The Artemis II crew capsule splashes down in the Pacific Ocean in this screengrab from a livestream video after the crew's flyby of the Moon. The Artemis II flight, travelling a total of 694,392 miles (1,117,515 km) across two Earth orbits and a climactic lunar flyby some 252,000 miles away, was the debut crewed test flight in a series of Artemis missions that aim to start landing astronauts on the lunar surface starting in 2028. At the flight's peak, the Artemis astronauts reached a point 252,756 miles from Earth, exceeding the previous record of roughly 248,000 miles set in 1970 by the crew of Apollo 13. In a historical parallel to the Cold War era of Apollo, the Artemis II mission has played out against a backdrop of political and social turmoil, including a US military conflict that has proven unpopular at home. As a result, NASA engineers altered the descent trajectory for Artemis II in order to reduce heat buildup and lower the risk of the capsule burning up.

Source: Otago Daily Times April 11, 2026 01:33 UTC