NASA has created a new path for astronauts who want to keep shaping human spaceflight without remaining on the agency’s full-time roster. Five months after splashing down from the Moon, Artemis II commander Reid Wiseman and pilot Victor Glover have become NASA’s first astronauts to join its emeritus program.
The move gives both astronauts room to pursue new opportunities while keeping their experience inside NASA’s mission pipeline. They will remain available to train and mentor the current workforce, carrying lessons from Artemis II into the missions that follow.
A New Role After Artemis II
Glover has accepted a full-time administrative leadership position at California Polytechnic State University (Cal Poly) in San Luis Obispo. At the same time, he has committed to NASA as a resource for future Artemis missions, offering knowledge of the Orion spacecraft and its systems.
NASA will issue Glover an access badge, and he plans to be present during training simulation runs. That arrangement keeps him connected to the spacecraft and the teams preparing for the next stages of lunar exploration, even as his primary job moves outside the agency.
“I have asked NASA … to not use the term ‘retire’ as much, but technically emeritus is a retirement program,” Glover said.
He described the program as a structure NASA has typically used for scientists with groundbreaking research who want to return to academia to teach, research, and publish. For Glover, the same idea now creates a bridge between university leadership and human spaceflight operations.
“So I’m not going to be paid for it, but I’ll be able to voluntarily be an advisor or a consultant providing insight into what living in Orion is like,” Glover said. He also described the goal as “building the future of the technical workforce leaders.”
Wiseman Keeps Artemis III in View
Wiseman plans to use his emeritus status to continue sharing his spaceflight experience with his now-former colleagues ahead of Artemis III. The mission is targeted for no earlier than mid-2027, giving NASA time to prepare the crew, spacecraft, and systems for a new test in lunar exploration.
Artemis III will test Orion’s rendezvous and docking capabilities with commercial human landing systems in low-Earth orbit. That operation will place experience from Artemis II directly into the next mission’s training and planning, with Wiseman continuing to contribute after leaving his active NASA role.
The transition follows a series of changes among the Artemis leadership team. On June 9, 2026, Wiseman handed off to Randy Bresnik at Johnson Space Center, while a photo from March 2026 showed Wiseman and Glover together. Kim Shiflett received credit for that photo.
The emeritus program does not erase the astronauts’ connection to NASA. Instead, it gives their knowledge a different route into the workforce, allowing both men to stay available for mentoring, training, and mission support while pursuing employment and opportunities outside the agency.
A Break from NASA’s Old Exit Routes
Before this program, astronauts who wanted to join private industry, run for public office, or return to military service retired from NASA. The agency also kept some astronauts in management, but those astronauts remained at NASA without eligibility for flight assignments.
NASA’s history includes several astronauts who stepped away and later returned, showing that careers in human spaceflight have never followed one straight line:
- Scott Carpenter took a leave from NASA to become an aquanaut in 1965, living on the ocean floor from August to September that year, and then returned to NASA.
- Edward Gibson resigned from NASA after returning to Earth in 1974, when he flew on the third and last Skylab mission, and rejoined the astronaut office three years later. Gibson retired in 1982.
- Tony England was selected as a scientist-astronaut in 1967, left five years later, returned as a mission specialist in 1979, flew on STS-51F in 1985, and retired in 1988.
- Anna Lee Fisher took an extended leave from 1989 to 1995 to raise her family and retired in 2017.
Those examples show why the emeritus designation matters. It recognizes that astronauts can leave active service without losing the expertise built through missions, training, and years of technical work.
Artemis II commander and pilot Reid Wiseman and Victor Glover now hold that distinction as NASA’s first astronaut emeriti. Their next chapter will not follow the old pattern of a clean break; it will keep their experience moving through NASA, Cal Poly, and the teams building Artemis III.
