Artemis II blazed toward the moon; First engine firing for a space crew after Apollo 17
NASA’s Artemis II astronauts fired their engines and blazed toward the moon on Thursday night. The so-called translunar ignition came 25 hours after liftoff, putting the three Americans and a Canadian on course for a lunar fly-around early next week. Their Orion capsule bolted out of orbit around Earth right on cue and chased after the moon to nearly 400,000 km away.
It was the first such engine firing for a space crew since Apollo 17 set out on that era’s final moonshot on December 7, 1972. NASA reported that preliminary reports indicate it went well. NASA had the Artemis II crew stick close to home for a day to test their capsule’s life-support systems before clearing them for lunar departure.
Commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen will dash past the moon then hang a U-turn and zip straight home without stopping on land. In the process, they will become the farthest humans have ever traveled from Earth, breaking the Apollo 13 distance record set in 1970. They also may become the fastest during their reentry at flight’s end on April 10.
