Artemis II Astronauts Begin Return to Earth After Record-Breaking Lunar Mission

The crew is expected to take approximately four days to return. If all goes as planned, they will splash down in the Pacific Ocean off the west coast of the United States at around 8:07 p.m. Eastern Time on April 10.

According to NASA, recovery operations will involve helicopters retrieving the astronauts from the water before transporting them to a nearby U.S. Navy vessel. Medical evaluations will be conducted onboard the ship before the crew is transferred back to land.

The mission began on April 1, when four astronauts launched from Kennedy Space Center aboard the Orion spacecraft. The crew includes NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, along with Jeremy Hansen of the Canadian Space Agency.

On Monday evening (UK time), the Orion capsule reached the far side of the Moon, at a distance of approximately 406,788 kilometers (252,760 miles) from Earth. This marks the farthest any human has ever traveled from the planet, setting a new record.

The previous record was set nearly 56 years ago during Apollo 13 in April 1970, when astronauts traveled about 400,171 kilometers (248,655 miles) from Earth.