Parmitano, who will represent the European Space Agency (ESA), is one of four men named as crewmembers and tasked with carrying out Artemis 3, which is targeting launch in 2027.Artemis is a series of missions geared towards returning humans to the Moon, perhaps as soon as 2028.During the NASA unveiling, Parmitano grew emotional as he thanked his family and the space agencies that made his nomination possible.He called Italy his "launchpad" into space and ESA a bridge, dubbing the US space agency NASA "the rocket, figuratively and literally."Three NASA astronauts are also on the crew: Randy Bresnik will command the mission, and Andre Douglas and Frank Rubio round out the rest of the team as mission specialists.This past spring's Artemis 2 mission saw humans conduct a lunar flyby, but the third phase will stay closer to Earth.The primary goals of the trip include testing the abilities of NASA's Orion spacecraft, as well as a rendezvous with lunar landers developed by the private space companies SpaceX and Blue Origin.The timeline of the mission had been thrown into question after the New Glenn rocket developed by Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin exploded during a ground test late last month, damaging the launchpad infrastructure.During Tuesday's event at Houston's Johnson Space Center, John Couluris of Blue Origin acknowledged the "significant anomaly" but insisted they will be ready for Artemis 3 on time."We have redoubled our efforts and are moving forward," he said.Baton handoff