• Seven-hour flyby of the moon begins: The NASA-led Artemis II mission is now conducting a seven-hour lunar flyby as four astronauts travel farther from Earth than anyone in human history. Though they will not land, they have been getting incredible views and photos of the moon.
• What to expect: As the spacecraft moves behind the moon from Earth’s perspective around 6:44 p.m. ET, the crew will experience a communications blackout with mission control that is expected to last about 40 minutes. The flyby is expected to conclude at 9:20 p.m. ET.
• The crew’s agenda: NASA’s Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch and the Canadian Space Agency’s Jeremy Hansen are observing the moon, including features of the mysterious lunar far side that have never before been seen by human eyes.
The moment mission control in Houston loses contact with the Orion spacecraft as it goes behind the moon, predicted to happen at 6:44 p.m. ET, is a tense one, said Rick Henfling, lead Artemis II entry flight director.
“All of our communication depends on having a line of sight with Earth,” Henfling told CNN earlier this year. “It’s nerve-racking, because whenever you don’t have communication with the spacecraft, you don’t have insight as to what’s going on,” he added.
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