Artemis II Astronauts Document Moon's Far Side During Historic Lunar Flyby

On April 6, 2026, NASA's Artemis II mission achieved a historic milestone as its crew traveled 248,655 miles from Earth, farther than any humans before. During their lunar flyby, astronauts captured unprecedented images of the Moon's rarely seen far side. The crew photographed the fully illuminated Orientale basin, a 600-mile-wide crater straddling the near and far sides, visible in its entirety for the first time. They documented the transition between lunar day and night along the terminator, where long shadows accentuated craters like Jule, Birkhoff, and Stebbins. Images revealed the South Pole-Aitken basin, the Moon's largest and oldest impact structure. The astronauts also captured an 'Earthset' event at 6:41 p.m. EDT, showing Earth's nighttime side over the lunar limb. Mission specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen, along with pilot Victor Glover, spent approximately seven hours taking turns at the Orion spacecraft windows, coming within 4,067 miles of the lunar surface. Their observations included the Orientale basin's concentric rings, which provide insights into planetary impact processes, and features like Vavilov Crater on the rim of the Hertzsprung basin. The crew suggested naming two smaller craters near Orientale as Integrity and Carroll. These photographs offer new scientific data about lunar geology and crater formation. The Artemis II astronauts are now returning to Earth, with a scheduled splashdown in the Pacific Ocean on Friday.