NASA releases 'Earthset' shot after Artemis II makes lunar flyby
· Toronto Sun
NASA has released a photo of Earth dipping below the horizon of the moon, almost 60 years after an “Earthrise” image was taken by a crew member of the Apollo 8 team in 1968.
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The Artemis II mission crew took the “Earthset” shot from their Orion ship during the crew’s record-breaking lunar flyby , a follow-up to the “Earthrise” photo taken by American astronaut Bill Anders in 1968 during the first mission to take humans around the moon.
Both NASA and the White House posted the image.
“Humanity, from the other side,” the White House posted on X . “First photo from the far side of the Moon. Captured from Orion as Earth dips beyond the lunar horizon.”
Historic mission
The Artemis II team of Canadian Jeremy Hansen, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Reid Wiseman is on a historic mission to fly around the moon before another program organizes a moon landing in 2028. They set a new record on Monday for travelling into deep space, going farther away from Earth than anyone had done before. Hansen is the first Canadian to fly to the moon and Canada is only the second country to send an astronaut that far from Earth.
Hansen, a native of southwestern Ontario, said the moment should “challenge this generation and the next to make sure this record is not long lived.”
The astronauts have reported unique features of the moon’s surface in unprecedented detail and even witnessed a solar eclipse of the moon passing in front of the sun. The White House also posted a photo of the eclipse , calling it “a view few in human history have ever witnessed.”
The voyage home
The crew is now on the way back to Earth in what Mission Control calls a free-return lunar trajectory to get the astronauts safely back as soon as possible. They’re expected to splash down somewhere in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Diego, Calif., on Friday.
Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield added some context about the Artemis II crew’s return to Earth on X .
“They are now falling 400,000 km to Earth, picking up speed pretty much the whole way. There’s a miniscule chance they’ll hit orbital debris, but the real impact will be with Earth — they’ll be the fastest humans ever as the atmosphere rudely slows them from 40,000 km/h to parachute speed. Counting on the heat shield for protection.”