HOUSTON — As Day 4 dawned on the Artemis II mission, the astronauts were closer to the moon than to Earth, after crossing the halfway point between the two bodies on Friday night.
Before Day 3 ended, the stark gray disk appeared in the crew’s view of the blackness of space from the window of their Orion spacecraft overnight. The crew has named the vehicle Integrity.
“It is a beautiful sight,” said Christina Koch, a mission specialist, while communicating with mission control on Earth. “We’re seeing more and more of the far side, and it’s just a thrill to be here.”
The crew is already observing some features that have never before been seen with human eyes, not even by the Apollo astronauts.
NASA shared more pictures taken from Integrity, including a view of what is partially the lunar near side, the part that is visible from the ground and splotched with dark plains where lava once formed.
Other images that NASA released show Koch and Reid Wiseman, the mission commander, gazing out of the window at Earth.
Using a camera on one of its solar arrays, Orion also snapped a picture of the retro NASA “worm” logo on its side. The agency brought the worm out of retirement in 2020.
It is the first time Jeremy Hansen, a mission specialist from the Canadian Space Agency, has been to space. In a video call with NBC News on Saturday afternoon, he described feeling a mix of disbelief, excitement and gratitude.
“I know those photos are amazing, but let me assure you, it is another level of amazing up here,” he said.
With their destination looming, Wiseman said in an update shared by NASA that the crew wasn’t sure what day it was on their home planet.
“We heard a rumor up here that it is actually Saturday back on Earth,” he said during a check-in with mission control after the crew started their day. “We have definitely lost track of the days.”
After a busy first two days of the mission, the Artemis II crew transitioned to more routine tasks on their third day of flight, including exercising and medical check-ins. They also began deploying cameras and other equipment that will be used during the lunar flyby.
Mission control woke the astronauts on Saturday around 12:35 p.m. Eastern time with “Pink Pony Club” by Chappell Roan and began troubleshooting the toilet drain. On Friday night, a routine wastewater dump to funnel urine out of the capsule and into space failed, most likely because of ice on the drain nozzle.
From Houston, flight controllers positioned Integrity to orient the nozzle of the drain line toward the sun on Saturday in hopes of thawing any ice. In the meantime, the crew will use backup waste collection bags, like the Apollo astronauts in the 1960s and ’70s.
“We are no-go for toilet,” Koch said as flight controllers attempted another wastewater dump.
In a news conference on Saturday evening, NASA confirmed that the toilet is functioning and can be used, though the thawing attempt was only partially successful.
Officials also acknowledged public interest on the situation.
“I think the fixation on the toilet is kind of human nature,” John Honeycutt, the chair of the mission management team, said with a smirk. “Everybody knows how important that is to us here on Earth. And it’s harder to manage in space.”
But Debbie Korth, Orion’s deputy program manager, said in the news conference that the capsule’s systems were faring even better than during Artemis I.
Glover and Wiseman also had the opportunity to speak with their families for the first time Saturday. (Koch and Hansen connected with their loved ones on mission Day 3.)
As the sole parent of two daughters, Wiseman described speaking to his children on the way to the moon as “surreal.”
“I was reunited with my little family, and it was the greatest moment of my entire life,” he said.
On Saturday night, the crew performed another test of Integrity’s manual handling to demonstrate how the Orion spacecraft can be controlled while maneuvering the spacecraft in different modes.
Hansen used two small hand controllers to test out small movements of the vehicle. After 20 minutes, Koch took over the piloting, while Wiseman and Glover requested maneuvers to see specific views from the window.
The crew’s last major task of Day 4 is to review a finalized list of lunar-surface features they will see Monday, while looping around the moon’s far side.
The astronauts will take a break from those lunar observations to watch a 53-minute eclipse that will occur soon after Earthrise.
Down in Houston on Saturday, a couple dozen flight officers appeared calm at Johnson Space Center as Orion zoomed toward its target.
Judd Frieling, the Artemis II flight director, spoke to members of the media during a tour of mission control. He said his team was not anxious about losing contact with the astronauts as they sojourn behind our closest celestial neighbor.
“We absolutely know physics is going to take them back to us,” Frieling said. “We’ll take a break, a breather,” he added, “and we’ll meet them on the other side.”
In a video call with CBS News, Koch and Glover mused about the vastness of the black space surrounding Earth.
“This is a whole bunch of nothing, this thing we call the universe,” Glover said, but amid the emptiness, “you have this oasis. This beautiful place that we get to exist together.”
The crew all grabbed hands after.