Orion Splashes Down in the Pacific Ocean. Historic Artemis II Lunar Mission Successfully Completed
The crew is in excellent condition.
NASA's Orion spacecraft, with four astronauts on board, successfully splashed down in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California. The Artemis II expedition — the first human flight to the Moon in over half a century — is complete, writes the BBC.
The splashdown occurred as planned, around 5:08 PM local time on the US West Coast (3:08 AM on April 11, Minsk time).
After splashdown, the Orion crew experienced difficulties establishing satellite phone communication with the rescue team; the astronauts had to coordinate their actions with rescuers via the mission control center in Houston. However, the Orion's splashdown itself was perfect; NASA called it a "textbook landing."
The four astronauts are reportedly "in excellent condition."
NASA head Jared Isaacman incredibly emotionally described how the sight of the mission crew's splashdown left him speechless.
"Child Jared cannot believe what he just saw. This is just the beginning," he said. "We are back in the business of sending astronauts to the Moon and returning them safely."
Let's recall how the return to Earth unfolded.
Module Separation
Approximately 25 minutes before Orion entered Earth's upper atmosphere, the service module, which had sustained the mission for 10 days, separated from the spacecraft.
The crew module returning to Earth oriented itself to enter the atmosphere heat shield first.
The final corrective maneuver began, positioning the capsule at the precise approach angle for re-entry into Earth's atmosphere.
Atmospheric Re-entry
Orion, returning from the Moon, entered the atmosphere at a speed not seen since the Apollo missions — 25,000 miles per hour, or nearly 40,000 km/h.
Therefore, the spacecraft entered the atmosphere on a very shallow trajectory, and maintaining the precise re-entry angle was crucial. The heat shield withstands temperatures up to 5000 degrees Fahrenheit (over 2700 degrees Celsius) — only twice "cooler" than the Sun's surface — but if the re-entry angle had been even one degree steeper, the temperature would have been significantly higher, and the spacecraft with its crew would have simply burned up.
During the first, uncrewed Artemis mission, the heat shield was seriously damaged, but engineers assured that they had solved this problem by adjusting the re-entry angle.
Moreover, as NASA specialists said, the shield still performed its task: the temperature inside the capsule did not exceed dangerous values, and if astronauts had been in the capsule then, they would have remained safe and unharmed.
From Space to Ocean
The atmospheric transit phase — from re-entry to splashdown — took only about 13 minutes.
During the first half of this journey, the capsule intentionally lost communication with Earth for approximately 6 minutes: the rapidly moving spacecraft heats the air so intensely that electrons are ripped from oxygen and nitrogen atoms, forming charged plasma that blocks radio signals.
At this stage, the spacecraft was decelerating simply "against the atmosphere." Then, when the speed dropped from 40,000 km/h to hundreds of kilometers per hour, Orion deployed its first two drogue parachutes, with canopies only 7.6 meters in diameter. With their help, the descent speed was reduced to approximately 500 km/h.
Then it was the turn of auxiliary small parachutes, which pulled out three main parachutes with canopies already over 35 meters in diameter. On these, at a speed of about 20 miles (over 32 km) per hour, Orion "splashed" into the Pacific Ocean.
Splashdown and Evacuation
As NASA specialists explained, Orion could splash down at any angle: after splashdown, floats automatically inflated around the perimeter of the spacecraft, bringing it into the correct orientation.
NASA and US Coast Guard vessels were awaiting Orion in a large splashdown zone, hundreds of kilometers in diameter.
Approximately an hour after splashdown, the side hatch of the Orion module opened to allow specialists to enter.
Four people are to enter the module, which is quite cramped inside, so that each astronaut can undergo an individual physical assessment.
After the initial assessment, a medic inside the Orion capsule confirmed that all four crew members were feeling well.
NASA stated that "there is no rush" to evacuate the astronauts, as their safety is the priority.
After assessing the astronauts' physical condition, they were moved one by one onto an automatically inflated raft-gangway attached to the spacecraft. Crew commander Reid Wiseman was the last to leave the spacecraft.
Helicopters transported the astronauts aboard the military transport ship USS John P Murtha, which will then take them to a naval base in San Diego.
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