After a thrilling liftoff that marked the first crewed lunar mission since Apollo, the Artemis II astronauts are concentrating on a busy opening day in orbit as they test their Orion spacecraft before heading to the moon.
The crew — commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, mission specialist Christina Koch and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen — will not land. Instead, Artemis II will loop around the moon, giving the team a rare view of the lunar far side and likely taking them farther from Earth than any humans have gone. The flight is a systems and procedures test for Orion (its second flight and first with people aboard) and for the groundwork needed for future long-duration lunar missions and a planned lunar base.
“This is a test flight,” NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said, calling Artemis II “the opening act” of missions that will return astronauts to the moon regularly.
An eight-minute ascent and two upper-stage burns put the spacecraft into a highly elliptical, roughly 24-hour Earth orbit so the crew could verify Orion’s communications, navigation, propulsion and life-support systems. Wiseman called the opening day “crazy,” noting the tight schedule to confirm essentials: “Can it scrub our carbon dioxide? Can it keep us alive? Can we drink water? Can we go to the bathroom?”
Shortly after reaching orbit, Koch ran into a problem while activating the capsule’s compact toilet. Flight controllers reported the unit would not spin up; it could still be used for solid-waste collection but urine would require contingency bags. Engineers on the ground worked a repair plan and, within about an hour, Koch restored the system to normal operation.
About three hours into the mission, Glover took manual control to confirm the vehicle’s handling and that thrusters responded as expected. He precisely positioned Orion relative to the upper stage that had boosted them and described the thruster firings as “a little rumble, like driving on a rocky road.”
The crew’s first day was long: an 18-hour workday followed by two scheduled four-hour sleep periods. They were to wake between those rest periods to monitor a service module engine firing that will adjust their orbit. Mission managers will review Orion’s early performance before clearing the spacecraft for the critical trans-lunar injection (TLI) burn.
The planned six-minute TLI burn, to occur near the orbit’s low point, will increase Orion’s speed by roughly 900 mph and place it on a free-return trajectory to the moon. Lunar gravity will bend that path back toward Earth, with a Pacific Ocean splashdown off Southern California targeted around April 10.
The roughly four-day trip to the moon will include entry into the lunar sphere of influence on Monday, when the moon’s gravity begins to dominate the spacecraft’s motion. Artemis II is expected to match and then exceed the Apollo 13 distance record from 1970, coming within about 4,100 miles of the lunar far side and reaching a maximum distance from Earth near 252,800 miles. While Orion is behind the moon and out of contact with mission control for about 40 minutes, the crew will have a rare opportunity to observe and record far-side features — in some lighting conditions, sights never seen by human eyes.
“We are going to maximize every minute of looking at that far side,” Koch said, noting the scientific value of illuminated observations. Glover pointed out that the flight will include the first woman to view the far side in person, adding an observational milestone.
After looping the moon and returning into contact with Earth, Orion will depart the lunar sphere of influence Tuesday afternoon and fall back toward our planet under gravity. Reentry will be intense: the capsule will hit the top of the atmosphere at about 25,000 mph, with its heat shield experiencing temperatures up to about 5,000 degrees as it slows. After peak heating the craft will decelerate to roughly 300 mph, deploy parachutes and slow to an estimated 15 mph for splashdown. Navy recovery teams will transfer the crew by helicopter to a recovery ship, then to shore for medical checks, debriefings and reunions.
Before reentry, the crew plans a ship-to-ship call with the International Space Station and will hold a news conference. After splashdown Orion will be brought aboard a recovery vessel and returned to shore for postflight processing.
With Artemis II completed and the crew back on Earth, NASA will shift attention to Artemis III and later missions, including planned tests of rendezvous and docking with commercial lunar landers. If schedules hold, one or two crewed lunar landings could occur in 2028.
“You’re doing it for the scientific potential, the economic potential as a technological proving ground to do the things on the moon that you’re going to need on Mars,” Isaacman said, adding that the mission also carries inspirational value for future generations.