When NASA looks for people to send toward the Moon, the search often leads through the high desert of Northern Arizona. The latest contender, geologist and astronaut candidate Lauren Edgar, is not just passing through that landscape, she grew up in it, shaped by a city that has quietly trained generations of lunar explorers. Her story pulls Flagstaff’s long-running role in Moon missions into sharp focus at the very moment the United States is preparing to fly astronauts around the Moon again.
Edgar’s candidacy for a future lunar flight is rooted in a place where volcanic rock, cinder cones, and observatories have doubled as a stand-in for alien worlds for decades. Her path from local kid to NASA scientist and astronaut trainee shows how a town better known to tourists for pine forests and Route 66 has become a pipeline to deep space.
From Flagstaff kid to Moon mission contender
Lauren Edgar’s journey to the astronaut corps began in the shadow of the San Francisco Peaks, where the city of Flagstaff has long embraced its identity as a space town. Edgar is now one of the 10 astronaut candidates NASA is grooming for the Aremis missions, a group that could help steer the next chapter of human exploration beyond low Earth orbit. In local interviews, she has described it as “such an honor to be a part of Flagstaff’s lunar legacy and continue that legacy as we return to the Moon,” a line that captures how she sees her own trajectory as part of a much older story.
Her selection as a Moon mission contender is not happening in a vacuum. Edgar’s training and public profile have been highlighted in coverage that emphasizes her deep ties to the city and its space community, including the way neighbors and former mentors have rallied around her candidacy. One report on her background notes that “Jack was a really instrumental part of her life,” a reference to a local supporter whose encouragement helped keep her on the science track, and quotes family members saying, “We’re here for her,” as she moves through the demanding astronaut pipeline linked to Moon missions.
Flagstaff’s quiet power in the Apollo era
To understand why Edgar talks about a “lunar legacy,” it helps to look back to the 1960s, when Northern Arizona became a proving ground for Apollo. In that period, the region’s volcanic fields and impact-like craters were turned into outdoor classrooms where astronauts learned to read rocks and navigate rough terrain. Reporting from VOA notes that Northern Arizona played an influential role in Apollo Moon missions, with training sites and the Astrogeology Science Center helping crews prepare for the real lunar surface.
That history is not just anecdotal pride. Local tourism and civic groups have cataloged the Lunar Legacy Milestones, pointing out that from 1961 to 1969, Artists worked with scientists at Lowell Observatory to create detailed lunar maps that guided Apollo landings. Another summary of those years underscores that Northern Arizona’s landscapes and research institutions were central to the way astronauts learned to think like field geologists, a tradition that now shapes how NASA trains crews for modern missions at the Astrogeology Science Center highlighted by Voice of America.
“Every astronaut” and the modern training ground
Flagstaff’s influence did not end when Apollo splashed down. Local leaders now point out that “Every astronaut who has ever been to the Moon has trained here in Flag,” a striking claim that underscores how deeply the city is woven into NASA’s playbook for human exploration. That line appears in coverage of a recent community event celebrating Edgar’s selection, where residents were reminded that their hometown has been a recurring stop for Moon-bound crews linked to NASA.
The same reporting notes that NASA Moon mission candidate has deep ties to Flagstaff, and that the city’s training sites remain active as the agency prepares for the next wave of lunar flights. Video segments on that celebration show residents gathered around Edgar and her family, with banners referencing the Moon and the city’s long record of astronaut visits. That continuity, from Apollo to Artemis, is part of what gives Edgar’s story such resonance for locals who have watched training exercises unfold on nearby cinder cones for decades.
Artemis, SLS and the new race around the Moon
Edgar’s candidacy is unfolding as NASA reshapes its strategy for sending people beyond low Earth orbit. The agency’s Artemis II mission, scheduled to launch in February 2026, will send a four person crew around the Moon without landing, a test flight that analysts say will demonstrate how U.S. space strategy has changed since Apollo. A detailed explainer on Why Artemis II notes that Artemis II will not land on the Moon, but Its role is to prove that the new systems can safely carry astronauts on deep space journeys.
Hardware for that effort is already moving into place. NASA has just moved its giant rocket, called the Space Launch System, or SLS, to the launch pad in Cape Canaveral, Florida, a milestone captured in a short video that shows the towering booster creeping toward the pad. Another clip of the same rollout, shared through a separate reel, underscores how the Space Launch System and SLS branding are now part of the public face of Artemis, a program that will rely on astronauts like Edgar who are comfortable bridging field geology and high tech spacecraft operations.
Edgar’s Mars years and what they mean for the Moon
Before Edgar was a Moon mission contender, she spent nearly two decades helping NASA explore another world. The 17 years preceding her work on Artemis were focused on supporting the Mars Curiosity rover and Mars Explorati missions, where she helped interpret images and data streaming back from the Red Planet. A profile of her career notes that Lauren Edgar’s experience with Mars Curiosity and Mars Explorati has made her a go to resource for NASA engineers, mission teams and astronauts, a background that now feeds directly into how she approaches training for Artemis.
That Mars experience is one reason local coverage has framed her as a particularly strong candidate among the 10 astronaut trainees being considered for Aremis missions. A video segment on her background describes how Lauren Edgar is one of the 10 astronaut candidates for the Aremis missions and notes that She has already spent years translating planetary science into practical guidance for crews, a skill set that will be vital as NASA sends people back to the Moon and eventually on to Mars.
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