Four astronauts are back home after a daring ride around the Moon
The Orion capsule endured 5,000°F reentry after carrying astronauts 252,756 miles from Earth.
NASA's Artemis II mission has successfully concluded, marking humanity's first crewed return to lunar vicinity in over 50 years. The Orion spacecraft, named Integrity, safely splashed down in the Pacific Ocean southwest of San Diego on Friday evening after a daring reentry. Slamming into the atmosphere at nearly 25,000 mph, the capsule endured temperatures of 5,000°F, causing a six-minute communications blackout before its three massive 10,500-square-foot parachutes deployed to slow its descent. The four astronauts—commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, mission specialist Christina Koch, and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen—were recovered in good health by the USS John P. Murtha, capping a near-flawless 10-day test flight.
The mission achieved several historic firsts. It was the inaugural crewed flight of NASA's powerful Space Launch System rocket and the Orion capsule. During its journey, Artemis II reached a farthest point of 252,756 miles from Earth, setting a new record for the greatest distance humans have ever traveled from our planet. The crew conducted a critical lunar flyby, capturing stunning imagery of the Moon's surface and a distant crescent Earth, before gravity pulled them back home. While this mission did not land, it paves the way for Artemis III, which aims to return astronauts—including the first woman and person of color—to the lunar surface using landers developed by SpaceX and Blue Origin.
- Capsule endured 5,000°F plasma during 25,000 mph reentry, with a 6-minute communications blackout.
- Crew traveled a record 252,756 miles from Earth, the farthest any humans have ever been.
- Mission validates NASA's SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft for future crewed lunar landing missions.
Why It Matters
This successful test flight proves NASA's deep-space hardware is ready to return humans to the Moon and eventually Mars.