
NASA's Orion capsule splashed down at 8:07 p.m. ET on Friday (00:07 GMT Saturday) in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Diego, California, completing the Artemis II mission, the first crewed flight to the Moon since Apollo 17 in December 1972.
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The four Artemis II astronauts shared their lunar flyby observations with NASA's science team on Tuesday, reporting meteoroid impact flashes, levitated lunar dust, unexpected surface colors and an unprecedented total solar eclipse witnessed from the Moon's orbit.

The Artemis 2 crew sent the first photographs of Earth taken from the Orion capsule on its historic journey to the Moon, accompanied by a message of unity at a moment of global turmoil. They are the first images captured by astronauts on a lunar mission since Apollo 17 in 1972.

NASA's Artemis 2 mission launched Wednesday at 6:35 p.m. EDT from Launch Complex 39B at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, marking the first crewed mission beyond low Earth orbit since Apollo 17 in December 1972 — 54 years ago.

A microsatellite designed and built entirely in Argentina will travel as a secondary payload on the crewed Artemis 2 mission, which NASA plans to launch Wednesday from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Argentina is the only Latin American country selected to participate and one of four globally, alongside Germany, Saudi Arabia, and South Korea.

The countdown for the Artemis 2 mission began Monday at 4:44 p.m. local time at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, with liftoff targeted for 6:24 p.m. on Wednesday, April 1. It will be the first time astronauts have traveled toward the Moon since the Apollo 17 mission in 1972.

NASA said on Thursday that Artemis II had passed its flight readiness review and received the go-ahead to proceed toward a launch attempt on April 1, in what would be the first crewed mission around the Moon since the Apollo era. The agency said the Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft are set to roll out to pad 39B on March 19 once remaining closeout work is finished.

NASA said on Friday it is targeting March 6 as the earliest launch date for Artemis II, the mission that will send four astronauts on a flight around the Moon and back, after completing a second full countdown-and-fueling rehearsal of its Space Launch System (SLS) rocket.