Artemis 2 crew sets new record distance from Earth, surpassing Apollo 13
The four astronauts on NASA Artemis 2 mission have ventured father from Earth than anyone has ever gone.
At 1:57 p.m. EDT on April 6, astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch and Canadian Jeremy Hansen crossed over the 400,171 km mark set by the Apollo 13 crew on April 15, 1970.
After notching that record, a flyby period will begin. The main cabin windows of the Orion will be pointed at the moon during this period and get close enough to the moon to photograph details and make scientific observations, according to NASA.
They will also be using the best cameras available on board: their eye. “The human eye, especially when it’s connected to a well-trained brain, which I assure you these four people have, are capable of, just in literally the blink of an eye, making nuanced colour observations that Apollo observations told us can tell us something scientifically,” Kelsey Young, the science flight operations lead of Artemis, has said.
The crew will get a detailed look at the moon during a six-hour flyby. They’ve been assigned a list of 30 lunar surface targets to observe. At the closest approach, 6,543 kilometres, the moon will look like a basketball held at arm’s length, Hansen has said.
Officials expect the Artemis 2’s maximum distance from Earth, 406,778 km, to be met tonight at 7:07 p.m. EDT.
As the Orion’s trajectory will take it past the moon, to the unexplored dark side, the astronauts will be afforded a view of the moon no one has seen before.
At the far point of the orbit, just as the lunar gravity slingshots it back toward Earth, the Orion will lose its line of sight, and communications with Earth, for 40 minutes. The blackout is expected and has occurred in past missions.
The Orion is expected to be homebound by Tuesday and reach Earth on Friday.