Artemis II and its crew of four have entered the Moon’s “sphere of influence,” meaning the spacecraft is affected more by lunar gravity than by Earth’s pull. The transition occurred at a distance of 39,000 miles from the Moon, four days, six hours and two minutes into the mission. The next and most important phase will take place tomorrow when the craft orbits the far side of the Moon, taking humans deeper into space than ever before.
At their peak, astronauts Reid Wiseman, Christina Koch, Victor Glover and Canadian Jeremy Hansen will be 400,000 kilometers from Earth. This will break the previous record of the Apollo 13 crew by just over 4,000 miles. They are the first humans to cross the lunar threshold since the Apollo 17 moon landing mission in 1972.
The crew spent this weekend making preparations for their lunar flyby. That included demonstrations of manual piloting, reviewing their scientific objectives for the six-hour observation period and evaluating their spacesuits, which are there to provide life support in the event of an emergency and for their return home. But they’ve also had plenty of time to enjoy the views, and those views are spectacular. In the latest series of images shared by the space agency, astronauts are seen looking at Earth through the windows of the Orion spacecraft.
Orion will arrive in the vicinity of the Moon shortly after midnight on Monday, April 6. Later that day, the crew is expected to reach the furthest point any human has ever traveled from Earth, surpassing the record of 248,655 miles from Earth set by the Apollo 13 astronauts in 1970.
Mission specialist Christina Koch takes in the view. (POT)
The lunar observing period will begin at 2:45 pm ET, and a few hours later, they will be behind the moon and briefly lose communication. The spacecraft’s closest approach to the Moon is expected to occur at 7:02 p.m., when it will be 4,066 miles from the surface. “From that distance, the crew will see the entire disk of the Moon at once, including the regions near the north and south poles,” according to POT. Later, the crew will have the opportunity to see a solar eclipse “when Orion, the Moon and the Sun align in such a way that astronauts will see our star disappear behind the Moon for about an hour.” NASA will have coverage of the flyby starting at 1 pm ET.
Update April 7 at 1:40 a.m. ET: The post was updated with the news that Artemis II has entered the Moon’s sphere of influence.
