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The video includes live pictures of the scenes from space now as the astronauts look forward to re-entry and returning home as ITV News’ Rachel Younger reports
As the crew of Artemis II hurtled home from the moon, they reflected on how their journey changed their perspective on life, as well as their anxieties about re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere.
Just days away from the end of their mission, the Artemis II crew carried out a press interview from space, with the astronauts answering questions with their floating microphone.
They spoke about the bonds they had forged during the runup to the mission and how they had solidified in space.
The most poignant moment came when Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen suggested to his other crew mates that they name a small crater on the moon after Commander Reid Wiseman’s late wife, Carroll.
Carroll Wiseman died in 2020. Credit: AP
The moment was so charged with emotion that Wiseman was too emotional to talk as they announced it.
Carroll Wiseman, a neonatal nurse, died of cancer in 2020.
“Just for me personally, that was kind of the pinnacle moment of the mission for me,” Wiseman said from space on Wednesday night.
He said when it was read out, everyone on board the capsule was crying.
“That was, I think, where the four of us were the most forged, the most bonded.”
The crew also decided to name another crater after their capsule, Integrity.
The decision also called back to earlier trips to the moon. During Apollo 8 in 1968, astronaut Jim Lovell bestowed his wife’s name upon a prominent lunar peak: Mount Marilyn.
The crew took questions from the press on Wednesday. Credit: AP
The three Americans and one Canadian of Artemis II are the first lunar visitors since Apollo 17 closed out that grand epoch in 1972, and their crater-naming request temporarily left ground controllers speechless.
“It was definitely a very emotional moment. I don’t think most of us knew it was coming,” NASA lunar scientist Ryan Watkins said on Wednesday from Johnson Space Center in Houston. “There was not a single dry eye.”
The proposed Carroll Crater is at the left limb on the boundary of the moon’s near and far sides, and occasionally visible from Earth.
It is rather shallow and approximately three miles across, according to Watkins. A slightly bigger crater, dubbed “Integrity”, is completely on the lunar far side.
The crew travelled to the far side of the moon. Credit: AP
Their request came shortly after they broke Apollo 13’s distance record for deep-space travelers. All four astronauts wept as they embraced in a group hug.
Once back on Earth later this week, the crew will submit the two proposed names to the International Astronomical Union.
Despite the emotional moments, the crew also remained laser-focused on the difficult tasks ahead.
Even though they have travelled further than any other human being, the most difficult part of their journey is arguably still to come.
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When asked about their fears for re-entering the atmosphere pilot Victor Glover said: “I’ve actually been thinking about entry since April 3, 2023 when we got assigned to this mission and one of the first press conferences, we were asked, what are we looking forward to?
“And I said, splashdown. And it’s kind of humorous, but it’s literal as well that we have to get back.
“There’s so many more pictures, so many more stories, and gosh, I haven’t even begun to process what we’ve been through. We’ve still got two more days, and riding a fireball through the atmosphere is profound as well.”
The crew is due to return to Earth on Saturday, around midnight UK time.
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