{"id":432034,"date":"2026-05-17T13:13:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-17T13:13:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/432034\/"},"modified":"2026-05-17T13:13:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-17T13:13:09","slug":"giant-radio-telescope-sees-artemis-2-astronauts-on-orion-flying-around-the-moon-there-are-4-people-in-those-pixels","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/432034\/","title":{"rendered":"Giant radio telescope sees Artemis 2 astronauts on Orion flying around the moon. &#8216;There are 4 people in those pixels.&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p id=\"elk-6e4357df-0171-439a-a317-c0bba2591753\">Here&#8217;s a unique view of NASA&#8217;s Artemis 2 moon mission.<\/p>\n<p>A giant radio telescope in West Virginia tracked <a data-analytics-id=\"inline-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/artemis-2-humans-moon-orbit\" data-url=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/artemis-2-humans-moon-orbit\" data-hl-processed=\"none\" data-mrf-recirculation=\"inline-link\" data-before-rewrite-localise=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/artemis-2-humans-moon-orbit\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Artemis 2<\/a>&#8216;s Orion spacecraft around <a data-analytics-id=\"inline-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/55-earths-moon-formation-composition-and-orbit.html\" data-url=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/55-earths-moon-formation-composition-and-orbit.html\" data-hl-processed=\"none\" data-mrf-recirculation=\"inline-link\" data-before-rewrite-localise=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/55-earths-moon-formation-composition-and-orbit.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">the moon<\/a> for five days, gathering precise observations on its movements from over 200,000 miles away during the historic mission.<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"elk-seasonal\"\/><\/p>\n<p id=\"elk-6e4357df-0171-439a-a317-c0bba2591753-2\" class=\"paywall\" aria-hidden=\"true\">The observations came from the U.S. National Science Foundation <a data-analytics-id=\"inline-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/green-bank-observatory.html\" data-url=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/green-bank-observatory.html\" data-hl-processed=\"none\" data-mrf-recirculation=\"inline-link\" data-before-rewrite-localise=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/green-bank-observatory.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Green Bank Telescope<\/a> (NSF GBT).<\/p>\n<p>            You may like<\/p>\n<p id=\"elk-c7dbfae3-2707-492d-a980-dfa830771b97\">Reaching 485 feet (148 meters) up into the sky and weighing 17 million (7.7 million kilograms) pounds, with a dish that covers about 2.3 acres (0.9 hectares), the massive steerable telescope is the largest moving structure on land.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;With the GBT, we were able to track the movement of the spacecraft within 0.2 millimeters per second of what NASA calculated in its projections,&#8221; Anthony Remijan, the observatory site director, said in <a data-analytics-id=\"inline-link\" href=\"https:\/\/public.nrao.edu\/news\/there-are-4-people-in-those-pixels-nsf-green-bank-observatory-shares-images-data-from-artemis-ii-mission\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-url=\"https:\/\/public.nrao.edu\/news\/there-are-4-people-in-those-pixels-nsf-green-bank-observatory-shares-images-data-from-artemis-ii-mission\/\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer-when-downgrade\" data-hl-processed=\"none\" data-mrf-recirculation=\"inline-link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">a May 6 statement<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s like having a speedometer in your car that can track your speed within 0.0004 decimal places per hour,&#8221; he continued.<\/p>\n<p>The observatory released a pixelated image that the telescope captured of Orion while it was over 213,000 miles (343,000 km) from <a data-analytics-id=\"inline-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/54-earth-history-composition-and-atmosphere.html\" data-url=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/54-earth-history-composition-and-atmosphere.html\" data-hl-processed=\"none\" data-mrf-recirculation=\"inline-link\" data-before-rewrite-localise=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/54-earth-history-composition-and-atmosphere.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Earth<\/a>. The vertical axis shows distance to the capsule, which the Artemis 2 crew named &#8220;<a data-analytics-id=\"inline-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/space-exploration\/artemis\/meet-integrity-artemis-2-astronauts-name-the-spacecraft-that-will-fly-them-around-the-moon\" data-url=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/space-exploration\/artemis\/meet-integrity-artemis-2-astronauts-name-the-spacecraft-that-will-fly-them-around-the-moon\" data-hl-processed=\"none\" data-mrf-recirculation=\"inline-link\" data-before-rewrite-localise=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/space-exploration\/artemis\/meet-integrity-artemis-2-astronauts-name-the-spacecraft-that-will-fly-them-around-the-moon\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Integrity<\/a>,&#8221; with the distance increasing downward.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/media\/img\/spc-logo-w.svg\" alt=\"Space\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"w-auto h-7 block w-auto mx-auto mb-4 h-[30px]\" data-component-name=\"Image\"\/><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There are four people in those pixels,&#8221; Will Armentrout, an NSF GBO scientist, said while presenting to colleagues at the NSF GBO.<\/p>\n<p class=\"vanilla-image-block\" style=\"padding-top:55.41%;\">\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/5W28CmJgupoWGqyC4hyGoE.jpg\" alt=\"a graph showing a squiggly red line against a white background\"   loading=\"lazy\" data-new-v2-image=\"true\" data-original-mos=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/5W28CmJgupoWGqyC4hyGoE.jpg\" data-pin-media=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/5W28CmJgupoWGqyC4hyGoE.jpg\" class=\"rounded-[var(--image--border-radius,0)] inline\"\/>\n<\/p>\n<p>The spike in this data, produced by the NSF GBT, represents the Artemis 2 Orion spacecraft. (Image credit: NSF\/AUI\/NSF NRAO)<\/p>\n<p id=\"elk-bce3e740-bb2a-4d71-af4c-aaaa8d9a2380\">The NSF National Radio Astronomy Observatory said that these observations show how the radio telescope can help on future space missions, both for NASA and for commercial aerospace companies.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s exciting when projects like this put our NSF facilities in national headlines,&#8221; Linnea Avallone, NSF chief officer for research facilities, said in the same statement. &#8220;Being able to offer inter-agency support to our colleagues at NASA makes the most of all our capabilities.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The Green Bank Telescope also provided radar support to NASA&#8217;s <a data-analytics-id=\"inline-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/space-exploration\/asteroid-comet-missions\/nasas-asteroid-smashing-spacecraft-managed-to-alter-target-space-rocks-orbit-around-the-sun\" data-url=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/space-exploration\/asteroid-comet-missions\/nasas-asteroid-smashing-spacecraft-managed-to-alter-target-space-rocks-orbit-around-the-sun\" data-hl-processed=\"none\" data-mrf-recirculation=\"inline-link\" data-before-rewrite-localise=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/space-exploration\/asteroid-comet-missions\/nasas-asteroid-smashing-spacecraft-managed-to-alter-target-space-rocks-orbit-around-the-sun\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART)<\/a> in 2022. That mission saw NASA deliberately smash a spacecraft into the asteroid Dimorphos, showing that we can knock an <a data-analytics-id=\"inline-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/51-asteroids-formation-discovery-and-exploration.html\" data-url=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/51-asteroids-formation-discovery-and-exploration.html\" data-hl-processed=\"none\" data-mrf-recirculation=\"inline-link\" data-before-rewrite-localise=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/51-asteroids-formation-discovery-and-exploration.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">asteroid<\/a> off course in case a dangerous one ever heads toward Earth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Here&#8217;s a unique view of NASA&#8217;s Artemis 2 moon mission. A giant radio telescope in West Virginia tracked&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":432035,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[111,139,69,147,392],"class_list":["post-432034","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-science","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432034","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=432034"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432034\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/432035"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=432034"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=432034"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=432034"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}