Artemis II Crew Splashes Down Off San Diego as NASA Schedules Post-Mission Briefing and Prepares Artemis III Core Stage Rollout
NASA's Artemis II crew returned to Earth on April 10 after the first crewed lunar voyage since 1972. A post-mission news conference is set for April 16, and the Artemis III core stage will roll out April 20.
Overview
The four astronauts of NASA’s Artemis II mission are back on Earth, and the agency is already turning toward the next steps in its lunar program. NASA’s Orion spacecraft, call sign Integrity, splashed down in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Diego at 8:07 p.m. EDT on April 10, 2026, closing out a nearly 10-day flight around the Moon, according to NASA’s Artemis II Flight Day 10 re-entry log. The agency has since invited media to a post-mission news conference on April 16 at Johnson Space Center and a rollout event for the Artemis III core stage on April 20, per a NASA media advisory.
The return caps the first crewed voyage beyond low Earth orbit since Apollo 17 in December 1972, as previously reported by The Machine Herald when the mission lifted off on April 1.
What We Know
The Artemis II crew consisted of NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman (commander), Victor Glover (pilot), and Christina Koch (mission specialist), along with Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen (mission specialist), NASA’s flight log confirms. The same log details the re-entry sequence: crew and service module separation at 7:33 p.m. EDT, atmospheric entry at roughly 400,000 feet while traveling 35 times the speed of sound at 7:53 p.m., drogue parachute deployment at 23,400 feet, and main parachute deployment that slowed the capsule to under 200 feet per second before the 8:07 p.m. splashdown.
Recovery teams from NASA, the U.S. Navy, and the U.S. Air Force extracted the crew from Orion at 9:34 p.m. EDT and brought them aboard the USS John P. Murtha for post-mission medical evaluations at 9:58 p.m., NASA reported.
During the mission, Artemis II set a new distance record for human spaceflight, reaching 252,756 miles from Earth and surpassing Apollo 13’s 1970 mark of 248,655 miles, Space.com reported. The same outlet noted that Glover became the first person of color to travel beyond Earth orbit, while Koch and Hansen were the first woman and first non-American astronaut to do so. Space.com also quoted NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman reacting to the splashdown: “The childhood Jared, right now, can’t believe what I just saw,” and Flight Director Rick Henfling saying, “If you didn’t have anxiety bringing the spacecraft home, you probably didn’t have a pulse.”
Next Steps
NASA’s media advisory sets the Artemis III SLS core stage rollout for Monday, April 20, 2026, at the agency’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, according to the NASA announcement. The event will mark the transfer of the top four-fifths of the core stage — comprising the liquid hydrogen tank, liquid oxygen tank, intertank, and forward skirt — onto the Pegasus barge for delivery to Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Boeing serves as the core stage lead contractor, with L3Harris Technologies supplying the four RS-25 engines that will produce more than 2 million pounds of thrust.
The same NASA advisory outlines the program’s near-term timeline: the Artemis III engine section and boat-tail were moved to the Vehicle Assembly Building in July 2025, the RS-25 engines are scheduled to ship from Stennis Space Center no later than July 2026, the Artemis III launch is targeted for 2027, and the crewed lunar landing is planned for 2028. NASA characterized SLS as “the only rocket capable of sending Orion, astronauts, and supplies to the Moon in a single launch.”
Space.com noted that NASA plans Artemis III for mid-2027 to test docking procedures, followed by Artemis IV in late 2028 targeting a lunar south pole landing as part of establishing a permanent outpost.
What We Don’t Know
NASA has not yet published detailed post-flight data on Orion’s heat shield performance, which was a focus area after the Artemis I uncrewed test flight identified unexpected charring. The April 16 news conference at Johnson Space Center is expected to include a crew debrief, but NASA’s advisory did not preview specific findings.
The agency has also not confirmed whether the 2027 Artemis III launch target will hold, given that the core stage still needs to be transported from Louisiana to Florida, stacked in the Vehicle Assembly Building, and integrated with the RS-25 engines that are not scheduled to ship until mid-2026.