The first astronauts to travel to the Moon in more than half a century have returned safely to Earth following a record-setting mission aboard Artemis II.
NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, alongside Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen, splashed down at 5:07 p.m. PDT Friday off the coast of San Diego, completing a nearly 10-day journey that took them 252,756 miles from Earth at their farthest point.
“Reid, Victor, Christina, and Jeremy, welcome home, and congratulations on a truly historic achievement. NASA is grateful to President Donald Trump and partners in Congress for providing the mandate and resources that made this mission and the future of Artemis possible,” said NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman. “Artemis II demonstrated extraordinary skill, courage, and dedication as the crew pushed Orion, SLS (Space Launch System), and human exploration farther than ever before. As the first astronauts to fly this rocket and spacecraft, the crew accepted significant risk in service of the knowledge gained and the future we are determined to build. NASA also acknowledges the contributions of the entire NASA workforce, along with our international partners, whose expertise and commitment were essential to this mission’s success. With Artemis II complete, focus now turns confidently toward assembling Artemis III and preparing to return to the lunar surface, build the base, and never give up the Moon again.”
Following splashdown in the Pacific Ocean, the astronauts were met by a joint NASA and U.S. military team, assisted out of the spacecraft in open water, and transported by helicopter to the USS John P. Murtha for initial medical evaluations. The crew is expected to return to Johnson Space Center in Houston on Saturday, April 11.
During the mission, the crew traveled a total of 694,481 miles. Their lunar flyby took them farther than any humans have traveled before, surpassing the previous record set during the Apollo 13 mission in 1970.
The Artemis II crew launched aboard NASA’s Space Launch System at 6:35 p.m. on April 1 from Launch Pad 39B at Kennedy Space Center. Generating 8.8 million pounds of thrust at liftoff, the rocket propelled the crew inside the Orion spacecraft into space, achieving precise orbit after a smooth countdown.
On the first day in space, astronauts conducted system checks on the spacecraft, named Integrity, confirming readiness for the journey to the Moon. NASA also deployed four CubeSats from international partners into Earth orbit.
By the second day, with all systems confirmed operational, Orion’s service module engine fired, placing the crew on a trajectory that brought them 4,067 miles above the lunar surface at their closest approach.
“The Artemis II crew is home. The entry, descent, and landing systems performed as designed and the final test was completed as intended. This moment belongs to the thousands of people across fourteen countries who built, tested, and trusted this vehicle. Their work protected four human lives traveling at 25,000 miles per hour and brought them safely back to Earth,” said NASA Associate Administrator Amit Kshatriya. “Artemis II proved the vehicle, the teams, the architecture, and the international partnership that will return humanity to the lunar surface. Reid, Victor, Christina, and Jeremy carried the hopes of this world farther than humans have traveled in more than half a century. Fifty-three years ago, humanity left the Moon. This time, we returned to stay. The future is ours to win.”
With astronauts aboard for the first time, engineers carried out a full in-flight evaluation of Orion, including testing life support systems to confirm its ability to sustain humans in deep space. The crew also conducted manual piloting demonstrations to validate handling and collect data for future docking operations during upcoming missions.
Additional tests assessed crew exercise routines, emergency procedures, spacesuits, and other critical spacecraft systems. The astronauts also supported scientific investigations, including the AVATAR study on how human tissue responds to microgravity and deep space radiation, as NASA prepares for long-duration missions.
During the April 6 lunar flyby, the crew captured more than 7,000 images, including views of a solar eclipse, Earthrise, Earthset, impact craters, lava flows, the Milky Way, and lunar surface features. They documented terrain along the terminator region, which resembles lighting conditions at the Moon’s South Pole, a planned landing site for future missions.
The astronauts also proposed names for two lunar craters and reported meteoroid impact flashes on the Moon’s night side. Data gathered from the mission will inform future lunar exploration and astronaut training.
With Artemis II successfully completed, NASA and its partners are now preparing for the Artemis III mission, which will test integrated operations with commercially developed lunar landers in low Earth orbit ahead of a planned return to the Moon’s surface.
As part of ongoing exploration efforts, NASA aims to establish a sustained human presence on the Moon, expand scientific discovery, unlock economic opportunities, and lay the groundwork for future crewed missions to Mars.
