Artemis II ended successfully early this evening, as Orion ‘Integrity’ splashed down safely in the Pacific Ocean at 8:07:40 PM EDT. This completed the first crewed lunar mission since Apollo 17 in 1972. The crew set new records, including the farthest traveled from Earth.
Recovery teams aboard the USS John P. Murtha (LPD-26) moved quickly to retrieve the capsule and its crew as the sun dropped toward the Pacific horizon.
Commander Reid Wiseman, Pilot Victor Glover, Mission Specialist Christina Koch, and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen are all healthy after their nine day journey that took them 252,756 miles away from their home planet. Farther than. any humans have ever been.
The mission, which launched from Kennedy Space Center on April 1, carried the crew on a free-return trajectory around the Moon, swinging within roughly 6,400 miles of the lunar surface before heading home. No lunar orbit was attempted, but the flight tested every system Orion will need for operations in cislunar space.
For Brevard County, the end of Artemis II is both a celebration and a starting gun. Teams at KSC have already begun preparing for Artemis III, a low-Earth orbit mission set for 2027.
The crew is expected to be flown to Houston for medical evaluations before reuniting with their families.
Author: Charles Boyer
NASA kid from Cocoa Beach, FL, born of Project Apollo parents and family. I’m a writer and photographer sharing the story of spaceflight from the Eastern Range here in Florida.
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