On Saturday, the Artemis II crew photographed a new view of the moon’s far side during the fourth day of their lunar transit; NASA released the image on Sunday. In the shot the moon appears upside down, with the South Pole at the top and portions of the far side exposed. Along the right edge is the vast Orientale basin — a feature hard to see from Earth — and the mission marks the first time humans have observed the basin in its entirety.
Orion’s four-person crew — commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, and mission specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen — will continue to study Orientale from different angles as they approach and pass the Moon. NASA says the basin can provide a useful baseline for comparing impact craters across the solar system.
Artemis II lifted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, last week in the first crewed lunar flight since the Apollo era more than five decades ago. The mission is a test flight designed to collect observations and systems data to refine procedures and hardware for future crewed lunar missions. On Face the Nation, NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman stressed that gathering data and learning how Orion performs are top priorities ahead of Artemis III.
On Sunday the spacecraft was roughly 64,000 miles from the Moon. The crew woke on day five to the song Working Class Heroes (Work) by CeeLo Green, and a flight controller in mission control was briefly seen dancing during the wakeup call. Later that day the spacecraft was scheduled to enter the lunar sphere of influence, where lunar gravity becomes dominant, and the crew planned a full day of spacesuit checks and other flight evaluations. NASA confirmed early Monday that Artemis II entered the Moon’s sphere of influence at 12:38 a.m. EDT.
Miles Doran contributed to this report.