NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman predicted he would one day go to the Moon almost a decade ago, after a fortune cookie told him of a "visit to a strange place."
A resurfaced tweet shows the Artemis II commander with a small piece of paper containing this "prophecy" in 2017. It read: "A visit to a strange place will bring you a new perspective," along with some lucky numbers.
Wiseman shared this photo on X with the caption: "I choose to trust this luck I got tonight. Maybe the Moon or a #JourneyToMars."
While many people see fortune cookies as a game or something to laugh at with friends, this one seems to have predicted his fate.
This week, Wiseman became one of four astronauts to set a new distance record, traveling farther from Earth than anyone else in human history during a massive mission around the dark side of the Moon.
The Orion team completed a six-hour lunar orbit on Monday, becoming the first people in more than half a century to see the far hemisphere of the Moon with the naked eye.
Last night, NASA retweeted Wiseman's historic tweet, adding "Strange Place" and "New Perspective" to show that the prophecy had come true. Space enthusiasts reacted enthusiastically in their comments.
A disaster cookie that came true on a cosmic level! – wrote one.
Nine years later, fate came true in the most epic way – added another.
Some even joked that they had bought lottery tickets with the numbers written on the piece of paper.
The number 47, the first to appear in the fortune card, is considered lucky and of great importance in many cultures. While the number 22 is associated with the ability to turn dreams into reality.
After the maneuver around the Moon and breaking the record of Apollo 13, Wiseman and the Artemis II team are now on their way back to Earth.
One particularly moving moment was the request to name a “bright spot” on the Moon after Wiseman’s late wife, Carroll. This request was made during the lunar orbiter, after they identified several new and unexplained craters.
Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen said during a conversation with mission control:
“Our science team helped us with some fresh craters that didn’t have names. We’d like to suggest some possible names. A few years ago we started this journey in our close astronaut family and lost a loved one. That was Carroll, Reid’s wife, Katie and Ellie’s mother. We want to call the point Carroll.”
The four astronauts hugged in midair, maintaining an emotional silence. The spot is located on the boundary between the near and far sides of the Moon and will occasionally be visible from Earth.
Carroll Taylor Wiseman, a neonatal intensive care unit nurse, died at age 46 in 2020 after a battle with cancer. Since then, Reid Wiseman has been raising their daughters alone.
Before the mission, which included a 730,000-mile (1.1 million km) journey around the moon, Wiseman had discussed the dangers of the journey with his daughters. He said his daughters, though teenagers, understand the risks but share his belief in the importance of exploration and humanity's desire to go beyond the known. /GazetaExpress/
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