Artemis on the way home

Artemis 2 crew completes flyby, heading home

The Artemis 2 spacecraft and its 4 astronauts are on their way home following a historic day in human spaceflight.

At around 18 UTC, the crew reached the farthest distance from Earth ever traveled by humans, breaking the record of 248,655 miles (400,171km) set by the Apollo 13 crew in 1970.

And a few hours later, the spacecraft began its voyage around the moon's far side. As the crew soared some 4,600 miles (7,400 km) above the lunar surface, the moon blocked all communications from Earth for 40 minutes.

In that time, the astronauts saw parts of the far side of the moon never before seen in daylight by human eyes. Plus, they spotted several impact flashes from space rocks hitting the lunar surface!

Read more about what they saw.