The four astronauts aboard the NASA’s Artemis II mission have on Monday reached the furthest point that any human has been from Earth.
Currently they are cruising along a path in the moon’s gravitational sphere of influence that will take them over the shadowed, lunar far side.
Flying in their Orion capsule launched last week from Florida, the Artemis II crew awoke around 10:50 am ET for their sixth flight day.
They woke up to a recorded message from late Apollo 8 and 13 astronaut Jim Lovell.
Lovell who died at 97 last year said, “Welcome to my old neighbourhood. It is a historic day and I know how busy you will be but don’t forget to enjoy the view, good luck and godspeed.”
Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch, the American astronauts and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen on Monday were due to reach their maximum distance from Earth of roughly 252,760 miles.
This is about 4105 miles beyond the record held by Lovell and his Apollo 13 crew for 56 years.
After this the spaceship will sail around the moon’s far side. They will be able to witness it from roughly 4000 miles above its darkened surface. It will appear to be a basketball sized earth in the distant background.
In the nearly 10-day Artemis II mission this milestone is a climatic point in the journey. This is the first test flight of NASA’s Artemis program.
The Artemis is a multi-billion-dollar series of missions to return American astronauts on the moon surface by 2028. The purpose is to go to the moon before China.
US plans to establish long term presence in space over the next decade. They also plan to build a moon base from where future missions to Mars will be launched.
Also read: NASA unveils first breathtaking Earth images from Artemis II
