Artemis II astronauts splash down after historic 10‑day lunar flyby

Artemis II astronauts complete lunar flyby

The Artemis II astronauts touched down in the Pacific at 8:07 PM ET on April 10, ending a ↑10‑day mission that circled the Moon and tested Orion’s re‑entry systems. Four veteran spacefarers – NASA’s Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and CSA’s Jeremy Hansen – survived a six‑minute communications blackout as the capsule pierced the upper atmosphere at 7:53 PM. Orion’s service module burned up while the crew module deployed drogue parachutes at 23,400 ft, then jettisoned them at 5,400 ft for the three main chutes that slowed the craft to roughly 200 ft/s for a clean splashdown.

“Mission success is a testament to decades of engineering,” NASA said at the post‑flight briefing.

Recovery teams in inflatable boats secured the capsule, opened the hatch and extracted the crew by 9:34 PM, then lifted them onto helicopters bound for the USS John P. Murtha. Doctors performed rapid health checks before the astronauts were debriefed. The flight marked the first time humans captured high‑resolution images of the Moon’s far side with personal devices, providing unprecedented visual data for upcoming surface missions. NASA will soon name the Artemis III crew, which will dock with commercial landers from SpaceX and Blue Origin in low‑Earth orbit before returning humans to the lunar surface. Meanwhile, policy makers continue to weigh the implications of nuclear technology on deep‑space exploration. For broader context, see Reuters and AP News.

Dispatch from: Kaelen Frost

Lead Cybersecurity Analyst