Overview
- The Orion capsule is set to reenter around 7:53 p.m. ET Friday and splash down near 8:07 p.m. ET off San Diego after separating from its service module.
- Reentry will hit about 25,000 mph and ~5,000 degrees Fahrenheit with a planned six‑minute communications blackout before drogue and main parachutes slow the capsule for landing.
- U.S. Navy teams on the USS John P. Murtha will hoist the crew aboard by helicopter for medical checks before their return to Johnson Space Center.
- NASA adjusted the descent profile after Artemis I’s unexpected heat‑shield erosion, which narrows the landing zone as the team executes a final course correction about five hours before splashdown.
- The 10‑day flight returned humans to lunar distance for the first time since Apollo, set a 252,756‑mile distance record, tested manual controls and life‑support, logged far‑side imagery, and gathered radiation and biomedical data with dosimeters, a German heavy‑ion detector, organ chips, and blood and saliva samples.