NASA’s Artemis II — the first crewed lunar mission in more than half a century — made history on its trip around the moon on Monday afternoon.
The four-member crew — NASA commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, mission specialist Christina Koch and Canadian space agency mission specialist Jeremy Hansen — surpassed the record for the farthest distance from Earth traveled by humans, set by Apollo 13 in 1970 at 248,655 statute miles.
“We will continue our journey even further into space before Mother Earth succeeds in pulling us back to everything that we hold dear,” Hansen told mission control. “But we, most importantly, choose this moment to challenge this generation and the next to make sure this record is not long-lived.”
The crew also proposed naming one of the moon’s previously unnamed craters in honor of Wiseman’s late wife, Carroll Wiseman.
“It’s a bright spot on the moon, and we would like to call that Carroll,” Hansen said,
During their seven-hour lunar flyby, the Artemis II astronauts took photos and made observations from the Orion spacecraft, dubbed Integrity, which lost contact with mission control for about 40 minutes as it passed behind the moon. The crew members became part of that elite group of humans who have ever witnessed an “Earthrise” as they cleared the far side of the moon.
The Orion is now officially on its way back to Earth. The 10-day mission is due to conclude on Friday, when Artemis II makes its reentry before a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Diego.
Follow the latest updates on the Artemis II lunar flyby in the blog below.
