NASA’s Artemis II crew returns to Earth
NASA’s historic 10-day mission around the moon came to an end on Friday, as the Artemis II astronauts aboard the Orion spacecraft made their final descent into the Pacific Ocean.
The crew—NASA’s Reid Wiseman, Christina Koch, and Victor Glover and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen—splashed down off the coast of San Diego, around 8:07 P.M. EDT.
The Orion spacecraft, named Integrity by the crew, reentered Earth’s atmosphere at nearly 25,000 miles per hour and withstood temperatures of up to about 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit (2,760 degrees Celsius) as it plummeted to Earth.
As the spacecraft passed below 35,000 feet, the capsule deployed a series of parachutes that slowed the craft’s speed to an estimated 19 miles per hour.
“This is a perfect descent for Integrity,” said NASA Public Affairs Officer Rob Navias on the agency’s Artemis II livestream on Friday, adding, “Everything is in great shape and we have four healthy crew members on board.”
Ahead of reentry, the Orion crew’s capsule separated from the service module, which held fuel in addition to oxygen and water for the crew at around 7:34 P.M. EDT.
After this, the capsule made a 19-second “raise burn” to refine its tilt. Orion entered Earth’s atmosphere at around 7:53 P.M. EDT, with splashdown about 13 minutes later.
“It’s 13 minutes of things that have to go right,” said Artemis II Flight Director Jeff Radigan at a press conference on Thursday.
After landing in the water several hundred miles off the California coast, NASA and U.S. military officials retrieved the astronauts by helicopter and carried them to a Navy ship called the USS John P. Murtha.
The weather at the splashdown site was “excellent,” with winds at 10 knots, wave heights less than four feet and “a few broken and scattered clouds,” Navias said ahead of splashdown.
From San Diego, the crew flew to Houston’s Johnson Space Center, where they will reunite with their families. –AP
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