The four astronauts of NASA’s Artemis II mission entered the moon’s gravitational sphere of influence early Monday morning as they cruised along a path that will soon take them over the shadowed lunar far side to become the farthest-flying humans in history.
The Artemis II crew, flying in their Orion capsule since launching from Florida last week, are due to awake around 10:50 a.m. ET Monday for their sixth flight day. By 7:05 p.m., they will reach the mission’s maximum distance from Earth of roughly 252,757 miles, 4,102 miles beyond the record held by the Apollo 13 crew for 56 years.
As NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen approach the distance record, they will be sailing around the moon’s far side, witnessing it from roughly 4,000 miles above its darkened surface as it eclipses a basketball-sized Earth in the distant background.