NASA’s Orion makes longest distance from Earth
The Orion capsule of NASA’s Artemis 1 moon mission has reached its farthest distance from Earth two weeks after launch, the US space agency says.
“We made it to the maximum distance from the Earth!” NASA tweeted on Monday.
The capsule went about 432,000 kilometres from Earth, the longest distance yet travelled by a spacecraft made for human passengers.
Just days earlier, Orion broke a record set by Apollo 13 in 1970 when it reached some 400,000 kilometres from Earth shortly after entering the orbit of the moon.
Tweet from @NASA
Orion was “about halfway through the #Artemis I mission around the moon” and was now on its way back to Earth, NASA tweeted.
It is expected to return on December 11, after about two million kilometres of flight.
No humans are on board the Orion capsule. Astronauts are not scheduled to join until the Artemis 2 mission in 2024.
After months of postponements, the Artemis 1 mission set off for its first test launch on November 16.
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