After launching from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on April 1, the crew of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) Artemis II mission splashed down in the Pacific Ocean on April 10; this marked the end of the successful mission taking a crew farther than humans have ever been before.

Taking the trip

The crew, consisting of NASA’s Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, as well as the Canadian Space Agency’s (CSA) Jeremy Hansen spent a total of ten days in space. The astronauts’ journey consisted of a trajectory taking them past the moon to a record-breaking 252,756 miles from Earth, surpassing the Apollo 13 mission crew’s record of 248,655 miles. This trip was taken in an Orion spacecraft that the crew named Integrity, to represent the values that they wanted to take with them to space. 

After original proposals for the mission were first released in 2017, this mission has been long awaited. Math teacher Tommy Cassilly said that he stayed after school to watch the launch so that he didn’t miss it after waiting so long to see the mission begin.

“I was talking with Miss Worsham, and on the day it launched, I was like, ‘There’s no there’s no way it’s going to launch, they’re going to delay it again.’ So I was actually up here watching it after school. I didn’t want to drive home and miss it, so I just stayed here and watched it,” Cassilly said.

The first of the crew’s days in space was spent orbiting the Earth before Integrity began its journey to the moon.

On day six of the mission, the crew experienced their lunar flyby, in which they became the first humans to see the far side of the moon. Reaching a distance of about 4,067 miles from the moon’s surface at their closest, the crew was tasked with making scientific observations about the moon’s unseen far side. After losing communication with Earth for about half an hour during the flyby, the crew was able to make calls to Earth, including one with President Donald Trump. During the call, Trump praised the crew for their achievements during their trip.

“Today, you’ve made history and made all of America really proud. There’s nothing like what you’re doing, circling around the Moon for the first time in more than half a century and breaking the all-time record for the farthest distance from planet Earth. You really are modern-day pioneers,” Trump said.

On the tenth and last day of the mission, the crew splashed down in the Pacific Ocean, where they were retrieved by NASA and U.S. Navy personnel to be taken to the Johnson Space Center in Houston. After landing on Earth, each astronaut must go through extensive work to adjust their bodies to living with gravity again. On Instagram, Koch posted a video of an exercise she was performing to work on readjusting to gravity in which she struggled to walk in a straight line with her eyes closed; Koch explained in the caption why exercises like this are so difficult after returning from space.

Out of this world impact

In addition to breaking records, the Artemis II mission was successful in its goals of testing the technology on the Orion spacecraft and making scientific observations about the Moon’s surface. With the Artemis program, including the unmanned Artemis I mission in 2022 and future Artemis III and Artemis IV missions planned for 2027 and 2028, NASA hopes to find usable resources on the moon and discover if the moon could be livable. One of the resources that the moon may be able to provide is found in frozen water in craters and polar regions of the moon.

There, scientists believe that helium-3, an isotope of helium that can be used for ultracold refrigeration used for quantum computing and possibly nuclear fusion in the future, could be found. Additionally, the far side of the moon would be an optimal place for a lunar telescope, as the moon blocks radio noise from Earth that interferes with telescopes.

Cassilly said that exploring space is one way that people can continue to understand the world around them and that it would be very cool to possibly have people living on the moon in the future.

“It’s just exploring everything. It’s like, why did we cross the Atlantic? Why did we cross the Pacific? Why do we explore in the first place? It’s cool for one, but finding a new place to live maybe. If you could live on the moon, would you? I mean, I would,” Cassilly said.

Aside from scientific discoveries, Artemis II has made a great impact on Earth, inspiring people from thousands of miles away. In a panel on ABC News, Koch said that she was very proud of the impact that the mission made and felt strengthened by support from Earth.

“What we were told, really through talking a couple times with our families, was that there was an impact, not necessarily the number of viewers or anything like that, but that there was a positive impact, that it was superseding any lines, any identities that people had. And when my husband looked me in the eye on that video call and said, ‘No really, you’ve made a difference,’ it brought tears to my eyes and I said ‘that’s all we ever wanted,’” Koch said. “I can tell you that the difference now is, when we come before you now, we’ve done this together.”

Spending days in space together, the crew was also able to connect in a special way. Wiseman said in the panel on ABC News that he and the other astronauts on the mission bonded during the trip.

“[We are as] close as four humans can be and not be a family. It was just an amazing adventure and every single person on that crew lifted each other up the entire time, so I just can’t thank the three of [them] enough. We launched as friends and we came back as best friends,” Wiseman said.