{"id":519636,"date":"2026-04-08T14:02:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T14:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/519636\/"},"modified":"2026-04-08T14:02:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T14:02:09","slug":"there-is-something-in-every-image-that-surprises-me-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/519636\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018There is something in every image that surprises me\u2019 \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">A day after passing over the far side of the moon, the crew of Nasa\u2019s Artemis II mission is  on the return leg of its journey, and the pace of activity has slowed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The spacecraft carrying the astronauts, named Integrity, left the sphere of lunar influence at 6.23pm Irish time on Tuesday. That meant that the attraction of Earth\u2019s gravity was stronger than the moon\u2019s, accelerating them toward a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean on Friday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The first batch of photographs and data was sent back to Earth overnight, sped up by a new laser communication system.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cWe got 20 gigabytes down in a little more than 45 minutes,\u201d Rick Henfling, one of the mission\u2019s flight directors, said during a news conference on Tuesday. That was much faster than the rate at which data is usually transmitted through space using longer wavelengths, he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Scientists on the ground have just begun analysing the reams of new information.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cI\u2019ve spent most of my morning just flipping through, you know, the thousands of images that have started to come down,\u201d Young said. \u201cAnd there is something in every image that surprises me.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The photographs included an \u2018Earthset\u2019, showing the Earth behind the moon, and a solar eclipse. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u2013 This article originally appeared in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/04\/07\/science\/artemis-2-moon-nasa-astronauts-crew.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The New York Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"An &quot;Earthset&quot;. Photograph: Nasa via The New York Times \" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/UK2YZLD3DS5O4724Q2OXENW5YU.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"533\"\/>An &#8220;Earthset&#8221;. Photograph: Nasa via The New York Times  <img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"A solar eclipse, captured by the Artemis II crew from the Orion Integrity spacecraft during their flyby around the far side of the moon. Photograph: Nasa via The New York Times\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/JN5FGFVDPV2VKCOIQTAKVNDWIQ.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"533\"\/>A solar eclipse, captured by the Artemis II crew from the Orion Integrity spacecraft during their flyby around the far side of the moon. Photograph: Nasa via The New York Times <img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"Another view of the  solar eclipse. Photograph: Nasa via The New York Times.\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/RMJS53QTWHZEGYIUIKQUWQAR2Y.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"533\"\/>Another view of the  solar eclipse. Photograph: Nasa via The New York Times. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A day after passing over the far side of the moon, the crew of Nasa\u2019s Artemis II mission&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":519637,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[92,90,416,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-519636","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-nasa","9":"tag-science","10":"tag-space","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom","13":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519636","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=519636"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519636\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/519637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=519636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=519636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=519636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}