NASA’s record-breaking crew Earth-bound after trip around moon

NASA’s four Artemis astronauts swung behind the moon and are headed home, in a journey that shattered space travel distance records and brought people the closest they’ve been to the lunar surface in more than 50 years.

“All of your flight controllers and your flight director have flipped their Artemis II patches around. We are Earth-bound and ready to bring you home,” Jenni Gibbons, a Canadian space agency astronaut and backup crew member for Artemis II, told the astronauts as they emerged from an expected communications blackout around the moon.

At their nearest distance to the moon, the Artemis II’s Lockheed Martin-built Orion capsule came within an estimated 4,067 miles (6,545 kilometers) of the lunar surface, according to calculations by NASA. From the crew’s point of view, the moon would have appeared roughly the size of a basketball in someone’s outstretched hand.