was also a test pilot at Naval Air Station Patuxent River.
Following this, his name was announced by NASA as a part of the astronaut program. Five years after the same, Reid Wiseman had his first mission, a 165-day mission to the International Space Station. Today, apart from being the commander of a historical project, he is a dad, a son, and a widower who returned to Earth after naming a lunar crater after his late wife, Carroll.
What do you think about Reid Wiseman, the commander of Artemis II?
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