The four astronauts aboard NASA’s Orion spacecraft are scheduled to splash down off the coast of San Diego on Friday evening, concluding a record-breaking lunar flyby mission that took them farther from Earth than any humans before.
Speaking to media from space during the journey home, mission pilot Victor Glover said the crew was eager to share their experiences with the world.
“We have to get back. There’s so much data that you’ve already seen, but all the good stuff is coming back with us,” Glover said. “There’s so many more pictures, so many more stories.”
The Artemis II mission broke the record for human space travel on Monday, surpassing the 248,655-mile mark set by Apollo 13 in 1970. The Orion spacecraft did not land on the Moon but flew around its far side—the hemisphere never visible from Earth. While satellites have previously photographed the region, the astronauts became the first human eyes to witness parts of its vast craters and lava plains.
Following the flyby, President Donald Trump congratulated the crew, telling them: “Today, you’ve made history and made all America really proud, incredibly proud.”
‘The Pinnacle Moment’
During a virtual news conference from NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, the astronauts answered questions with considerable transmission delays. Commander Reid Wiseman described the 40 minutes of “profound solitude” when they lost contact with Earth—a period that included critical scientific observations.
“The four of us took a moment, we shared maple cookies that Jeremy had brought, and we took about three or four minutes, just as a crew to really reflect on where we were,” Wiseman said.
For Wiseman, the mission’s emotional peak came when his crewmates named a lunar crater after his late wife, Carroll, who died of cancer in 2020.
“I think when Jeremy spelled Carroll’s name… for me that is when I was overwhelmed with emotion,” he said. “Just for me personally, that was kind of the pinnacle moment of the mission.”
Pilot Victor Glover called the experience of watching a lunar eclipse from beyond the Moon’s far side “the greatest gift” of the voyage.
‘Worth the Risks’
Asked what she would miss most about space, astronaut Christina Koch said it would be the “camaraderie.” And what wouldn’t she miss? “There isn’t anything,” she replied.
“We can’t explore deeper unless we are doing a few things that are inconvenient, unless we’re making a few sacrifices, unless we’re taking a few risks. And those things are all worth it,” Koch said.
The crew now faces several quieter days of checks and experiments before the final ordeal: a fiery re-entry through the atmosphere at nearly 25,000 mph, followed by a parachute splashdown that will test the capsule’s heat shield and recovery systems.
Splashdown is expected at approximately 20:00 US EST Friday (00:00 GMT Saturday).
