Artemis II safely splashes down

Glad that they're safe and sound.

It's worth pointing out that this is the first extremely public, widely acknowledged high risk mission NASA has done in over 50 years. The Shuttle was risky, but it wasn't thought of or acknowledged by NASA as being risky until very late in its lifecycle.

According to NASA's OIG, Artemis acceptable crew mortality rate is 1 in 30. Roughly 3x riskier than the shuttle. There genuinely is a world where they don't make it back home.

I am grateful that they did. And I'm grateful that we're going to go even further. I can't wait to see what Jared's cooking up (for those who don't know, he made his own version of the Gemini program in Polaris and funded it out of pocket).

As an American I feel like I've been going through a bit of an identity crisis from what I remember growing up.

Probably the rose tinted glasses of being a child but being from Florida I always had a sense of amazement and wonder as I heard the sonic boom of the shuttle returning to earth.

Really felt like I was coexisting in this incredible scientific powerhouse of a country full of bright and enabled peoples that knew how to prioritize curiosity and innovation.

Feeling like a bit of a "vibe" post which is everything wrong lately but I can't help but feel some satisfaction that we're still able to accomplish something like this in our space endeavors.

I had to explain to my wife and kids (not that I'm in this field, but I also have to remind myself) that we are able to pinpoint where the craft will land, when it will land down to the minute, because of ... just ... math. And we're able to get them there and back because of science.

It all boils down to equations that describe the world accurately, and a way of experimentation, iteration, thinking that gets us all the way to do something this unbelievably complex.

Wild that they manage to fly to the moon but still seem to be having those comms problems. Asking the astronauts if they’re really pressing the PTT button is wild.

Impressive mission but I feel it's not capturing the public attention because it's actually a step back from the mission 50 years ago when they actually landed men on the moon with tech that was orders or magnitude simpler and less powerful.

This whole mission was amazing, and the most positive and hopeful thing I have seen as a global event in the last 5 years at least. Bravo and cheers to everyone involved :)

Apparently there's more work than just clicking "Recover Vessel" after splashdown!

It’s been amazing - and inspirational - watching the live stream of Mission Control and the capsule over the last ten days. Or at least having it as background audio. I’m going to miss all these folks I’ve grown to know.

Bring on Artemis III and IV!

Watching this, I can only describe it as holy. An incredible reminder of what humanity can do, and the beauty of our curiosity and the universe around us. I grew up learning that my great uncle was in Mission Control for Apollo; missions like this are what inspired me to pursue engineering in the first place.

"NASA reporting four green crew members. That is not their complexion, it is that they are in good condition. That's what that means." LOL

Held my breath the whole time after all the heat shield warnings. Very glad it all worked, or that there was enough margin!

Watching that capsule fall out of the sky at high speed from the teaching cameras was nerve wracking! Awesome footage, exciting to watch it live in such detail.

So the new heat shield works just fine, and NASA still knows things better than arm-chair aerospace engineers? Safety third.

What is coming into view from the top center at 08:26:25 [0], right after the commentator says, "the weather conditions remain go"? It stays visible for more than seven minutes before disappearing behind the horizon.

[0] https://youtu.be/X9Miy8ngusQ?t=30382

I had this in the back of my mind today https://idlewords.com/2026/03/artemis_ii_is_not_safe_to_fly....

Glad they got home safe and sound!

Amazing, congrats! Why where they hoisted by heli and not ‘just’ sail to the mother ship (and hoisted there)?

Can somebody help me understand why this does a water landing, like the old Apollo missions, instead of like the space shuttle that lands like a plane?

Announcer just said “we just reenacted” the last Apollo mission. So, yep. That’ll be used as proof-text that this was all staged.

Apropos

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jG6NNnoNC80

For All Mankind aired an episode today that movingly commemorated the fictional lead character Ed Baldwin's Apollo 10-like in-universe mission on the same day that the real world Artemis II mission which also strongly resembles Apollo 10 landed safely. A strange and moving coincidence.

Buzz Aldrin is reported to be watching this on TV.

Awesome! I can't wait to watch the moon landing whenever that happens.

Dealing with the typical Excel foot guns during the last few hours before re-entry felt like an unnecessary risk.

Missaved their version 2 Excel spreadsheet using the wrong file name causing confusion about this version was the latest.

Nearly missed a cell in their burn sheet had multiple lines of text until mission control reminded them to resize the cell.

Ad astra per aspera

This almost brought tears to my eyes. I can only imagine how people felt when the first astronauts got to the Moon, and then when they got back to Earth in one piece.

Woke up at 5:00 am to watch this live Regret no part of it

Cheers! Looking forward to future space travel!!

"Reid Wiesman reporting all crew members green; that's not their complexion, all crew members are in good shape."

Best comment exchange from a thread on a different site:

OP: "I'm happy they didn't die."

Response: "You're going to be less happy when they turn into the Fantastic Four and Dr. Doom shows up."

Bravo Zulu, Integrity crew, NASA, and USA!

With 1 in 30 chance of death can somebody help me understand why this had to be a manned mission?

Been a long time since I've felt any amount of national pride like this. Welcome home.

Has anyone collated the best space based footage?

Amazing live video of the descent and splash down. Really awesome to watch!

Went out to the beach hoping to hear/see something, but sadly grey skies and no boom. Tons of other people out there doing the same thing too.

good, But how did you build it?

I noticed a delay between video and audio - the announcer on the NASA official live broadcast said splashdown before the the capsule splashed down on video. Was it intentional (in case something happened)?

Also, what were these puffs on thermal camera after the main chutes were deployed?

https://www.youtube.com/live/m3kR2KK8TEs

Now this is actually for the benefit of humanity.

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As I've said before. This is a huge achievement. And also is the most effective political propaganda ever. Bravo to everyone involved .

This is not sarcastic. This is very much meant. I love that America does this. We still get to evoke an awe which previous empires awesome as they may be, could never match. American superlatives are amazing. God bless America

I don't know how to describe the feeling but it feels like a bad movie remake. Maybe I am just a sucker for practical effects and not 2020s CGI to stick with the metaphor and conspiracy...

As a long time space nerd, I'm not sure what this accomplishes by repeating the previous stunts that failed to usher in the promised space frontier.

Apollo was, IMO, not successful at changing the course of human history. A really cool footnote, sure, but everything else that was to follow, nope, just a bunch of neat, interesting but ultimately meh science missions.

An exciting change would be more like Delta-V/Critical Mass, but NASA is not going to deliver that, at least not in any form it has taken thus far.

Dear NASA. Please dial back the poetics and rhetoric. Be more like ATC than Shakspear.

Why this was such a big deal? Haven't people reach the moon so many years ago? By this time we should have lunar bases, not cheer so much that we got past the moon at a few thousands miles away.