Artemis II astronauts share powerful realization they had when returning to Earth
Two of the four astronauts who recently traveled to the Moon have revealed what they've come to realize since returning to Earth.
The Artemis II crew were launched into space on April 1 and made their safe return to Earth nine days later in what was dubbed the 'perfect splashdown'.
Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen were the four astronauts to make the round trip. Not only was their mission the first trip to the Moon in 50 years, but the crew were able to take photographs of parts of the Moon and our own planet that have never been seen before, traveling further than any humans have ever gone in the process.
Having safely been back home now for a week, Glover, Wiseman, Hansen, and Koch sat down for a Q&A at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, yesterday (April 16).
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Glover, who is the first Black astronaut to travel to deep space, reflected on their mission being shared with everyone back on Earth.
"I think something that we all feel and we try to share is how much we want to reflect back to you all how we did this, not we as a crew, we as countries and as humans did this," he said, as per BBC News.
Glover went on to say that during the mission, he and his fellow astronauts reflected on 'how beautiful Earth is'.
Elsewhere, Hansen said his faith in people has been deepened since flying to the Moon.
"We don't always do great things. We're not always in our integrity, but our default is to be good and to be good to one another," he said, adding: "What I've seen has brought me more joy, but more hope for our future."
Meanwhile Wiseman revealed that, despite being a man of science, he sought out a chaplain when he returned to Earth and 'broke down in tears' to them.
He shared: "I'm not really a religious person but there was just no other avenue for me to explain anything or to experience anything. So I asked for the chaplain on the Navy ship... and I broke down in tears.
"I don't think humanity has evolved to the point of being able to comprehend what we're looking at right now, because it was otherworldly."
Following the success of the Artemis II mission, Artemis III has been confirmed to be in the works.
It's expected to launch sometime next year, NASA's website states, and will 'launch crew in the Orion spacecraft on top of the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket to test rendezvous and docking capabilities between Orion and commercial spacecraft needed to land astronauts on the Moon'.
Niamh Shackleton