After ten history-making days, the crew of the Artemis II mission successfully returned to earth on Friday after breaking the record for the distance that human beings have traveled from Earth. They touched down in the Pacific Ocean just outside of San Diego, CA at the exact time that they’d been projected to. Their landing was basically pitch-perfect. The moon’s gonna miss us when we’re gone.
This mission marked the first time in 54 years since humans have successfully been to the moon. The Artemis’ crew, made up of Commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, NASA specialist Christina Koch, and Canadian Space Agency specialist Jeremy Hansen, broke the record for the farthest distance that humans have traveled from Earth. They also joined an elite group of astronauts to have seen the far side of the moon in person. Their touchdown was watched and cheered on worldwide. During an address on Saturday at Ellington Field at Johnson Space Center in Houston, the crew had a lot of incredible, poignant things to say about their mission.
Reid Wiseman: “Victor, Christina and Jeremy, we are, we are bonded forever, and no one down here is ever going to know what the four of us just went through. And it was the most special thing that will ever happen in my life.”
Wiseman acknowledged that no one will truly know what the crew’s families went through.
“This was not easy being 200,000-plus miles away from home,” Wiseman said. “Like, before you launch it feels like it’s the greatest dream on Earth, and when you’re out there, you just want to get back to your families and your friends. It’s a special thing to be a human and it’s a special thing to be on planet Earth.” Wiseman was visibly choked up, and the four crewmembers stood to hug on stage. “It is time to go and be ready. Because it takes courage. It takes determination. And you all are freaking going, and we are going to be standing there supporting you every single step of the way in every possible way possible.”
Victor Glover: Glover admitted he has not fully processed the entire mission and “what we just did” yet, but was full of gratitude.
“When this started, I wanted to thank God in public, and I want to thank God again, because even bigger than my challenge trying to describe what we went through, the gratitude of seeing what we saw, doing what we did, and being with who I was with, it’s too big to just be in one body,” Glover said. “And I wanted to thank our families for everything. I love you, but not just those five beautiful cocoa-skinned ladies right there,” Glover said, gesturing to his family. “All of you.”
Christina Koch: Koch shared that her nurse on the Navy recovery ship asked her for a hug last night, one of many great “human moments” that began and ended the mission, she said. “A crew is a group that is in it all the time, no matter what, that is stroking together every minute with the same purpose, that is willing to sacrifice silently for each other, that gives grace, that holds accountable. A crew has the same cares and the same needs, and a crew is inescapably beautifully, dutifully linked.”
She said one of her strongest revelations came while observing Earth appear tiny through the window of Orion, and all of the blackness around it.
“I know I haven’t learned everything that this journey has yet to teach me,” Koch said. “But there’s one new thing I know, and that is planet Earth: You are a crew.”
Jeremy Hansen: “We have a term in our crew that we coined a long time ago, the ‘joy train,’” Hansen said. “And it sounds like you saw a lot of joy up there. There was a lot of joy. We’re not always on the joy train, this crew, there are many times we’re not on the joy train, but we are committed to getting back on the joy train as soon as we can. And that is a useful life skill for any team trying to get something done.”
Hansen asked his crewmates to stand with him as he talked about love.
“What you saw was a group of people who loved contributing, having meaningful contribution and extracting joy out of that,” Hansen said. “And what we’ve been hearing is that was something special for you to witness. I would suggest to you that when you look up here, you’re not looking at us. We are a mirror reflecting you, and if you like what you see, then just look a little deeper. This is you.”
My family and I were watching the live stream of the Artemis II’s landing and it was just so incredible. I’m in awe of the fact that their landing was predicted to the exact minute, and that NASA’s brilliant, hard-working scientists also accurately predicted their entire schedule, including the amount of time that they’d be out of touch while they were viewing the back side of the moon. I also cannot believe just how wonderful the four astronauts were at every single turn. They kept us entertained during the down times, pumped us up during the “go” times, and got serious when it was time to do so. Their statements in Houston were so profound, too.
The Artemis crew also came back with such incredible pictures that I can’t help but become overwhelmed when I see them. Things are not great here on Earth right now, but looking at the pictures that NASA has posted to their website really puts things back into perspective. It’s a beautiful, mad world out there. As much as I really hope we don’t wait another 50+ years before exploring it, I equally, desperately want the leaders of our planet to recognize how lucky we are and come together to save it.
nasa themselves posting this is so beautiful to me
pic.twitter.com/yFp8iFnHy4
— lily
(@swiftlycline) April 11, 2026
Photos credit: Atlas Photo Archive/NASA/Avalon, Atlas Photo Archive/NASA/Bill In/Avalon