Look at this image. That tiny bright dot in the window of the Orion capsule “Integrity” is the Moon and Artemis 2 commander Reid Wiseman is staring straight at it, knowing he and his crew are further from Earth than any human being has ever been.
On April 6, 2026, the Artemis 2 crew, Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch (all NASA) and Jeremy Hansen (Canadian Space Agency), reached a maximum distance of 252,756 miles (406,771 km) from Earth, shattering the record set by Apollo 13 back in 1970.
This is the first time humans have ventured beyond low Earth orbit since Apollo 17 in 1972, over 50 years ago.
The journey didn’t stop there. Earlier that same day, Integrity entered the Moon’s “sphere of influence”, the region where lunar gravity becomes stronger than Earth’s, at 12:37 a.m. EDT. A moment that very few spacecraft carrying humans have ever experienced.
And that tiny dot in the window? The crew flew right past it hours later.
For those of us dreaming of Mars, this is how it starts. One record at a time.
Look at this image. That tiny bright dot in the window of the Orion capsule “Integrity” is the Moon, and Artemis 2 commander Reid Wiseman is staring straight at it, knowing he and his crew are further from Earth than any human being has ever been.
On April 6, 2026, the Artemis 2 crew, Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch (all NASA) and Jeremy Hansen (Canadian Space Agency) — reached a maximum distance of 252,756 miles (406,771 km) from Earth, shattering the record set by Apollo 13 back in 1970.
This is the first time humans have ventured beyond low Earth orbit since Apollo 17 in 1972 , over 50 years ago.
The journey didn’t stop there. Earlier that same day, Integrity entered the Moon’s “sphere of influence” , the region where lunar gravity becomes stronger than Earth’s, at 12:37 a.m. EDT. A moment that very few spacecraft carrying humans have ever experienced.
And that tiny dot in the window? The crew flew right past it hours later.
For those of us dreaming of Mars, this is how it starts. One record at a time.
