Artemis II crew returns to Earth

Four astronauts from NASA’s Artemis II mission splashed down in the Pacific Ocean on April 10, ending the first crewed trip around the Moon since Apollo 17 in 1972. (nasa.gov) NASA said Orion landed at 5:07 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time off the California coast after a 10-day mission that launched on April 1. The crew was commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, mission specialist Christina Koch, and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen. (nasa.gov) The spacecraft flew a free-return path, a loop that uses the Moon’s gravity like a slingshot to send a crew around the far side and back toward Earth without going into lunar orbit. NASA said the mission lasted 9 days, 1 hour, and 32 minutes. (nasa.gov) Before re-entry, Orion made a final engine burn, then hit the atmosphere at about 25,000 miles per hour. NASA and outside coverage said the capsule went through a communications blackout lasting about six minutes before parachutes deployed for splashdown. (nasa.gov) (houstonpublicmedia.org) The flight was the first crewed test of the Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft beyond low-Earth orbit, which is the band of space where the International Space Station circles Earth. NASA is using Artemis II to prove those systems can carry people safely into deep space and back before trying a landing mission. (nasa.gov) NASA said the crew set a new distance record for human spaceflight on April 6, reaching 248,655 miles from Earth and passing the mark set by Apollo 13 in 1970. A NASA gallery page later listed the farther record-setting point at 1:56 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time that day. (nasa.gov 1) (nasa.gov 2) The mission also carried firsts for the crew roster. Glover became the first Black astronaut to travel to the Moon, Koch became the first woman to do it, and Hansen became the first Canadian astronaut on a lunar mission. (nasa.gov) Artemis is NASA’s program to return astronauts to the Moon and build up the hardware and operations for later Mars missions. NASA’s Artemis II mission page says the next major step is Artemis III, the planned mission intended to land astronauts near the Moon’s south pole. (nasa.gov) With Orion back on Earth and its heat shield, parachutes, navigation and life-support systems now tested with a crew aboard, NASA moves from proving the ride works to preparing the next one to land. (nasa.gov)