NASA officials were asked to name their favorite moments from the Artemis II mission during a post-splashdown news conference.
Shawn Quinn, manager of NASA’s Exploration Ground Systems at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, named launch day and watching the rocket rise off the pad as his.
“You know, for me, the greatest moment was the parachutes, the main chutes deploying,” said Howard Hu, NASA’s Orion program manager. “I think seeing that, I was chanting, ‘go, go, go’ by myself. That was just a tremendous moment. Objective No. 1 is ‘get the crew home.’”
Rick Henfling, entry flight director, chose the crew’s naming of the two craters on the lunar surface, including one for Artemis II Commander Reid Wiseman’s late wife, as his top moment.
Lori Glaze, acting associate administrator for NASA’s Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate, picked two: when Wiseman reported “four crew green” after splashdown to indicate they were in good shape and watching NASA astronaut Christina Koch as the first to emerge from the capsule.
Amit Kshatriya, NASA associate administrator, closed with, “It’ll be tomorrow when I see my friends again,” referring to the crew.