Artemis II Astronauts Reunite with Their Moonship 3 Months After Record-Breaking Flight
The crew thanked the workforce behind the mission and said the lunar flyby proved Orion and Artemis systems before future moon landings.
- On April 6, 2026, NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, along with Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen, set a new human spaceflight distance record of 252,756 miles from Earth.
- The mission surpassed the 56-year-old Apollo 13 record of 248,655 miles by utilizing a carefully designed free-return trajectory that used lunar gravity to loop around the far side of the Moon.
- While the crew did not land, they conducted a lunar observation period reporting visual details of craters and terrain as Orion lost direct radio contact with Earth for about 40 minutes behind the Moon.
- The crew expressed excitement about handing off duties to a team of three NASA astronauts and one Italian, while next year Artemis III will practice docking with lunar landers in development.
- President Donald Trump honored the four astronauts during the nation's 250th anniversary celebration on the National Mall in Washington on Saturday, July 4, 2026, recognizing their historic contribution to space exploration.
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Hanford Sentinel
The Lawton ConstitutionArtemis II astronauts return to Florida for 1st time since historic launch
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — The last time the four astronauts of Artemis II were together in Florida, they were taking a ride on the most powerful rocket to ever launch humans into space. The quartet of NASA’s Reid Wiseman, Victor…
Associated Press News
Artemis II astronauts reunite with their moonship 3 months after record-breaking flight
The Artemis II astronauts who flew around the moon earlier this year are back in Florida, reunited with their capsule and launch team.
In April 2026, four Artemis II astronauts flew 406,771 kilometres from Earth — farther than any humans in history — breaking the Apollo 13 record from 1970 not by landing on the Moon, but by looping around its far side on a free-return path while the Moon’s elliptical orbit carried them just a little farther from home.
Artemis II broke a human spaceflight record in a way that looks almost modest until the geometry is understood. The four astronauts did not land on the Moon. They did not enter lunar orbit. They did not even need to make the record the centrepiece of the mission. They flew past the Moon, looped around its far side, and let a carefully designed free-return path carry them farther from Earth than any people had ever been. On April 6, 2026, NASA as…
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