Overview
- The Orion capsule, which looped the Moon's far side Monday, carried Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen to a new human distance mark of about 252,756 miles from Earth.
- NASA on Tuesday published the first high‑resolution images from the pass, including rare Earthset views and an extended total solar eclipse that held near 54 minutes from the crew's vantage.
- The astronauts gathered roughly 175 gigabytes of photos and notes, with laser communications moving about 20 gigabytes to Earth in a little more than 45 minutes for rapid analysis.
- Orion left the Moon's sphere of influence at 1:23 p.m. ET Tuesday and is targeting a parachute splashdown in the Pacific near San Diego on Friday as Navy recovery forces stage for pickup.
- Lunar scientists are assessing the crew's far‑side observations, including reports of split‑second flashes on the Moon's night side that appeared to be micrometeoroid impacts.