Artemis II Orion Capsule Splashes Down Safely

NASA's Artemis II mission concluded successfully on Friday when the Orion capsule, carrying four astronauts, splashed down in the Pacific Ocean off the Southern California coast after a nearly 10-day journey to the moon's vicinity. The gumdrop-shaped spacecraft, named Integrity by its crew, touched down at approximately 5:07 p.m. Pacific Time under partly cloudy skies, marking the first crewed flight beyond low Earth orbit since the Apollo program ended in 1972.

The crew—mission commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, mission specialist Christina Koch, all from NASA, and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen—emerged unharmed following a tense reentry. The capsule hurtled through Earth's atmosphere at 32 times the speed of sound, generating temperatures up to 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit on its heat shield. A sheath of ionized gas caused a planned radio blackout lasting over six minutes, with contact reestablished about 40 seconds later than anticipated. Two sets of parachutes then deployed to slow the descent to around 15 mph before the gentle water landing.

Recovery teams from NASA and the U.S. Navy acted swiftly, securing the capsule with a floating collar within two...