As the Orion spacecraft continues its path toward the Moon, the Artemis II crew will spend their fourth flight day preparing for their lunar flyby on Monday, April 6.
The crew of NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jeremy Hansen, began their day in space to the tune of Chappell Roan’s “Pink Pony Club,” before transitioning into their daily activities.
At wakeup, the spacecraft and its crew were approximately 169,000 miles from Earth and approaching the Moon at 110,700 miles.
View the updated mission schedule for the lunar flyby here.
Taking control of Orion in deep space
Later Saturday, Glover will take manual control of the spacecraft to test its performance in deep space to provide more data about the spacecraft’s handling qualities across different movements. The demonstration is scheduled for 9:10 p.m.
A 24-hour acoustics test also will occur to help engineers characterize the sound environment in the spacecraft.
Crew prepares to study lunar surface
After the piloting demonstration, the crew will review a list of the surface features the NASA science team has asked them to analyze and photograph during their six-hour flyby on Monday, April 6. The flyby period begins at 2:45 p.m., when Orion’s main cabin windows will be pointed toward the Moon and the Artemis II crew will be close enough to make scientific observations.
The crew will see the Moon from a unique vantage point compared with the Apollo missions, which flew about 70 miles above the surface. Orion will fly 4,066 miles away at closest approach at approximately 7:02 p.m. From that distance, the crew will see the entire disk of the Moon at once, including regions near the north and south poles.
As they pass the Moon, the crew will apply geology skills learned in the classroom and in Moon-like environments on Earth to photograph and describe features including impact craters, ancient lava flows, and surface cracks and ridges formed as the Moon slowly changed over time. They will note differences in color, brightness, and texture, which provide clues that help scientists understand what th …