The Artemis II commander sent a subtle message back to Earth just minutes before he and his crew shattered a record set by Apollo 13 in 1970.
The four-person team, NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch, along with Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen, reached a maximum distance of 252,757 miles from Earth at 1.57pm ET, becoming the farthest humans ever to travel from the planet.
The Apollo 13 crew previously held the record, traveling 248,655 miles from Earth during their dramatic emergency return mission more than five decades ago.
Wiseman’s family watched the historic moment unfold from the viewing gallery on the ground.
When mission control told him his two daughters were smiling as they saw their dad on a big screen, the commander responded by forming his hands into a heart, a quiet sign of love sent across more than 250,000 miles of space.
Weisman then radioed to NASA’s Mission Control: ‘From the cabin of Integrity, as we surpass the farthest distance humans have ever traveled from planet Earth, we do so in honor of the extraordinary efforts and achievements of those who came before us in human space exploration.
‘We will continue our journey even farther before Mother Earth succeeds in pulling us back to everything we hold dear, but we must use this moment to challenge this generation and the next to ensure this record is not long-lived.’
The crew also spotted an unnamed crater on the moon, labeling it ‘Carroll’ after Wiseman’s wife, who died of cancer in 2020.
The Artemis II milestone is just one of several historic moments expected Monday, as the astronauts prepare to become the first humans in decades to view the Moon’s far side with the naked eye, bringing them within 4,070 miles of the lunar surface.
Later in the mission, the crew is also set to witness a rare solar eclipse from lunar orbit, beginning at 8.35pm ET and lasting roughly one hour.
Capsule Communicator Jenni Gibbons radioed to the Artemis II crew from Mission Control: ‘On April 15, 1970, during the Apollo 13 mission, three explorers set the record for the farthest distance humans have ever traveled from our home planet.
‘At that time, over 55 years ago, Lovell, Swigert and Haise flew 248,655 statute miles away from Earth. Today, for all humanity, you’re pushing beyond that frontier.’
NASA Flight Director Brandon Lloyd and others also marked the milestone by emailing the crew with ‘the longest person-to-person message ever sent in human history.’
The crew is now heading toward the far side of the moon, the lunar hemisphere that permanently faces away from Earth.
Unlike the familiar near side, it features a rugged, cratered terrain with a thicker crust and fewer dark volcanic plains.
Moments after breaking the Apollo record, Hansen got on the radio to announce two newly named craters.
One crater was named ‘Integrity,’ after the Orion capsule used by the crew during the historic mission.
‘If you were to look at Orientale on the far side and then draw a line straight up to Ohm on the far side, relatively in the middle is an unnamed crater, and we would like to suggest it be called Integrity,’ Hansen said.
But the most emotional moment came when Hansen revealed the name of a second crater. ‘It’s a bright spot on the Moon, and we would like to call it Carroll,’ he said.
Wiseman and Koch could be seen wiping away tears.
The announcement prompted the astronauts to embrace, while mission control in Houston fell silent in a rare moment of reflection.
This is a developing story… More updates to come.
