astronauts on the mission Artemis II of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) started their engines and headed towards the moon on Thursday.
The so-called “translunar ignition” occurred 25 hours after liftoff, putting three Americans and one Canadian on track for a lunar flyby early next week. Their Orion capsule rocketed out of orbit around Earth just in time and is headed for the Moon, nearly 250,000 miles away.
It was the first such engine firing for a space crew since Apollo 17 undertook the last trip to the Moon of that era on December 7, 1972.. NASA reported that preliminary reports indicate that it went well.
NASA had the Artemis II crew stay close to Earth for a day to test their capsule’s life support systems before clearing them for departure to the Moon.
Now the test flight of Artemis II is the opening act of NASA’s big plans to install a lunar base.
Under the command of Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen will speed past the Moon, make a U-turn and return home without stopping to land. In the process, they will become the humans who have traveled the farthest from Earth, breaking the Apollo 13 distance record set in 1970. They could also become the fastest during their re-entry at the end of the flight on April 10.
The lunar flyby will be on Monday.
Orion will reach 4,000 miles beyond the Moon before turning around, providing unprecedented, illuminated views of the far side of the Moon, at least to human eyes. The cosmos will even treat the Artemis II astronauts to a total solar eclipse, as the Moon will temporarily block the Sun from their perspective.
Meanwhile, astronauts are enjoying views of Earth from tens of thousands of miles above.
1 / 15 | Meet the crew of NASA’s Artemis II mission. One day (April 1, 2026) before the scheduled launch of the Artemis II mission, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) finalized planning for its first manned mission to the Moon since 1972. – EFE Agency
NASA is counting on this test flight to boost the entire Artemis program and lead to a two-astronaut landing on the moon in 2028. Before that happens, Orion’s toilet may need some design adjustments.
The toilet failed as soon as the Artemis crew reached orbit Wednesday night. Mission Control walked Koch through some plumbing tricks and she finally got it working, but not before having to resort to contingency urine storage bags.
Mission Control managed to raise the temperature of the Orion capsule cabin. It was so cold at the beginning of the flight — 18 degrees Celsius (65 degrees Fahrenheit) — that the four astronauts had to dig through their suitcases for long-sleeved clothing.
1/11 | This is what it looked like when Artemis I began with the launch of the new lunar rocket. Almost three months after the first launch attempt, the powerful lunar rocket of the Artemis I mission took off towards the orbit of the Moon. – The Associated Press